THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 DAVIS 
 
RISE AND FALL 
 
 OF THE 
 
 SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
HISTORY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 
 IN AMERICA. 
 
 BY HENKY WILSON. 
 VOL. I. 
 
 NINTH EDITION. 
 
 BOSTON AND NEW YORK: 
 HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY. 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 DAVIS 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1872, 
 
 BY JAMES R. OSGOOD & CO., 
 in the Office of the Lbrariau of Congress, at Washington. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 FROM the closing months of 1860 to the spring of 1865, the 
 United States presented to the gaze of mankind a saddening 
 and humiliating spectacle. Treasonable menaces had ripened 
 into treasonable deeds. A rebellion of gigantic proportions 
 burst upon the nation with suddenness and fierceness. Vio 
 lence held its carnival and reaped its bloody harvest. Millions 
 of treasure and hundreds of thousands of lives were sacrificed 
 on the wasting shrine of civil war. 
 
 During that stern conflict, and since its close, thoughtful 
 men have asked why this Christian nation, with so many ties 
 to bind it together, and with such momentous interests to be 
 imperilled, was rent and dissevered by fraternal strife. Why 
 was the soil of republican America reddened with the blood 
 of husbands and fathers, sons and brothers, and bathed with 
 the tears of wives and mothers, daughters and sisters ? 
 
 In the lights of the present, it is now more clearly seen that 
 the dark spirit of slavery was the inspiration of these crimes 
 against the peace, the unity, and the life of the nation, and 
 that these sacrifices of property, of health, and of life were 
 the inflictions of the Slave Power in its maddened efforts to 
 make perpetual its hateful dominion. These bitter fruits of 
 the seeds sown in colonial times afford another signal illustra 
 tion of the truth of the inspired declaration that " righteous 
 ness exalteth a nation, and sin is a reproach to any people." 
 
VI PREFACE. 
 
 I propose to write a history of the beginning and growth, 
 the expansion and extinction, of slavery ; also of the develop 
 ment and extirpation of the Slave Power. This work will be 
 comprised in three volumes of some one hundred and thirty 
 chapters, and about two thousand pages. The first and sec 
 ond volumes will trace slavery and portray its influences from 
 its introduction in 1619 to the opening of the civil war. The 
 third volume will describe that series of measures by which 
 slavery was extinguished and the Slave Power broken, the 
 Union reconstructed on the basis of freedom, and citizenship, 
 with civil and political rights, assured to all. The second vol 
 ume will be published next year, and the third in the year 
 following. 
 
 I have striven with scrupulous fidelity to truth and justice 
 to narrate the facts, develop the principles, and portray the 
 results of this "irrepressible conflict" between the antago 
 nistic forces of freedom and slavery. Although I have borne, 
 for more than thirty years, an humble part in this stern strife, 
 and have been personally acquainted with many of the actors 
 and their doings, I have endeavored to be as impartial as the 
 lot of humanity will permit. Of the actors in the great 
 drama I have not set down aught in malice. Of the living 
 and of the dead I have written as though I were to meet them 
 in the presence of Him whose judgments are ever sure. 
 
 To my countrymen I commit this work, on which I have 
 bestowed years of unstinted labor, in the confident hope that 
 it will contribute something to a clearer comprehension of 
 the career of that Power, which, after aggressive warfare of 
 more than two generations upon the vital and animating spirit 
 of republican institutions, upon the cherished and hallowed 
 sentiments of a Christian people, upon the enduring interests 
 and lasting renown of the Republic, organized treasonable 
 conspiracies, raised the standard of revolution, and plunged 
 
PREFACE. Vll 
 
 the nation into a bloody contest for the preservation of its 
 threatened life. I trust that this record will reveal to those 
 who raised voice and hand against their country the true 
 nature and real character of that system they sought to per 
 petuate at such fearful cost ; and to those who were loyal to 
 country and liberty, the magnitude and grandeur of the cause 
 in which they exhibited such faith and devotion, endurance 
 and heroism. I trust, too, that the young men who remember 
 the days of their boyhood, when homes were saddened by the 
 absence of fathers, brothers, and kindred, summoned to 
 encounter the hazards and hardships of the camp and field, 
 will gather something from these pages which will enable them 
 to realize in larger measure the toils and sacrifices offered for 
 the redemption of their country and its free institutions, of 
 which they, under Providence, are so soon to become the 
 
 guardians. 
 
 HENRY WILSON. 
 
 February 16, 1872. 
 
CONTENTS TO VOL. I. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH OF SLAVERY AND THE EARLY DEVELOPMENT OP 
 
 THE SLAVE POWER. 
 
 PAGES 
 
 Basis of Slavery. American Slavery. Slave Power. Issues of the Civil 
 War. African Slave-trade. Slaves brought into Virginia. Colonial 
 and Commercial Policy of England. Slave-trade encouraged. Colonial 
 Statutes annulled. Spread of Slavery and Increase of Slave-trade. 
 Slavery in New England. John Eliot. Samuel Sewall. Action of 
 the Quakers. Testimonies against Slavery by Burling, Sandiford, Lay, 
 "Woolman, Benezet, "Wesley, Whitefield. Emancipation advocated by 
 Dr. Hopkins and Dr. Eush. Opinions of the Kevolutionary Leaders. 
 Slave-trade denounced by Congress. South Carolina and Georgia for the 
 Slave-trade. Articles of Confederation. Development of the Slave 
 Power . . . . ..... ; . . . . . 1-17 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ABOLITION. ABOLITION SOCIETIES. 
 
 Articles of Association of the Colonies. Colored Soldiers. Slavery abol 
 ished in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania Abolition 
 Society. New York Abolition Society. Rhode Island Abolition So 
 ciety. The Abolition Societies of Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland, 
 and Virginia. Character of the Members of the Abolition Societies. 
 National Conventions . . . . . . 18-30 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES. ORDINANCE OF 1787. 
 
 Public Domain. Cessions of Territory by the States. Mr. Jefferson's pro 
 posed Inhibition of Slavery in the Territories. Ordinance of 1787, re 
 ported by Nathan Dane. Adopted by Congress. Sanctioned by First 
 Congress under the Constitution. Efforts to suspend it in Indiana. 
 Blessings of the Ordinance of 1787. Cessions of North Carolina and 
 Georgia, with Limitations concerning Slavery. The Mississippi Terri 
 tory. Debate on Mr. Thatcher's Antislavery Amendment . . 31-38 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 COMPROMISES OF THE CONSTITUTION. SLAVE REPRESENTATION. BLAVE-TRADE. 
 
 RENDITION OF FUGITIVE SLAVES. 
 
 The Failure of the Confederation. Distress and Discontent of the People. 
 Assembling of the Convention to frame a Constitution. Difficulties 
 and Dangers. Antagonism between Freedom and Slavery. Basis of 
 Eepresentation. Debates thereon. Northern and Southern Parties de 
 veloped. Slaveholding Interest successful. Committee of Detail. 
 Duties on Exports. Regulation of Commerce. Slave-trade. South 
 Carolina and Georgia demand its Continuance. The Bargain. Slave 
 Representation. Slave-trade to be continued Twenty Years. Rendition 
 of fugitive Slaves. The Compromise. The Slave Power developed 39-56 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 PROPOSED TAX ON SLAVES. FIRST SLAVERY DEBATES IN CONGRESS. PETITIONS 
 
 FOR EMANCIPATION. POWERS OF THE GOVERNMENT DEFINED. 
 
 Meeting of Congress. Proposition to tax Slaves imported. Debate on 
 the Amendment. Defeat of the Proposition. Petitions for Emancipa 
 tion. Franklin's Memorial. Excited Debate. Special Committee. 
 Report of the Committee. Southern Members defend Slavery and the 
 Slave-trade. Tone of the Debate. Powers of Congress denned and de 
 clared. Mr. Mifflin's Petition. Right of Petition violated . .57-68 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT OF 1793. PROPOSED AMENDMENTS. 
 
 Bill for the Rendition of Fugitive Slaves. Bill passed the Senate, 
 passed the House. Petition of Free Colored Men to be protected against 
 it. Exciting Debate. Memorial of Colored Men of Philadelphia. 
 Exciting and Violent Debate. Disunion threatened by Mr. Rutledge. 
 Action of the House. Further Legislation demanded. Mr. Pindall's 
 Bill. Amendment by Mr. Rich. Mr. Storrs's Amendment. Debate 
 on the Bill and Amendments. Mr. Fuller's Amendments. Bill passed 
 the House, passed the Senate, with Amendments. House refused to 
 take it up. Mr. "Wright's Resolution. Bill reported by Judiciary Com 
 mittee. Debated. Recommitted to a Select Committee. Reported, 
 but not acted on . - .. I II & T '.! A V r ? . . . . 69-78 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE SLAVE-TRADE. ITS PROHIBITION. 
 
 Increase of the Slave-trade. Memorial of the National Convention of Aboli 
 tion Societies. Bill reported by Mr. Trumbull, and passed. Memorial 
 of Pennsylvania Quakers against the Re-enslavement of Emancipated Ne 
 groes in North Carolina. Exciting Debate. Mr. Sitgreaves's Report 
 adopted. Mr. Hillhouse's Bill amendatory of the Slave-trade Act of 
 
CONTENTS. XI 
 
 1794. Senate Bill referred to a Select Committee in the House. Re 
 ported with Amendments and passed. President Jefferson recommends 
 the Prohibition of the Slave-trade. A Bill reported and passed in the 
 Senate. A Bill reported in the House. A Debate thereon. Mr. 
 Sloan's Amendment. Mr. Early's Threat. Mr. Sloan's Amendment 
 defeated. Mr. Bidwell's Amendment. Death Penalty proposed by Mr. 
 Smilie. Death Penalty defeated. Bill recommitted. Bill reported. 
 Laid on the Table. Senate Bill taken up, amended, and passed. Mr. 
 Randolph's Defiance. Further Legislation demanded ., . .79-97 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN SLAVE-TRADE. NEGOTIATIONS WITH FOREIGN POWERS. 
 
 Extent of Domestic and Foreign Slave-trade. Cruel Character of the 
 Traffic. Slave-breeding. Prosecution of the Foreign Trade. Chris 
 tian Sentiment. Action of the Quakers. Motion of Mr. Burrell. 
 Rufus King. Mr. Morrill. Mr. Eaton's Motion. Mercer's Resolu 
 tion. Passage of the Bill. Mr. Gorham's Report. Co-operation with 
 Foreign Powers recommended. Treaty of 1815. British Proposition. 
 Mr. Rush's Treaty. Action of England. Dilatory Action of the Sen 
 ate. Treaty amended. Mr. Clay's Reply. Insincerity of the Ameri 
 can Government . ; '. r> . . ."" . ' . . 98-111 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 FOREIGN RELATIONS OF THE GOVERNMENT INFLUENCED BY SLAVERY. 
 
 American Government humiliated by Slavery. Treaty of 1783. Demands 
 on England. Jay's Treaty. Free Negroes of San Domingo. De 
 mands of Napoleon. Monroe Doctrine. Congress at Panama. Report 
 of the Committee on Foreign Affairs. Debate. War of 1812. Ran 
 dolph's Speech. Instruction to the Peace Commissioners. Treaty of 
 Ghent. Demands on the Commander of the British Squadron. Posi 
 tion of the British Government. Persistent Demands of the American 
 Government for Payment of Slaves. Decision referred to Russia. Pro 
 posed Invasion of Cuba by Mexico. Intervention of the Government of 
 the United States. Debate in the Senate. Instructions of Mr. Clay to 
 the Panama Commissioners . . . "' ' "- v ". "'' * H2-122 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 INDIAN POLICY AFFECTED BY SLAVERY. EXILES OF FLORIDA. 
 
 Disgraceful Attitude of the Nation. Escape of Slaves into Florida. 
 Return of Fugitives refused. Commissioners to negotiate a Treaty with 
 the Creeks. Action of Georgia. Protection demanded. Failure of 
 Negotiations. Treaty negotiated at New York. Stipulation for the 
 Return of Slaves. Spanish Authorities refuse to surrender Slaves. 
 Misconduct of Georgia. Claims on England for Fugitive Slaves. Com- 
 
Xli CONTENTS. 
 
 missioners appointed to meet the Creeks in Washington. Annexation 
 of Florida pressed by the Slave Power. Amelia Island seized by Geor 
 gia. Expedition sent by Georgia into Florida to capture Fugitives. 
 Raid into Florida. Negro Fort. Order of General Jackson to invade 
 Florida. Negro Fort captured. Exiles killed, captured, and reduced 
 to Slavery. Disgrace of the Nation. General Jackson enters Florida. 
 
 Defeats the Indians. Acquisition of Florida. Treaty of Indian 
 Spring. Treaty of Camp Moultrie. Seizure of Slaves. Fugitives 
 captured by the Army. Slave-catchers permitted to hunt Slaves . 123 - 134 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE. THE COMPROMISES. 
 
 The Louisiana Purchase. Missouri Territory. Bill authorizing the Ter 
 ritory to form a Constitution. Mr. Tallmadge's Amendment prohibiting 
 Slavery. Exciting Debate. Amendment agreed to. Inhibition of 
 Slavery stricken out by the Senate. Bill lost. Territory of Arkansas 
 organized. Mr. Taylor's Amendment. Bill introduced by Mr. Scott 
 to authorize Missouri to form a Constitution. Maine and Missouri united 
 in the Senate. Mr. Roberts' s Amendment for the Inhibition of Slavery. 
 
 Debate in the Senate. Mr. Thomas's Amendment. Amendment 
 agreed to. Bill passed the Senate. House disagree to Senate's Amend 
 ment. Mr. Taylor's Amendment. Bill passed. Conference Commit 
 tee. Prohibition of Slavery defeated in the House. Prohibition of 
 Slavery north of the Parallel of 36 30' agreed to. Triumph of the Slave 
 Power complete . . * : ; <,>* > . . . 135-152 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 ADMISSION OF MISSOURI. ATTEMPT TO INTRODUCE SLAVERY INTO ILLINOIS. 
 
 Constitution of Missouri. Resolution of Admission in the Senate. Mr. 
 Eaton's Proviso. Mr. "Wilson's Proviso. Debate. Passage of the 
 Resolution of Admission. Report by Mr. Lowndes in the House. Re 
 marks by Sergeant, Storrs, Lowndes, Cook. House Resolution rejected. 
 Senate Resolution referred to a Committee of Thirteen. Report of Com 
 mittee rejected. Speech of Mr. Pinckney. Mr. Brown's Proposition. 
 Appointment of Joint Special Committee. Mr. Clay's Compromise 
 adopted. Conditions accepted by Missouri. Slaves in Illinois. Slave 
 Codes. Governor Coles. Defeat of the Plot to make Illinois a Slave 
 State ... .... ."/. . .... 153-164 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 EARLY ANTISLAVERY MOVEMENTS. BENJAMIN LUNDY. WILLIAM LLOYD 
 
 GARRISON. 
 
 Aggressive and Dominating Spirit of Slavery. Elias Hicks. Antislavery 
 in Kentucky and Tennessee. Benjamin Lundy. He organizes an An 
 tislavery Society in Ohio. " Genius of Emancipation." Removed to 
 
CONTENTS. XU1 
 
 Tennessee. Established Abolition Societies in North Carolina. Meet 
 ing of the American Abolition Convention. Political Action recom 
 mended. Establishes his Paper in Baltimore. Visits the Eastern 
 States. Joined by Mr. Garrison. Imprisonment of Mr. Garrison. 
 Paper removed to Washington. Establishes the "National Inquirer." 
 
 Removal to the West. Death. Character. Mr. Garrison. Joins 
 Mr. Lundy. Adopts the Doctrine of Immediate Emancipation. De 
 nunciation of the Slave-trade. Imprisoned in Baltimore. Release 
 through Intervention of Arthur Tappan. Denounces the Colonization 
 Society. Establishes " The Liberator." Public Sentiment. Rewards 
 offered for his Arrest. His Fearlessness, Inflexibility, and Persistency 165-188 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE VIRGINIA CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. SOUTHAMPTON INSURRECTION. 
 SLAVERY DEBATE IN THE LEGISLATURE. 
 
 Constitutional Convention. Struggle between Eastern and Western Vir 
 ginia. Slaveholding Interest Successful. Southampton Insurrection. 
 
 Nat Turner. Message of Governor Floyd. Resolution of Mr. Sum 
 mers. Debate on Slavery. Proposition of Thomas Jefferson Randolph. 
 
 Mr. Goode's Motion to discharge the Committee. Report of the 
 Committee. Mr. Preston's Amendment. Speeches of Mr. Moore, Mr. 
 Boiling, Mr. Randolph, Mr. Rives, Mr. Brodnax, Mr. Daniel, Mr. Faulk 
 ner, Mr. Knox, Mr. Summers, Mr. McDowell. The "Richmond In 
 quirer." Reaction in the State . . . '. . . . 189-207 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE FORMATION AND PURPOSES OF THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY. 
 
 Its Inconsistencies. Views of Dr. Hopkins. Mr. Jefferson's Proposi 
 tion. Resolutions of the Virginia Legislature. Judge Tucker's Plans 
 of Emancipation. Mercer's Resolutions. Meetings of the Society. 
 Its Constitution and Officers. Its Purpose. Equivocal Position. 
 Declarations of Mr. Clay. Avowals of its Advocates. Views of the 
 "African Repository." Black Laws. Compulsory Colonization. 
 Action of Maryland Legislature. Action of the Free People of Color. 
 Views of the National Conventions of Free Colored Men. Declaration 
 of Mr. Webster. Mr. Garrison's Mission to England. Eliot Cresson. 
 
 Protest of the British Abolitionists. Address of Mr. Garrison. 
 Hold of the Colonizationists upon the Country. Their Prescriptive 
 Course. Encouragement to Mobs . . ... . 208 - 222 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 NEW ENGLAND AND NEW YORK CITY ANTISLAVERY SOCIETIES. 
 
 Conference at the Office of Samuel E. Sewall. Adjourned Meeting. 
 Adoption of the Preamble and Constitution of the New England Anti- 
 
Xiv CONTENTS. 
 
 slavery Society. Officers of the Society. Principles enumerated. 
 Address to the People. First Annual Meeting. Resolutions. First 
 Annual Report. Mr. Garrison's Resolution in Favor of a National Con 
 vention. "Emancipator." Great Excitement Public Meeting. 
 Organization of the New York City Antislavery Society. Arthur Tap- 
 pan. Lewis Tappan. William Goodell. Joshua Leavitt. Coloniza- 
 tionists. Denunciation of the Abolitionists. Rapid Increase of the 
 Abolitionists. Publications of John G. Whittier, Lydia Maria Child, 
 Amos A. Phelps 223 - 230 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 HOSTILITY TO COLORED SCHOOLS. MISS CRANDALL'S SCHOOL SUPPRESSED. 
 
 Slavery Hostile to Education. Proposed Collegiate School at New Haven. 
 
 Hostile Action of the Citizens of New Haven. Noyes Academy in 
 New Hampshire. Colored Students admitted. Institution broken up. 
 
 Miss Crandall's School in Connecticut. Admission of Colored Pupils. 
 
 Hostility of the People. Arbitrary Legislation. Imprisonment of 
 Miss Crandall. Samuel J. May. Arthur Tappan. Trial. Failure 
 of the Prosecution. Persecution of Miss Crandall. Incendiary At 
 tempts. Abandonment of her School. Her Opposers Triumphant 237 - 247 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 NATIONAL ANTISLAVERY CONVENTION AT PHILADELPHIA. ORGANIZATION OP 
 
 THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 
 
 National Antislavery Convention called. Excited Condition of the Pub 
 lic Mind. Conference held at the House of Evan Lewis. Assembling 
 of the Convention. Its Officers. Committee on the Declaration of 
 Sentiments. Resolutions. Speeches of Lewis Tappan, Amos A. Phelps. 
 
 Female Antislavery Societies recommended. The Constitution. 
 The Object of the Society the entire Abolition of Slavery. Conference 
 on the Declaration of Sentiments. "Words of Elizur Wright, Jr. Decla 
 ration of Sentiments prepared by Mr. Garrison. Reported by Mr. Atlee. 
 
 The Declaration adopted. Signatures to the Declaration. Its Doc 
 trines. Officers of the Society, Elizur Wright, Jr., John G. Whittier, 
 Amos A. Phelps, Theodore D. Weld, Ellis Gray Loring, Robert Purvis. 
 Increase of Auxiliary Societies ' . . , . 248 - 263 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 LANE SEMINARY. ANTISLAVERY ACTION. 
 
 Antislavery Debate at Lane Seminary. Action of the Trustees. Anti- 
 slavery Students dissolve their Connection with the Institution. Offer 
 of the American Antislavery Society to give the Bible to Slaves. Con 
 duct of Managers of the Bible Society. Abolitionists mobbed in New 
 York. Address issued by the Abolitionists. Address of Massachusetts 
 
CONTENTS. XV 
 
 Antislavery Society. Doctrines of the Abolitionists. Abolitionists ar 
 raigned in the Annual Message of President Jackson. Reply of the 
 American Antislavery Society. Activity of the Abolitionists. Rapid 
 Increase in Numbers . . '. "". ' . ' f" V . . 264-273 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 MOBS. OUTRAGES IN CINCINNATI. WOMEN MOBBED IN BOSTON. 
 
 Proscription. Theodore D. Weld. James G. Birney. Establishment of 
 the "Philanthropist." Mobs. Meeting of the Citizens of Cincinnati. 
 
 Resolution to suppress the "Philanthropist." Firmness of the Anti- 
 slavery Committee. Riotous Mob. Destruction of the Press. The 
 "Philanthropist" continued. Dr. Bailey. Mobs in Philadelphia. 
 Continued Violence against the Abolitionists. Orange Scott. George 
 Storrs. Meeting of Citizens of Boston in Faneuil Hall. Boston Female 
 Antislavery Society. Public Meeting of the Society. George Thomp 
 son. Mob Violence. Mayor Lyman. Seizure of Mr. Garrison. 
 Imprisoned. Francis Jackson. Meeting at his House. Remarks of 
 Miss Martineau . .<>,,-. ;>' *>* " - '> "': s - 274-286 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 RIOTOUS DEMONSTRATIONS IN NEW YORK AND VERMONT. 
 
 Convention at Utica. Mr. Beardsley. Joshua A. Spencer. Hall occupied 
 by Citizens. Meeting in the Church. Society formed. Mob. Con 
 vention broken up. Members insulted. Gerrit Smith. Members in 
 vited to meet at Peterboro'. Officers of the Society chosen. Resolution 
 and Speech by Mr. Smith. Antislavery Cause placed on High Principle. 
 
 Samuel J. May. Mob in Vermont. Mr. Knapp. Colonel Miller. 
 
 Years of Mobs. Dedication of Pennsylvania Hall. Speeches by 
 Alvan Stewart. Mr. Garrison. Miss Angelina Grimke. Miss Abby 
 Kelley. Mob. Burning of Pennsylvania Hall. Impotence of City 
 Authorities V'V* , ' 287-298 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 SLAVERY AND THE SLAVE-TRADE IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 
 
 The Seat of Government. Sectional Claims. Capital fixed on Slave Soil. 
 
 Slave Codes of Virginia and Maryland indorsed. Inhumanity of the 
 Slave Laws. Jails used by Slave-traders. Randolph's Resolution. 
 Speech. Judge Morrell. Petition of the Citizens against the Traffic. 
 Mr. Miner's Resolutions and Speech. Resolutions adopted. Committee. 
 
 Communication of the Grand Jury against the Slave-trade. Slave- 
 traders licensed by the City of Washington. Men and Women whipped 
 on their bare backs. Laws against Free Negroes. Responsibility of 
 the Northern People. Arrest, Imprisonment, and Trial of Dr. Reuben 
 Crandall 299-306 
 
XVI CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 PETITIONS AGAINST SLAVERY AND THE SLAVE-TRADE IN THE DISTRICT OF 
 COLUMBIA. DENIAL OF THE RIGHT OF PETITION. 
 
 Presentation of Antislavery Petitions. Debate thereon. Petitions laid 
 on the Table. Meeting of the XXIVth Congress. Presentation of Anti- 
 slavery Petitions. Excited Debate. Mr. Jarvis's Resolution. Mr. 
 Pinckney's Resolution. Report of the Committee. Petitions ordered 
 to be laid on the Table. Presentation of Antislavery Petitions in the 
 Senate. Mr. Calhoun's Motion. Debate thereon. Mr. Calhoun's 
 Motion to reject Petitions defeated. Mr. Buchanan's Motion to reject 
 the Prayer of Petitioners adopted. Long Debate. Servility of North 
 ern Members. The South victorious 307-320 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 NORTHERN LEGISLATION DEMANDED. 
 
 Spirit of the Abolitionists. Mr. Sullivan's Pamphlet. Dr. Leonard 
 "Woods. Mr. Hazard's Report. Charleston Post-office rifled. Public 
 Meeting. Conduct of the New York Postmaster. Amos Kendall's 
 Letter. His Course. Report of Mr. Calhoun. Governor McDuffie's 
 Message. Resolutions of South Carolina Legislature. Resolutions 
 of Southern States: Governor Ritner's Message. Governor Gayle's 
 Demand for Mr. Williams. Message of Governor Marcy. Governor 
 Dorr. Report of Mr. Stevens. Failure to legislate. Edward Everett. 
 His Readiness to shoulder a Musket to put down Insurrection. Mr. 
 Cambreleng rebukes him. His Response to Southern Demands. His 
 Message. Referred to a Select Committee. Resolution of Southern 
 States. Action of Massachusetts Antislavery Society. Hearing before 
 the Committee. Speeches of Mr. May, Mr. Loring, Mr. Garrison, Mr. 
 Goodell. Mr. Lunt interrupts Mr. Goodell. Dr. Follen insulted by 
 Mr. Lunt. Dr. Follen sustained by Mr. May. Memorial to the Legis 
 lature. Another Hearing. Speakers interrupted by Mr. Lunt. Ex 
 citement of the Audience. Mr. Lunt's Report. Resolutions laid on 
 the Table . . . 321-338 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 INCENDIARY PUBLICATION BILL. ADMISSION OF ARKANSAS. CONVERSION OF 
 
 FREE SOIL INTO SLAVE SOIL. ATTEMPT TO CENSURE MR. ADAMS. RIGHT 
 
 OF PETITION DENIED. 
 
 President Jackson's Message. Referred to a Special Committee. Mr. 
 Calhoun's Report. Incendiary Publication Bill. Debate thereon. 
 Mr. Van Buren's casting Vote. Defeat of the Bill. Application of 
 Arkansas for Admission into the Union. Constitution guarantees Per 
 petual Slavery. Debate on the Admission. Mr. Adams's Amendment 
 rejected. Arkansas admitted. The Boundaries of Missouri extended. 
 
CONTENTS. XV11 
 
 Free Soil made Slave Soil. Success of the Slaveholders. Second 
 Session of the XXIVth Congress. Presentation of Antislavery Peti 
 tions. Presentation of a Petition by Mr. Adams purporting to come 
 
 from Slaves. Violent Scene in the House. Mr. Patton's Motion to 
 return the Petition to Mr. Adams. Motion of Mr. Thompson to censure 
 Mr. Adams. Substitute moved by Mr. Lewis. Angry Debate. Mr. 
 Adams's Defence. Triumph of Mr. Adams. Speech of Mr. Slade. 
 Violent Scene. Caucus of Southern Members. Adoption of Mr. Pat- 
 ton's Eesolution. Antislavery Papers not to be debated, printed, or 
 read. Subserviency of Congress . '..'".' "> V- 339-354 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 ACTIVITY OF THE ABOLITIONISTS. ACTION OF NORTHERN LEGISLATURES. 
 
 The Abolitionists hopeful. Meeting of the Massachusetts Antislavery So 
 ciety in the Capitol. Mr. Stanton's Eesolutions. Public Sentiment. 
 
 . Formation of the Illinois Antislavery Society. Black Laws of Ohio. 
 Condition of the Colored People in Ohio. Hearing before a Commit 
 tee of the Massachusetts Legislature. Mr. Stanton's Speech. Action 
 of the Legislature. Decision of Judge Shaw. James C. Alvord. 
 Resolutions against Texas. Legislatures of Connecticut and Vermont 355-373 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 THE ALTON TRAGEDY. MURDER OF ELIJAH P. LOVEJOY. 
 
 Mr. Lovejoy discusses the Slavery Question. Maintains the Right of the 
 Press and Speech. Murder of a Negro. Charge of Judge Lawless. 
 Destruction of the Office o the "Observer." The Press destroyed at 
 Alton. The Slaveholders demand its Suppression. It is destroyed. 
 Mr. Lovejoy mobbed in Missouri. Insulted at Home. Speech to the 
 Citizens. Excitement in Alton. Mr. Linder leads a Mob. State 
 Society formed at Upper Alton. Speech of Edward Beecher. Meeting 
 at the Store to protect tlje Press. Assault upon the "Warehouse. The 
 Fire returned. Mr. Lovejoy shot ; died. Press thrown into the River. 
 
 The Murder applauded or excused by the Supporters of Slavery. 
 Resolutions of the Boston Abolitionists. Faneuil Hall refused. Dr. 
 Channing's Letter. Mr. Hallett's Resolutions. The Hall granted. 
 Address of Dr. Channing. Resolutions of Mr. Hallett. Mr. Austin's 
 Speech. Reply of Wendell Phillips. Excitement. Action of the Na 
 tional and Massachusetts Antislavery Societies. Edmund Quincy. 
 Non-Resistants .',.'. . 374-389 
 
 CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 CALHOUN'S RESOLUTIONS. ATHERTON'S RESOLUTIONS. ASHBURTON TREATY. 
 
 Calhoun's Resolutions. Smith's Amendment. Allen's Motion. Debate. 
 
 Atherton's Resolutions. Southern Whigs. Mr. Slade. Speech of 
 
XV111 CONTENTS. 
 
 Mr. Clay. Speech of Mr. Morris. Resolutions of Vermont. Meeting 
 of the XXVIth Congress. Mr. Wise's Resolutions. Mr. Thompson's 
 Resolutions. Menace of Cooper. Mr. Botts. Motion of Mr. Adams. 
 Amendment of William Cost Johnson. Feeling of the South. Let 
 ter of the World's Convention to Southern Governors. Quintuple 
 Treaty. Protest of General Cass. Ashburton Treaty. Debate in the 
 Senate. The Treaty sustained 390-403 
 
 CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 DISSENSION AMONG THE ABOLITIONISTS. DISRUPTION OF THE AMERICAN 
 ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 
 
 Increase of the Abolitionists. Dissensions. New York Abolitionists vote 
 for Seward. Opposition of Mr. Goodell. New Party proposed by 
 Mr. Smith. Action of the Massachusetts Antislavery Society. Young 
 Men's Antislavery State Convention at Worcester. Resolution. Polit 
 ical Action. The Woman Question. Pastoral Letter. New England 
 Convention. Protest of Mr. Torrey. Memorial to the Churches. 
 Action of the Rhode Island Consociation. Churches and Ministers. 
 The Abolitionists. Controversy between the Massachusetts and National 
 Antislavery Societies. Opinion of Mr. Birney. Sixth Anniversary. 
 The Woman Question. New England Antislavery Convention. Massa 
 chusetts Abolition Society. Address of the Society. Bitter Controversy. 
 Financial Action. Proposition to dissolve the American Antislavery 
 Society. Sale of the "Emancipator." Seventh Anniversary of the 
 American Antislavery Society. Rights of Woman conceded. Disrup 
 tion. American and Foreign Antislavery Society organized. Both 
 Societies appeal to the Public 404-422 
 
 CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 ABOLITION PETITIONS. ARRAIGNMENT OF MR. ADAMS. RIGHT OF PETITION 
 WON. MR. ADAMS'S POSITION. 
 
 The Election of 1840. Death of President Harrison. President Tyler. 
 Mr. Adams's Motion to repeal the 21st Rule adopted. The South warned 
 against the Abolitionists. President Tyler's Letter. Thomas F. Mar 
 shall, Henry A. Wise, and Joshua R. Giddings. Vote on 21st Rule 
 reconsidered. Discussion. Petition presented by Mr. Adams. Reso 
 lution of Censure. Caucus. Mr. Weld and Mr. Leavitt. Marshall's 
 Resolutions. Speech. Mr. Adams's Defence. Remarks of Wise. 
 Adams's Reply. Liberal Action of Underwood, Arnold, and Botts. 
 Resolution laid on the Table. Debate in XXVIIIth Congress. Re 
 marks of Hale and Hamlin. Rule abrogated and Right of Petition 
 secured. Position of Mr. Adams. Criticisms of Garrison, Birney, and 
 Goodell 423-438 
 
CONTENTS. XIX 
 
 CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 COASTWISE SLAVE-TRADE. DEMANDS UPON THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT. 
 
 CENSURE OF MR. GIDDINGS. 
 
 Coastwise Slave-trade. American Vessels wrecked. Slaves liberated by 
 British Authorities. Eepresentations of the Case by the American Min 
 ister to England. The Action of the British Government denounced. 
 
 Kesolutions of Mr. Calhoun. Debate on the Kesolutions. Remarks 
 
 of Mr. Porter. Passage of the Resolutions. Exasperation of the Slave 
 holders. The "Creole" seized by the Slaves and carried into Nassau. 
 Refusal to surrender the Slaves. Excitement in the South. Excited 
 Debate in the Senate. Mr. Calhoun's Resolutions relating to the "Cre 
 ole." Mr. Webster's Despatch to Mr. Everett. Approved by Mr. Cal 
 houn. Action of England. Resolution of Mr. Giddings. Exciting 
 Scene. Resolution of Censure by Mr. Botts. Resolution adopted by 
 Mr. "Weller. Resolution of Censure passed. Mr. Giddings sustained 
 by his Constituents 439-455 
 
 CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 THE "AMISTAD" CAPTIVES. 
 
 Demands of Slavery. The "Amistad" captured by the Africans. Taken 
 to New London. Africans claimed as Slaves. Demands of the Spanish 
 Minister. Africans before the District Court. Conduct of District At 
 torney. Instructions of the Secretary of State. A Committee appointed 
 to aid the Africans. The Attorney- General of the United States. 
 Africans held for Trial. Decision of the Circuit Court. President. 
 Declaration of the Secretary of State. Appeal to the Supreme Court. 
 Efforts of the Committee. Mr. Adams employed. His Argument. 
 Arraignment of the President and his Cabinet. Discharge of the Pris 
 oners. Labors of Lewis Tappan \ 456-469 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 THE PRIGG CASE. THE USE OF ITS JAILS FORBIDDEN BY MASSACHUSETTS. 
 AN AMENDMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION PROPOSED. 
 
 Various Interpretations of the Constitution. Margarette Morgan. Prigg 
 Case. Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. Supreme Court of the United 
 States. Decision. State Legislation not required. Taney. Daniel. 
 
 Jurisdiction of the Government. Supreme Court of Massachusetts. 
 
 State Laws repealed. Laws against the Use of Jails. Latimer's 
 Arrest. Trial. City Officers. Excitement. Public Meetings. 
 Meeting in Faneuil Hall. Edmund Quincy. Joshua Leavitt. Dis 
 turbance. Speech of Phillips. Remonstrances. Latimer Journal. 
 Popular Demonstrations. Grey paid by Mr. Colver. Convention. 
 Petition to 1he Legislature. Meeting in Faneuil Hall. Petition pre- 
 
XX CONTENTS. 
 
 sented to Congress by John Quincy Adams. Proposed Amendment of 
 the Constitution. Petition. Resolutions of Massachusetts. Singular 
 Avowal of Mr. Wise. Mr. Holmes. Speech of Mr. Adams. Report of 
 Committee. Massachusetts Senators. Action of the Legislature 470 - 487 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 INTERMARRIAGE LAW OF MASSACHUSETTS. CASTE. 
 
 The Law of Massachusetts. Petitions. Report of Mr. Lincoln. De 
 bate. Mr. Davis's Report. Mr. Bradburn's Bill. General Howe's 
 Bill. Sharp Debate. Repeal of the Law. Colored Persons excluded 
 from the Cars. Scene on the Eastern Railroad. Action of the Legisla 
 ture. Colored Schools. Controversy in Nantucket. Petitions to the 
 Legislature. Mr. Barrett's Bill. Defeated. Mr. Wilson's Motion to 
 reconsider. Earnest Debate. Reconsidered. Bill passed. Action 
 of Boston School Committee .488-498 
 
 CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 POSITION OF THE COLORED PEOPLE. FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 
 
 Sentiments of the Colored People. Diverse Influences of Slavery and 
 Freedom. Childhood of Frederick Douglass. Cruelties of Slavery il 
 lustrated. Attempts to escape. Sent to Baltimore. Became a Ship- 
 caulker. Escaped to New York. Introduced to Mr. Ruggles. Arrived 
 at New Bedford. Works in a Ship-yard. Addresses an Antislavery 
 Convention in Nantucket. Impressions made upon Garrison and Rogers. 
 
 Becomes Agent of the Massachusetts Antislavery Society. Wonder 
 ful Effects of his Speeches. His Devotion to the Cause of his Race. 
 Publishes his Autobiography. Visits England. Reasons for going. 
 Establishes the " North Star." Immense Labors of Twenty Years 499 - 511 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVI. 
 
 THE FLORIDA WAR, SLAVERY ITS CAUSE. 
 
 The Surrender of Slaves by the Seminoles demanded. The Additional 
 Treaty. Agreement to remove to the West. Outrages perpetrated by 
 Slave-traders. Exasperation of the Indians. Stern Policy of President 
 Jackson. Seizure of Osceola's Wife. Death of the Indian Agent. 
 Destruction of Major Dade's Command. Conduct of the Citizens of Flor 
 ida. Recall of General Scott. Action of General Jessup. Treaty of 
 Peace ; rejected by the Government. The Slave-hunters. Admissions 
 of General Jessup. Bounty offered to the Creeks. Dishonorable Con 
 duct of Army Officers. Honorable Action of the Cherokee Delegation. 
 
 Cruel Action of the War Department. Violation of Flags of Truce. 
 
 Noble Conduct of General Taylor. Treaty with the Creeks and Semi 
 noles. Danger of the Exiles. Demands of the Creeks. The Exiles 
 emigrate to Mexico. The Faith and Honor of the Nation tarnished 512 - 527 
 
CONTENTS. xxi 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 DEMAND FOR THE RECOGNITION OF PROPERTY IN SLAVES. 
 
 The Greed of Gain gratified by Slavery. Mr. Whittlesey's Report. De* 
 bates on the Question of Slave Property. Spanish Treaty. The Flor 
 ida Claims. Mr. Cooper's Report. Mr. Giddings's and Mr. Adams's 
 Speeches. Payment for Slaves by the British Government. Mr. Fill- 
 more's Bill. Speech of Mr. Giddings. Violent Scenes in the House. 
 Degrading Influences of Slavery. General Jessup's Contract with 
 the Indians. "Watson's Claim. General Gaines's Order. His Honor 
 able Conduct. The Collins Claim. Action of General Taylor. Faith 
 less Action of the Government. Renewal of Watson's Claim. Reports 
 on the Claim. Watson's Claim allowed. Claim of Pacheco. Failure 
 of the Bill . . . . '/ . . 528-544 
 
 CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 
 THE LIBERTY PARTY. 
 
 Early Abolitionists pledged to Political Action. Questioning Candidates. 
 Seward, Cushing, Fillmore, Brooks, Parmenter. A Political Party 
 demanded. Myron Holley. New York State Society calls a National 
 Convention at Albany. Opposed by the Board of Managers of the Mas 
 sachusetts Society. Meeting of the Convention. Nomination of James 
 G. Birney for President and Thomas Earle for Vice- President. Small 
 Vote. Address of Committee. Salmon P. Chase. State Convention 
 in Ohio. Peterboro' Convention. Address to the Slaves. National 
 Convention. Resolutions. Candidates. Philadelphia Convention. 
 Professor Cleaveland's Address. Election. Western and Southwestern 
 Convention. Mr Chase's Address. Eastern Convention. Dissen 
 sions. Unconstitutionally of Slavery. Divisions . . . 545 - 555 
 
 CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 
 MOBS. ANTISLAVERY ACTIVITIES. WOMEN'S FAIRS. 
 
 Riot at Cincinnati. Cowardice of the City Government. Manly Stand 
 of Dr. Bailey. Riot in Philadelphia. Riots in New Bedford, Nan- 
 tucket, and Portland. Riotous Demonstrations in the North. The 
 Tone of the South. Divisions among Abolitionists. New Organization. 
 Old Organization. Antislavery Fairs. "Liberty Bell." Address 
 to the Slaves. Address to President Tyler. One hundred Conventions. 
 ' Thomas P. Beach. Visit of Abolitionists to England. Henry C. 
 Wright. Case of John L. Brown. Decrease of Antislavery Societies. 
 Spread of Antislavery Sentiments. The Impending Struggle . 556 - 567 
 
XX11 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XL. 
 
 NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 
 
 Meeting of the American Autislavery Society in 1842. Debate on the 
 Issue of No Union with Slaveholders. Meeting of the Massachusetts 
 Antislavery Society. Protest against the Constitution by Mr. Foster. 
 Mr. Garrison's Proposition. Meeting of the American Antislavery So 
 ciety in 1844. The Doctrine of No Union with Slaveholders adopted. 
 
 Protests. Address to the Abolitionists. Letter of Francis Jackson. 
 
 Gerrit Smith's Letter to John G. Whittier. Replies. Disunion 
 Policy adopted . . . .- -. : .'-... ' . 568-575 
 
 CHAPTER XLI. 
 
 IMPRISONMENT OF COLORED SEAMEN. 
 
 Imprisonment in South Carolina. Laws of Louisiana. Resolutions of 
 Massachusetts. The Governor authorized to appoint Agents to defend 
 Colored Seamen. Appointment of Mr. Hoar. Excitement in South 
 Carolina. Action of Governor Hammond. Resolutions of South Caro 
 lina Legislature. Fines and Imprisonments imposed upon Persons that 
 defend Negroes. Indignation at Charleston. Action of the Authori 
 ties. Mr. Hoar forced to leave the State. Mr. Hubbard's Mission to 
 New Orleans. Compelled to leave. Petitions presented to Congress 
 by Mr. Winthrop. Reports of Hoar and Hubbard. Message of the 
 Governor. Action of the Legislature . * . . . 576-586 
 
 CHAPTER XLII. 
 
 PLOT FOR THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 
 
 Dominating Influences of the Slave Power. Texas. Immigration from 
 the South. Texas declared Independent. Annexation to the United 
 States proposed. Rejected by Mr. Van Buren. Election and Death of 
 General Harrison. Mr. Tyler. Mr. Gilmer's Letter. General Jack 
 son's Letter. Presidential Intrigue. Address of Members of Congresa 
 against the Texas Scheme. Duff Green's Letter. Visit of Mr. An 
 drews and Mr. Tappan to England. Motives for Annexation distinctly 
 avowed. Accusations against England. Position of the British Gov 
 ernment. Texas or Disunion. Conditions demanded by Texas. 
 Death of Mr. Upshur. Mr. Calhoun made Secretary of State. 
 Treaty. . . . ' ,; .' .. '. , ; * ,W 4 " . ''. . . 587-605 
 
 CHAPTER XLIII. 
 
 TEXAS PLOT CONSUMMATED. 
 
 Presidential Election. The Issue distinctly presented. Position of the 
 Whig and Democratic Parties. Embarrassing Position of Antislavery 
 Men. The Alabama Letter. Secret Circular. Mr. Walker's Letter. 
 
CONTENTS. XX111 
 
 Election of Mr. Polk. Meeting of Congress. Mr. Benton's Bill. 
 Mr. Bale's Proposition. Mr. Ingersoll's Resolution. Mr. Hamlin's 
 Motion. The Debates. Adoption of Mr. Brown's Amendment. 
 Passage of the Resolutions. Reported against by the Senate Committee 
 on Foreign Affairs. Debates in the Senate. Mr. Walker's Amend 
 ment. Mr. Miller's Amendment. Passage of Joint Resolutions. 
 Position of Southern Whigs. Weakness or Treachery of Northern Demo 
 crats. Action of Mr. Tyler. Rejoicing of the Friends of Annexation 606-620 
 
 CHAPTER XLIV. 
 
 VERMONT AND MASSACHUSETTS. JOHN P. HALE. CASSIUS M. CLAY. 
 
 Action of Vermont and Massachusetts. Massachusetts Anti-Texas Conven 
 tion. Proscriptive Policy of the New Administration. John P. Hale. 
 
 Address to his Constituents. Denounced by the Democrats of New 
 Hampshire. His Nomination withdrawn. Appeal to the People. 
 " Independent Democrats." The State canvassed by Mr. Hale. 
 Speeches of Hale and Pierce. Coalition between the Whigs and Inde 
 pendent Democrats. The Democracy defeated. Mr. Hale elected 
 United States Senator. Brave Fight in the Senate. Cassius M. Clay. 
 
 Opposes the Annexation of Texas. Visits the Northern States. 
 Advocates the Election of Mr. Clay. Returns to Kentucky. Issues an 
 Address to the People. Establishes the "True American." Boldly 
 denounces Slaveholding. Exasperation of Slaveholders. They demand 
 the Suppression of the Paper. Refusal to comply with the Demand. 
 The Paper forcibly suppressed. Mr. Clay appeals to the People. Re 
 establishes his Paper . . , 621 - 635 
 
 CHAPTER XLV. 
 
 TEXAS ADMITTED AS A SLAVE STATE. 
 
 Resolve of Antislavery Men to continue the Struggle. Action of the Massa 
 chusetts Legislature. Differences among leading Whigs. Celebration 
 of the 1st of August by the Abolj+ionists. Anti-Texas Conventions held 
 in Massachusetts. Committee appointed. Petitions against the Ad 
 mission of Texas as a Slave State. Meeting of Congress. Presentation 
 of Petitions. Resolutions for the Admission as a State. Speech of Mr. 
 Rockwell. Resolutions for Admission. Considered in the Senate. 
 Protest of Mr. Webster. Texas admitted. Address of the Anti-Texas 
 Committee. Complete Victory of the Slave Power . . . 636 - 651 
 
RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER 
 IN AMERICA. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH OF SLAVERY AND THE EARLY 
 DEVELOPMENT OP THE SLAVE POWER. 
 
 Basis of Slavery. American Slavery. Slave Power. Issues of the Civil War. 
 
 African Slave-trade. Slaves brought into Virginia. Colonial and Com 
 mercial Policy of England. Slave-trade encouraged. Colonial Statutes 
 annulled. Spread of Slavery and Increase of Slave-trade. Slavery in New 
 England. John Eliot. Samuel Sewall. Action of the Quakers. Testi 
 monies against Slavery by Burling, Sandiford, Lay, Woolman, Benezet, Wes 
 ley, Whitefield. Emancipation advocated by Dr. Hopkins and Dr. Rush. 
 Opinions of the Revolutionary Leaders. Slave-trade denounced by Congress. 
 
 South Carolina and Georgia for the Slave-trade. Articles of Confederation. 
 
 Development of the Slave Power. 
 
 GOD'S Holy Word declares that man was doomed to eat his 
 bread in the sweat of his face. History and tradition teach 
 that the indolent, the crafty, and the strong, nninindful of 
 human rights, have ever sought to evade this Divine decree 
 by filching their bread from the constrained and unpaid toil 
 of others. From inborn indolence, conjoined with avarice, 
 pride, and lust of power, has sprung slavery in all its Protean 
 forms, from the mildest type of servitude to the harsh and 
 hopeless condition of absolute and hereditary bondage. Thus 
 have grown and flourished caste and privilege, those deadly 
 foes of the rights and well-being of mankind, which can exist 
 only by despoiling the many for the benefit of the few. 
 
 American slavery reduced man, created in the Divine image, 
 to property. It converted a being endowed with conscience, 
 reason, affections, sympathies, and hopes, into a chattel. It 
 sunk a free moral agent, with rational attributes and immortal 
 
2 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 aspirations, to merchandise. It made him a beast of burden 
 in the field of toil, an outcast in social life, a cipher in the 
 courts of law, and a pariah in the house of God. To claim 
 himself, or to use himself for his own benefit or the benefit of 
 wife or child, was deemed a crime. His master could dispose, 
 of his person at will, and of everything acquired by his enforced 
 and unrequited toil. 
 
 This complete subversion of the natural rights of millions, 
 by which they were " deemed, held, taken, reputed, and ad 
 judged in law to be chattels personal to all intents, con 
 structions, and purposes whatsoever," constituted a system 
 antagonistic to the doctrines of reason and the monitions of 
 conscience, and developed and gratified the most intense spirit 
 of personal pride, a love of class distinctions, and the lust of 
 dominion. Hence arose a commanding power, ever sensitive, 
 jealous, proscriptive, dominating, and aggressive, which was 
 recognized and fitly characterized as the Slave Power. 
 
 This slavery and this Slave Power, in their economical, so 
 cial, moral, ecclesiastical, and political relations to the people 
 and to the government, demoralizing the one and distracting 
 the councils of the other, made up the vital issues of that " irre 
 pressible conflict " which finally culminated in a civil war that 
 startled the nations by its suddenness, fierceness, and gigantic 
 proportions. 
 
 Half a century before the discovery of America, Portuguese 
 and Spanish navigators had introduced African slaves into 
 Europe. The English and other commercial nations followed 
 their example. When, therefore, the Western Continent was 
 opened to colonization and settlement, these nations were pre 
 pared to introduce slaves and to prosecute the African slave- 
 traffic with vigor and on a large scale. 
 
 In the month of August, 1619, a Dutch ship entered James 
 River with twenty African slaves. They were purchased by 
 the colonists, and they and their offspring were held in per 
 petual servitude. Thus, at Jamestown, twelve years from the 
 settlement of the colony of Virginia, and one year before the 
 feet of the Pilgrims had touched the New World, began that 
 system in the British continental colonies which, under the 
 
BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH OF SLAVERY. 3 
 
 fostering care of England, overspread the land. So near in 
 time, though remote in points of destination, came those two 
 vessels across the sea, with elements at once so potent and yet 
 so unlike, the "Mayflower,'' with its freight of learning and 
 Christian civilization ; the other, with its ill-starred burden of 
 wretchedness and woe, bearing the seeds of a system destined, 
 after a struggle of two hundred and forty years for develop 
 ment, expansion, and dominion, to light the fires of civil war, 
 and perish in the flames its own hand had kindled. 
 
 During the years from 1619 to the opening of the American 
 Revolution the friends of the slave-trade and of slavery con 
 trolled the government and dictated the policy of England. 
 Her kings and queens, lords and commons, judges and attor 
 ney-generals, gave to the African slave-traffic their undeviating 
 support. Her merchants and manufacturers clamored for its 
 protection and extension. Her coffers were filled with gold 
 bedewed with tears and stained with blood. " For more than 
 a century," in the words of Horace Mann, " did the madness 
 of this traffic rage. During all those years the clock of eternity 
 never counted out a minute that did not witness the cruel 
 death, by treachery or violence, of some father or mother of 
 Africa." 
 
 Under the encouragement of British legislation and the fos 
 tering smile of royalty, more than three hundred thousand 
 African bondmen were imported into the thirteen British colo 
 nies. The efforts of colonial legislation whether dictated by 
 humanity, interest, or fear to check this traffic were defeated 
 by the persistent policy of the British government. " Great 
 Britain," in the words of Bancroft, " steadily rejecting every 
 colonial restriction on the slave-trade, instructed the governors, 
 on pain of removal, not to give even a temporary assent to such 
 laws." The planters of Virginia, alarmed at the rapid increase 
 of slaves, as early as 1726 imposed a tax to check their im 
 portation, but " the interfering interest of the African company 
 obtained the repeal of that law." South Carolina attempted 
 restrictions upon the importation of slaves as late as 1760, 
 for which she received the rebuke of the British authorities. 
 The legislature of Pennsylvania, as early as 1712, passed an 
 
4 BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 act to prevent the increase of slaves ; but that act was an 
 nulled by the Crown. The legislature of Massachusetts, in 
 1771, and again in 1774, adopted measures for the abolition 
 of the slave-trade ; but they failed to receive the approval of 
 the colonial governors. Queen Anne, who had reserved for her 
 self one quarter of the stock of the Royal African Company, 
 that gigantic monopolist of the slave-trade, charged it to fur 
 nish full supplies of slaves to the colonies of New York and 
 New Jersey, and instructed the governors of those colonies to 
 give due encouragement to that company ; and it was the tes 
 timony of Madison that the British government constantly 
 checked the attempts of his native State " to put a stop to this 
 infernal traffic." Up to the hour of American Independence, 
 the government of England steadily resisted colonial restric 
 tions on the slave-trade, and persisted in forcing this traffic, 
 so gainful to her commercial and manufacturing interests, upon 
 her colonies, " which," in the words of the Earl of Dartmouth, 
 in 1775, " were not allowed to check or discourage in any 
 degree a traffic so beneficial to the nation." British avarice 
 planted slavery in America ; British legislation sanctioned and 
 maintained it ; British statesmen sustained and guarded it. 
 
 But the British government and British merchants were not 
 alone responsible for the spread of slavery in the colonies. 
 The inhabitants themselves were generally only too willing to 
 profit by such enforced and unpaid toil. North Carolina was 
 settled by colonies from Virginia, who carried slaves with 
 them. Governor Sir John Yeamans brought slaves with him 
 from Barbadoes into South Carolina, and planted slavery there. 
 Georgia, however, was settled by colonies under the lead of 
 James Oglethorpe, who held slavery to be a horrid crime 
 against the gospel, as well as against the laws of England, and 
 slavery was there forbidden. Some of the colonists, however, 
 soon began to complain that they were prohibited the use of 
 slave-labor. The laws were evaded ; slaves from South Caro 
 lina were hired, at first for short periods, and afterwards for 
 life. Soon slave-ships sailed from Savannah for the coast of 
 Africa, and slaves were introduced with the connivance of the 
 British government, and Georgia became a slave State. Slav- 
 
BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH OF SLAVERY. 5 
 
 ery also readily found its way into the colonies of Maryland, 
 Delaware, and Pennsylvania. The company interested in the 
 colonization of New Jersey offered a land bounty of seventy-five 
 acres for every slave introduced there. And the Royal African 
 Company was enjoined by Queen Anne " to have a constant 
 and sufficient supply of merchantable negroes" for this colony. 
 The Dutch West India Company promised to supply the Dutch 
 settlers of New York with slaves, a promise afterwards re 
 newed. They were then allowed to purchase slaves of others, 
 and finally to engage in the foreign traffic itself. Nor did the 
 rugged soil, or the still more rugged clime, of New England 
 save its colonies from the introduction of the system even 
 there. Slavery, however, grew slowly. In 1680 it was stated 
 by Governor Bradstreet that there were only about one hun 
 dred and twenty African slaves in the colony of Massachusetts. 
 At the end of a hundred years from the settlement of Plymouth 
 there were estimated to be only about two thousand. 
 
 During the half-century preceding the Revolution slavery 
 increased with rapidity, especially in the Southern colonies. 
 There the production of tobacco, indigo, and rice became 
 of great commercial importance to the mother country, and 
 slavery felt its stimulating influence. There slaves toiled 
 generally on large plantations, often under merciless over 
 seers and the menace of the lash. In the colonies north 
 of Mason and Dixon's line they were either employed in the 
 families of the wealthy or belonged to small farmers who 
 labored with their own servants and usually received them 
 into their families. From this circumstance, and from the 
 fact that they were accorded privileges under the laws and in 
 the usages and customs of society, their condition was rendered 
 more tolerable, and their character was less degraded than 
 were the character and condition of Southern slaves. 
 
 In spite, however, of the avarice which guided and inspired 
 the commercial and colonial policy of England, in spite of the 
 corrupting influence of the slave-trade and of slavery itself, 
 they found sturdy opposers in both England and America. 
 The colonial legislature of Massachusetts of 1641 enacted 
 in its code, styled the " Body of Liberties," that there should 
 
* 
 6 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 never be any bond-slavery, unless it be of captives taken 
 in "just war," or of such as willingly sold themselves or 
 were sold to them, and such should have the liberties and 
 Christian usages that God had established in Israel. Whether 
 this act prohibited the slavery of Africans or not has been 
 a question freely discussed, and on which differences of 
 opinion have obtained. There can be no doubt, however, that 
 the colonists of that day made a distinction between slaves 
 captured in "just war " and those stolen in Africa, and that 
 this act was based on this distinction. At any rate, it is safe 
 to say that the servitude it authorized, with its recognized 
 limitations of the Mosaic code, had little in common with 
 the American slavery which afterwards obtained in all the 
 colonies. 
 
 In 1646 two slaves were introduced into the colony by a 
 member of a church, who had procured them in a slave-hunt in 
 Africa. A memorial immediately presented to the General 
 Court, setting forth the threefold outrage of " murder, man- 
 stealing, and Sabbath-breaking," the slave-hunt having taken 
 place on the Sabbath, drew forth a stringent order. " Con 
 ceiving themselves," they said, " bound by the first opportunity 
 to bear witness against the heinous and crying sin of man- 
 stealing," they supplemented their testimony with the require 
 ment that the victims " should be sent to their native country, 
 Guinea, and a letter," expressing " the indignation of the court 
 thereabout." In November of that year it was enacted that " if 
 any man stealeth a man, or mankind, he shall surely be put to 
 death." The colony of Connecticut, in 1650, and the colony of 
 New Haven, soon after, passed acts making man-stealing a 
 capital offence. 
 
 "W hatever differences of opinion there may have been concern 
 ing the full import and effects of the Massachusetts act of 1641, 
 there can be none concerning that of the colony of Rhode Island, 
 adopted in 1652. By this act it was prodded that no " black 
 mankind or white," " being forced by covenant-bond or other 
 wise," should serve more than ten years, or after the age of 
 twenty-four years, but should be set free. " This noble act," 
 says Moore, in his " Notes on Slavery in Massachusetts," 
 
BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH OF SLAVERY. 7 
 
 " stands out in solitary grandeur in the middle of the seven 
 teenth century, the first legislative enactment in the history 
 of this continent, if not of the world, for the suppression of 
 involuntary servitude." It was in view of this early legislation 
 against African slavery and the slave-trade, and of the small 
 number of slaves that found their way into the Massachusetts 
 colonies during the first two generations of their history, that 
 Whittier says : " It was not the rigor of her northern winter, 
 nor the unfriendly soil of Massachusetts, which discouraged the 
 introduction of slavery during the first half of the century of 
 her existence as a colony. It was the recognition of the brother 
 hood of man in sin, suffering, and redemption, the awful respon 
 sibilities and eternal destinies of humanity, her hatred of wrong 
 and tyranny, and her stern sense of justice, which led her to 
 impose upon the African slave-trade the terrible penalty of the 
 Mosaic code." 
 
 In spite, however, of this early legislation, and of the popular 
 sentiment which prompted it, slavery made progress, the num 
 ber of slaves slowly increased, and men were found ready to 
 engage in the infamous traffic. The demoralizing influence 
 of the Indian wars, and the recognition of the principle that 
 captives taken in them might be rightfully held in bondage, 
 contributed largely to this result. There were, however, ear 
 nest and faithful protestants who saw and deeply deplored the 
 great and grievous wrong thus inflicted on both the Indian and 
 the African. John Eliot, the apostle to the Indians, presented, 
 in 1675, a memorial to the Governor and Council against sell 
 ing captured Indians into slavery. His objections were that 
 it prolonged the war, that it hindered the enlargement of 
 Christ's kingdom, and that " the selling of souls is a danger 
 ous merchandise." Though the mission of this large-hearted 
 man was mainly with the Indians, he did not forget the Afri 
 can, but lamented, it is said by Cotton Mather, with " a bleed 
 ing and burning passion," " the destroying ignorance " in which 
 they were left, by men bearing the name of Christian, " for 
 fear of losing the benefit of their vassalage." 
 
 The iniquity of slavery and of the slave-trade, and the 
 wrongs of the slave, were deeply felt by Justice Samuel Sewall, 
 
8 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 afterwards Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Massachu 
 setts. In the year 1700 he wrote a pamphlet entitled " The 
 Selling of Joseph : A Memorial," in which slavery was char 
 acterized, and the primal truths of human equality and obliga 
 tion were enunciated, with signal boldness and force. He 
 maintained that " originally and naturally " there was no such 
 thing as slavery ; and that " these Ethiopians, as black as they 
 are, seeing they are the sons and daughters of the first Adam, 
 the brethren and sisters of the last Adam, and the offspring 
 of God, they ought to be treated with respect agreeable." 
 
 Although this production was received, its faithful and fear 
 less author says, " with frowns and hard words," there was a 
 state of unrest in the public mind which revealed itself in vari 
 ous ways. The slaves themselves were uneasy under their bond 
 age, and made no secret of their earnest longings for liberty. 
 Though their increase was small, the most thoughtful and 
 conscientious viewed that increase with apprehension, and 
 earnestly desired the abolition of both the trade and the sys 
 tem. During the ten years immediately preceding the Decla 
 ration of Independence, in which the rights of man and of the 
 colonies were under sharp discussion, the wrongfulness and in- 
 consistency of slavery became more and more apparent. The 
 desire for emancipation and the extinction of the slave-trade 
 found utterance in sermons and pamphlets, some thorough and 
 of decided merit, and in the resolutions and memorials of 
 towns praying -the legislature to take action at once in the 
 interests of humanity and true patriotism. 
 
 But members of the society of Friends took the lead in this 
 opposition. In the year 1688 a small body of German Quak 
 ers, at Germantown, Pennsylvania, presented a protest to the 
 Yearly Meeting against the "buying, selling, and holding 
 men in slavery." But though not then prepared to take ac 
 tion, it sent forth in 1696 the advice that "the members should 
 discourage the introduction of slavery, and be careful of the 
 moral and intellectual training of such as they held in servi 
 tude." Three years before this advice was given, George 
 Keith, then a member of that society, had denounced slav 
 ery as contrary to the religion of Christ, the rights of man, 
 
BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH OF SLAVERY. 
 
 and sound reason and policy, and charged its members to 
 " set their negroes at liberty after some reasonable time of 
 service." 
 
 In New England the Quakers, at the Monthly Meeting at 
 Dartmouth in 1716, sent to the Rhode Island Quarterly Meet 
 ing the query, " whether it be agreeable to truth for the 
 Friends to purchase slaves and keep them for a term of life." 
 The Quakers of Nantucket in the same year, moved by the 
 eloquence of the wife of Nathaniel Starbuck, a preacher of 
 their denomination, sent forth the declaration that " it is not 
 agreeable to the truth for Friends to purchase slaves and hold 
 them for the term of life." In 1729 they made an earnest 
 appeal to the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, in which they say : 
 " Inasmuch as we are restrained by the rule of discipline from 
 being concerned in fetching or importing negro slaves from 
 their own country, whether it is not as reasonable that we 
 should be restricted from buying them when imported." At 
 that time Elihu Coleman wrote a pamphlet against making men 
 slaves, because it was " anti-christian " and " very opposite 
 both to grace and nature." 
 
 Most faithful testimony against slavery was borne by William 
 Burling, of Long Island, in the Yearly Meeting of the Friends. 
 In 1729 Ralph Sandiford published " The Mystery of Iniquity," 
 in which he earnestly condemned the sin of oppression. The 
 ardent but eccentric Benjamin Lay, who had witnessed in 
 Barbadoes scenes of cruelty to slaves that disturbed and dis 
 tressed his sensitive nature, pleaded the cause of the bondman 
 in a volume, published in 1737 by Benjamin Franklin. From 
 1746 to 1767 John Woolman, of New Jersey, travelled much 
 in the Middle and Southern colonies, proclaiming to Christians 
 that " the practice of continuing slavery is not right," and that 
 " liberty is the natural right of all men equally." This humane, 
 unselfish, and self-denying man, as he travelled among the 
 people, saw " a dark gloominess overhanging the land," and 
 " a spirit of fierceness and love of dominion." But, notwith 
 standing all that was calculated to depress and sadden his 
 heart, he labored on with earnest and unconquerable zeal, and 
 largely contributed to the work of preparing his denomination 
 2 
 
10 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 to bear their early testimony against the sin and practice of 
 slavery. 
 
 But the most active antislavery worker of that age was 
 Anthony Benezet, the son of Huguenot parents, who escaped 
 from France on account of the revocation of the Edict of 
 Nantes. Having inherited an intense and passionate love of 
 liberty, and becoming deeply affected by the iniquity of the 
 slave-trade and the cruelty exercised toward slaves by their 
 owners, he earnestly lifted up his voice on behalf of the op 
 pressed, and strove to awaken Christians to a just sense of the 
 sin of slaveholding. He established and taught gratuitously an 
 evening school for the instruction of negroes. Under his pious 
 labors their moral and religious advancement recommended 
 the colored race to the notice of influential persons, too much 
 accustomed to hold it in contempt. Among his many publi 
 cations was an historical account of Guinea, which is said to 
 have given an impulse to the mind of Thomas Clarkson, who 
 afterward labored so effectively for the abolition of the slave- 
 trade by the British government. He exerted himself to in 
 duce the legislature of Pennsylvania, in 1780, to begin the 
 work of emancipation. 
 
 By the faithful and self-denying labors of these devoted 
 pioneers and early advocates of antislavery, and others of less 
 note, covering a period of a hundred years, was the society of 
 Friends at length persuaded to rid itself of the system of 
 enforced servitude. Nor was this great work accomplished 
 without much of exciting discussion, stern rebuke, and stirring 
 appeal. For with them, as with others, the love of ease and the 
 lust of dominion were strong, nor did they at once and easily 
 let go their hold on the victims of their power. And not until 
 the conscience of the society was aroused by the unequivocal 
 decisions of its ecclesiastical tribunals, showing slavery to be 
 a sin to be repented of and forsaken, did it achieve the high 
 distinction of being the first and only denomination to purge 
 itself entirely of this great iniquity. 
 
 Nor were the people without remonstrance and warning from 
 strangers, who, seeing the abomination of the system, boldly 
 denounced its essential cruelty and wickedness. John Wesley, 
 
BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH OF SLAVERY. 11 
 
 who visited the country during the early part of the last century, 
 unequivocally condemned it. His terse and trenchant charac 
 terization of slavery, so often repeated, that it was " the sum 
 of all villanies," was only one of many sharp things he 
 uttered. He called the system " the vilest that ever saw the 
 sun," and denominated " slave-dealers man-stealers, the 
 worst of thieves, in comparison with whom highway robbers 
 and housebreakers are comparatively innocent." To these 
 emphatic words he added that " men-buyers are exactly on a 
 level with men-stealers." 
 
 In 1739 George White field, the renowned pulpit-orator and 
 evangelist, having travelled extensively through the Southern 
 States, addressed to their inhabitants a " Letter," in which he 
 combined the impressions of an eyewitness with the reflections 
 of a Christian teacher. Affirming that his sympathies had 
 been strongly excited by the " miseries of the poor negroes," 
 he called attention to the practice of slave-masters, and the 
 encouragement it afforded to the savage tribes in Africa to con 
 tinue their warfare on each other, to supply the demand for 
 slaves thus created. He charged the "generality of" them 
 with using their slaves " as bad as though they were brutes ; 
 nay, worse," worse than their horses, which were " fed and 
 properly cared for " after the labors of the day, while the 
 slaves must grind their corn and prepare their own food, 
 worse even than their dogs, who are " caressed and fondled," 
 while the slaves " are scarce permitted to pick up the crumbs 
 which fall from their master's table." He spoke of the cruel 
 lashings which "ploughed their backs and made long furrows," 
 sometimes ending in death. He reminded them of their spa 
 cious houses and sumptuous fare ; while they to whose " inde 
 fatigable labors " their luxuries were " owing " had neither 
 convenient food to eat nor proper raiment to put on. 
 
 Among the earlier apostles of emancipation was Dr. Samuel 
 Hopkins, pastor of the Congregational Church in Newport, 
 Rhode Island, who was as much distinguished for his advocacy 
 of the doctrines of human rights as of the doctrines of the school 
 of theology which bears his name. In 1770 he deliberately 
 and solemnly resolved to attack the system of kidnapping, pur- 
 
12 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 chasing, and retaining slaves. Although Rhode Island had, as 
 early as 1652, passed an act against the purchase of negroes, 
 she had become deeply involved in the slave-trade. Newport 
 was the great slave-mart of New England. Cargoes of slaves 
 were often landed near the church and home of the great di 
 vine. Before his congregation, thus deeply involved in the 
 guilt of slave-trading and slaveholding, he boldly rebuked the 
 sin and pleaded the cause of its victims in a discourse of great 
 plainness and power. It was an unselfish and heroic act, 
 imperilling his position both as a pastor and as a recognized 
 leader in the church. Of this noble act Whittier says : " It 
 may well be doubted whether, on that Sabbath day, the angels 
 of God, in their wide survey of His universe, looked upon a 
 nobler spectacle than that of the minister of Newport, rising 
 up before his slaveholding congregation, and demanding, in 
 the name of the Highest, ' the deliverance of the captive and 
 the opening of prison doors to them that were bound ! ' " 
 
 From 1770 to 1776 Dr. Hopkins repeatedly spoke on behalf 
 of the slave, visited from house to house, and urged masters to 
 free their bondmen. In the latter year he published his dia 
 logue concerning slavery, together with his address to slave 
 holders. He dedicated this remarkable production, said to 
 have been " the ablest document which had at that time and 
 on that theme appeared in the English language," to the 
 Continental Congress. It had a large circulation among the 
 statesmen of that day, and exerted a potent influence on 
 public opinion. This early champion of the black man was 
 cheered by the passage, in 1774, of a law prohibiting the im 
 portation of negroes into Rhode Island ; and, in 1784, by the 
 passage of an act declaring all children born after the next 
 March free, results to which he had largely contributed by 
 his early, persistent, and self-denying labors. His heart was 
 gladdened, too, by the action of his church. Instructed by his 
 teachings and inspired by his zeal, it declared slavery to be 
 " a gross violation of the righteousness and benevolence of the 
 gospel," and therefore it resolved, " We will not tolerate it in 
 this church." 
 
 In 1773 Dr. Benjamin Rush, an eminent physician, philan- 
 
BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH OF SLAVERY. 13 
 
 thropist, and statesman, published in Philadelphia " An Ad 
 dress to the Inhabitants of the British Settlements in America 
 on Slave-keeping." In this address he combated the idea so 
 persistently pressed by the supporters of the slave-trade, that 
 it was impossible to carry on the production of sugar, rice, and 
 indigo without negro slaves. " No manufactory," he said, with 
 refreshing boldness and fidelity to truth, " can ever be of con 
 sequence enough to society to admit the least violation of the 
 laws of justice or humanity." This early abolitionist eloquently 
 pleaded the cause of " the unhappy Africans transported to 
 America." Of the slave-traffic he said : " Future ages, when 
 they read the accounts of the slave-trade, if they do not regard 
 them as fabulous, will be at a loss which to condemn most, 
 our folly or our guilt in abetting this direct violation of nature 
 and religion." 
 
 These utterances of those earlier apostles of emancipation 
 awoke responses in the bosoms of many of their countrymen. 
 During the years of agitation preceding the Revolution, in 
 which the liberties of the colonies and the rights of man were 
 discussed with masterly power by the most gifted minds of 
 the country, many of the popular leaders of New England, 
 the Middle colonies, and even of Virginia, did not fail to 
 see and to acknowledge the wrongfulness of slavery, and to 
 denounce the slave-traffic and the slave-extending, policy of 
 the British government. Many slave-masters, who afterward 
 aided in inaugurating the Revolution, in fighting its battles, 
 and carrying the country over from colonial dependence to 
 national independence, were hostile not only to the slave-trade, 
 but to the existence of slavery itself. 
 
 On the 20th of October, 1774, the first Continental Congress 
 signed and promulgated the Articles of Association. In that 
 bond of union, which laid the foundation of the new nation, 
 the pledge was made that the United Colonies would "neither 
 import nor purchase any slave," and would " wholly discon 
 tinue the slave-trade." The explicit declaration was added, 
 that any persons violating these Articles of Association should 
 be pronounced " foes to the rights of British America," "univer 
 sally contemned as the foes of American liberty," " unworthy 
 
14 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of the rights of freemen." This union of the inhabitants of 
 the thirteen British colonies, thus making one people, was 
 begun with a solemn pledge wholly to abstain from all par 
 ticipation in a traffic then supported by the commercial na 
 tions of Europe. The Articles of Association, containing these 
 explicit pledges, were adopted by colonial conventions, county 
 meetings, and lesser assemblages throughout the country, and 
 became the fundamental Constitution of the first American 
 Union. 
 
 That Congress gave expression to the general sentiment of 
 the people of the colonies fully appears in the declarations of 
 the North Carolina and Virginia conventions, which sent dele 
 gates to that Congress. These conventions pledged themselves 
 not to import slaves, and not to purchase them when imported 
 by others. In Georgia a colony founded by James Ogle- 
 thorpe, who forbade slavery there, but whose humane purposes 
 were afterward thwarted by avarice and power a public 
 meeting declared " their disapprobation and abhorrence of the 
 unnatural practice of slavery in America," and pledged their 
 " utmost endeavors for the manumission of slaves in our col 
 ony." And Congress itself, on the 6th of April, 1776, resolved, 
 without opposition, that " no slave be imported into any of the 
 thirteen united colonies." 
 
 The British commercial and colonial policy, however, had 
 interested, active, and influential supporters. Leading states 
 men in South Carolina and Georgia were confessedly not only 
 for slavery, but for the continuance of the slave-trade. In 
 Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina slavery had still a 
 strong hold upon the people. But their interest in the do 
 mestic quickened their opposition to the foreign slave-traffic. 
 Although there were but few negroes in the Middle and New- 
 England colonies, many of these having been made free by the 
 voluntary action of their masters, still slavery and the slave- 
 trade had zealous supporters, especially among the commercial, 
 wealthy, and aristocratic classes. This fact was signally mani 
 fested by the action of Congress in striking from the original 
 draft of the Declaration of Independence Mr. Jefferson's ar 
 raignment of the British king for forcing upon his American 
 
BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH OF SLAVERY. 15 
 
 colonies that traffic in men which he branded as an " execrable 
 commerce," " a piratical warfare," " the opprobrium of infidel 
 powers," " a cruel war against human nature." " That clause 
 reprobating the enslaving of the inhabitants of Africa was 
 struck out," its illustrious author declares, " in complaisance 
 to South Carolina and Georgia, who had never attempted to 
 restrain the importation of slaves, and who, on the contrary, 
 still wished to continue it. Our Northern brethren, also, I 
 believe, felt a little tender under those censures. Although 
 their people had very few slaves themselves, yet they had been 
 pretty considerable carriers of them to others." 
 
 The same spirit and policy which struck these words from 
 the Declaration of Independence influenced the action of Con 
 gress in framing the Articles of Confederation. The report of 
 the committee to prepare a plan provided that supplies should 
 be obtained by requisitions on each State in proportion to the 
 number of its inhabitants. This at once and necessarily raised 
 the question of the status of the slave. Mr. Chase, of Mary 
 land, afterwards one of the justices of the Supreme Court of 
 the United States, moved to count only the white inhabitants. 
 " The negroes," he said, " were property, and no more mem 
 bers of the state than cattle." 
 
 It was suggested by Mr. Harrison, of Virginia, that two 
 slaves should be counted as one freeman. Mr. Wilson, of 
 Pennsylvania, said the exemption of slaves from taxation would 
 be " the greatest encouragement to slave-keeping and the impor 
 tation of slaves." He declared that they increased products 
 and imposed burdens, and prevented freemen from cultivating 
 the country. "Dismiss your slaves," he said ;" freemen will 
 take their places." 
 
 To this remark Mr. Lynch, of South Carolina, replied with em 
 phasis, " Our slaves are our property; if that is debated, there is 
 an end of confederation." He asked why they should " be taxed 
 more than sheep." To this question Franklin replied : " Sheep 
 will never make insurrections." Mr. Chase's amendment was 
 rejected. Georgia was divided, and all the States north of 
 Mason and Dixon's line voted against it. 
 
 The obstacles in the way of Confederation being found so 
 
16 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWEE IN AMERICA. 
 
 great, the discussion was then suspended ; but it was resumed 
 again in October, 1777. It was then moved that the supplies 
 be based on the value of property in each State. This propo 
 sition was rejected, and a motion was made to exempt slaves 
 from taxation. The four New England States voted against 
 it, New York and Pennsylvania were divided, an.d Maryland, 
 Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and New Jersey 
 voted for it. This vote exempted slaves from taxation alto 
 gether, either as inhabitants or property. It was a complete 
 triumph of those representing the slave interest, and may be 
 counted among the earlier illustrations of the potent influence 
 of the rising Slave Power. 
 
 No power was given to the Confederation to regulate com 
 merce. Each State was left free to decide what imports it 
 would admit or prohibit, so that Congress, after its emphatic 
 condemnation by the acts of 1774 and 1776, " renounced for 
 ever," in the words of Bancroft, " the power to sanction or to 
 stop the slave-trade." This result could not but enure to the 
 interests of slavery and to the strengthening of its power. 
 
 But the Confederation secured to the free inhabitants of the 
 State all privileges and immunities of the citizens of the several 
 States. The legislature of South Carolina, when the Articles of 
 Confederation were under consideration, saw that by this pro 
 vision the rights of inter-citizenship were secured to the free 
 colored inhabitants of all the States. After debate, the plan of 
 Confederation was returned to Congress with the recommenda 
 tion that inter-citizenship should be confined to white persons. 
 South Carolina and Georgia supported the proposed change, 
 but eight States refusing their assent, the proposition was lost. 
 In this instance freedom won, and the claims of human equal 
 ity were vindicated. 
 
 But it cannot be doubted that at the time of the Decla 
 ration of Independence, when the government of England 
 ended and the government of the United States began, the 
 people were, on the grounds of justice, humanity, and interest, 
 largely in favor of putting an end to the African slave-trade. 
 Neither can it be doubted that the most conscientious and 
 enlightened portion of the people, including most of the Revo- 
 
BEGINNINGS AND GROWTH OF SLAVERY. 17 
 
 iutionary leaders, who guided the colonies through civil war 
 to national unity and independence, believed slavery to be in 
 consistent with the doctrines they were proclaiming and the 
 civil institutions they were founding. The statesmen of that 
 era hoped, and confidently expected, that it would soon pass 
 away. But the slave system, fostered by England and sus 
 tained by individual interest, indolence, and pride, during a 
 hundred and fifty years, had so incorporated itself into the 
 social life of the people, especially of the South, that, when 
 menaced by the logic of events, it was seen to have a hold and 
 tenacity of life not dreamed of by either friend or foe. Cham 
 pions were ready not only to protect it against the advancing 
 currents of Christian civilization, but also to oppose every 
 interest, every institution, and every individual that menaced 
 its paramount sway. Even then, when the Republic took its 
 place in the family of nations, had begun and had far advanced 
 that work of personal and public deterioration, that poison 
 ing of the fountains of individual and social life whose full 
 development the Rebellion revealed, as it was itself their sad 
 and legitimate result. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 ABOLITION. ABOLITION SOCIETIES, 
 
 Articles of Association of the Colonies. Colored Soldiers. Slavery abolished 
 in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania Abolition Society. 
 New York Abolition Society. Rhode Island Abolition Society. The Aboli 
 tion Societies of Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland, and Virginia. Character 
 of the Members of the Abolition Societies. National Conventions. 
 
 THE Republic of the United States commenced its indepen 
 dent existence .by the proclamation of the self-evident truths 
 that all men are created equal, that all have an inalienable right 
 to liberty, and that governments are instituted to secure these 
 rights. Thus, in the Articles of Association and in the Decla 
 ration of Independence, pronounced by John Hancock " the 
 ground and foundation of future government," these funda 
 mental doctrines were recognized : that all men are by nature 
 free, and that the American government was founded on the 
 rights of human nature. Nor was this comprehensive assertion 
 of rights limited by race or color. " The new republic," in the 
 words of Bancroft, " as it took its place among the powers of 
 the world, proclaimed its faith in the truth, reality, and un- 
 changeableness of freedom, virtue, and right." This " asser 
 tion of right was made for the entire world of mankind and 
 all coming generations, without any exception whatever." 
 
 When the United States joined the family of nations there 
 were in the country about half a million persons of African 
 descent. Nearly all were slaves ; although there were a few, \ 
 especially in the Eastern States, who had been emancipated. 
 Some of these bore an honorable part in the War of Indepen 
 dence. Crispus Attucks, a colored patriot, was a leader, and - 
 the first martyr in the Boston massacre, on the 5th of March, 
 1770, which so fired the hearts and aroused the patriotism of 
 
ABOLITION AND ABOLITION SOCIETIES. 19 
 
 the people. One of that race mingled his blood with the fallen 
 patriots of the 19th of April, 1775. The sons of Africa fought 
 side by side with their countrymen of the white race at Bunker 
 Hill, where Major Pitcairn, as he stormed the works, fell mor 
 tally wounded by the shot of Salem, a black soldier. Indeed, 
 it is hardly too much to say that some of the most heroic deeds 
 of the War of Independence were performed by black men. 
 
 Rhode Island raised a colored regiment, commanded by Colo 
 nel Christopher Greene, the hero of Red Bank. Of the men 
 of this regiment Governor Eustis, of Massachusetts, who had 
 been Secretary of War under Jefferson, said in Congress, in 
 1820 : " They discharged their duty with zeal and fidelity. 
 The gallant defence of Red Bank, in which this regiment bore 
 a part, is among the proofs of their valor." Tristam Burgess 
 also said, in the House of Representatives, in 1828, that " no 
 braver men met the enemy in battle." Of the conduct of these 
 men in the Battle of Rhode Island, pronounced by Lafayette 
 " the best fought battle of the war," Arnold, in his " History 
 of Rhode Island," says : " It was in repelling these furious 
 onsets that the newly raised black regiment, under Colonel 
 Greene, distinguished itself by deeds of desperate valor. 
 Posted behind a thicket in the valley, they three times 
 drove back the Hessians, who charged repeatedly down the 
 hill to dislodge them." 
 
 Connecticut raised a battalion of black soldiers, and Colo 
 nel David Humphrey, attached to the military family of Wash 
 ington, accepted a command in this corps. The heroic de 
 fence of Fort Griswold, on the heights of Groton, by Colonel 
 Ledyard and his brave comrades, was among the most brilliant 
 achievements of the war. When the works were stormed, the 
 British officer, exasperated by the heroic resistance encoun 
 tered, inquired, " Who commands this fort ? " "I did ; you 
 do now," replied Ledyard, handing the officer his sword, which 
 was instantly seized and run through his own body. Lambert, 
 a negro soldier, avenged the murder of his commander by 
 thrusting his bayonet through the British officer, and then 
 fell himself, pierced with thirty-three bayonet wounds. 
 
 The right of free negroes to bear arms in the country's de- 
 
20 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 - fence was not disputed in the more Northern colonies. At the 
 opening of the war the Committee of Safety, in Massachusetts, 
 declared that no slave should be admitted into the army upon 
 any consideration whatever, as it would be " inconsistent with 
 the principles that are to be supported, and reflect dishonor on 
 this colony." Many were emancipated on condition of enter- 
 
 * ing the army. Not always, however, did they receive the 
 reward due to their bravery. In Maryland and Virginia, 
 
 some who had served with fidelity to the close of the war 
 were afterward dishonorably and wickedly reduced to slavery. 
 When the heel of British tyranny was resting heavily on 
 South Carolina and Georgia, Colonel John Laurens, a member 
 of Washington's military family, sought to fill the patriot 
 ranks by emancipating slaves and enrolling them in the ranks 
 of the country's defenders. This eminently wise and patriotic 
 effort, though encouraged by Congress, and sanctioned by 
 Washington, met with little success ; and that heroic son of 
 South Carolina, whose life, near the close of hostilities, was 
 given to the country, was forced to declare that " avarice, 
 pusillanimity, and prejudice " defeated the measure. 
 
 In the midst of the war all the States, with the exception 
 of Connecticut and Rhode Island, framed and adopted consti 
 tutions. The settlers of Vermont, in 1777, framed a constitu 
 tion forever excluding slavery from that Commonwealth ; 
 but it did not become a State until after the adoption of the 
 Federal Constitution. The constitution of Massachusetts was 
 adopted in 1780. Its Bill of Rights declares that " all men 
 are born free and equal, and have certain natural, essential, 
 and inalienable rights ; among which may be reckoned the 
 right of enjoying and defending their lives and liberties." 
 
 Before the adoption of this constitution several unsuccessful 
 attempts had been made to extirpate slavery and the slave- 
 traffic. A bill for that purpose had been introduced in 1767 ; 
 and three measures for the prohibition of the slave-trade had 
 failed to receive executive approval. After the commencement 
 of the war petitions were presented to the legislature in favor 
 of emancipation. Among these petitions was one presented 
 in 1777 by several colored persons, praying that they might 
 
ABOLITION AND ABOLITION SOCIETIES. 21 
 
 " be restored to the enjoyment of that freedom which is the 
 natural right of all men." It was referred to a committee, 
 which promptly reported a bill " to prevent the practice of 
 holding persons in slavery." It declared that " the practice 
 of holding Africans, and the children born of them, or any 
 other person in slavery is unjustifiable in a civil government 
 at a time when they are asserting their natural rights to free 
 dom." Before acting upon this bill, the legislature, fearing to 
 give offence to some of the States, addressed a letter to the 
 Continental Congress to ascertain its views concerning the 
 expediency of such action. In this letter they say : " Con 
 vinced of the justice of the measure, we are restrained from 
 passing it only from an apprehension that our brethren in the 
 other colonies should conceive there was an impropriety in our 
 determining on a question which may in its nature and opera 
 tion be of extensive influence, without previously consulting 
 your Honors." " And," they continue, " we ask the attention 
 of your Honors to this matter, that, if consistent with the 
 union and harmony of the United States, we may follow the 
 dictates of our own understanding and feelings ; at the same 
 time assuring your Honors that we have such a sacred regard to 
 the union and harmony of the United States as to conceive our 
 selves under obligation to refrain from any measure that should 
 have a tendency to injure that union which is the basis of our 
 defence and happiness." To this communication, breathing 
 the spirit of freedom, the desire to do justly, and their intense 
 anxiety to preserve harmony, and not to break with the other 
 States, no response was returned. 
 
 What, however, Massachusetts failed to effect by direct legis 
 lation was secured indirectly through the decisions of her Su 
 preme Court based on a clause in her Bill of Rights. Cases 
 soon arose involving the question of the legality of slavery under 
 her new constitution in which such eminent lawyers and states 
 men as Levi Lincoln, Caleb Strong, and Theodore Sedgwick 
 were engaged in behalf of those claiming their freedom. By 
 one of these decisions a master had lost ten slaves. In a me 
 morial to the legislature for relief he urged as a reason for his 
 plea that " by the determination of the Supreme Court the said 
 
22 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 clause in the Bill of Rights is so to be construed as to operate 
 to the total discharge and manumission of all negro servants 
 whatsoever." So Massachusetts, while yet the war was raging 
 for national independence, and before that independence was 
 recognized by the treaty of peace, became a free State ; taking 
 her place in the van, a relative position she has honorably 
 maintained, not indeed without some faltering and mistakes, 
 in the long struggle with slavery and the Slave Power. 
 
 In 1780 Pennsylvania, under the lead of George Bryan, and, 
 no doubt, largely influenced by the indefatigable Anthony Bene- 
 zet, who is said to have had a personal conference with every 
 member of her legislature, passed " an act of gradual abolition," 
 by which the importation of slaves was prohibited, and all per 
 sons born or brought into the State were made free. The minor 
 ity, however, entered their protest ; " because," they say, " if the 
 time ever comes when slaves might be safely emancipated, we 
 cannot agree to their being made free citizens in so extensive 
 a manner." These protesting legislators further expressed 
 their belief that the negroes would be satisfied " without giv 
 ing them the right of voting for and being voted into office." 
 In 1784 New Hampshire, like Massachusetts, became a free 
 State by the judicial interpretation of her constitution. 
 
 The Virginia Assembly,, on motion of Jefferson, in 1778, 
 prohibited the further introduction of slaves ; and in 1782 the 
 old colonial statute was repealed, which forbade emancipations 
 except for meritorious services. During this repeal, which 
 continued in force for ten years, a large number of such manu 
 missions took place. It was, however, subsequently re-enacted ; 
 and that source of just and humane individual action, being 
 forcibly stopped, gradually dried up and ceased to flow. Mary 
 land, like Virginia, both prohibited the introduction of slaves 
 and removed the restriction on individual emancipation. 
 
 In the same year, immediately after the close of the war, the 
 Pennsylvania Abolition Society was resuscitated. It had been 
 organized before the Revolution, being the first abolition soci 
 ety ever formed, as it is now the oldest in the world. Its 
 primary purpose was indicated by its name, " The society for 
 the relief of free negroes, unlawfully held in bondage." In its 
 
ABOLITION AND ABOLITION SOCIETIES. 23 
 
 preamble it was stated that many were unlawfully held in bon 
 dage who were "justly entitled to their freedom by the laws 
 and constitution." John Baldwin was its first president. A 
 Committee of Inspection was appointed, whose title, in con 
 nection with the name of the society, sufficiently indicates the 
 functions of their office. During the first year of its existence 
 it was eminently successful in its operations. But the break 
 ing out and progress of the war diverted and absorbed public 
 attention. The active prosecution of its chosen work was 
 mostly suspended, and no meetings were held until the year 
 1784. Although there are no records of its doings, it is 
 not probable that such men were idle during that eventful 
 period. 
 
 Upon its resuscitation the society commenced operations 
 with great vigor, extending them wherever there were evils, 
 incident to slavery, to be remedied or removed. As it became 
 known and appreciated, men eminent for public service became 
 members. In 1787 it revised its constitution, enlarged both 
 its name and range of effort, and became " The Pennsylvania. 
 Society for promoting the abolition of slavery, the relief of free 
 negroes unlawfully held in bondage, and for improving the 
 condition of the African race." The illustrious Franklin was 
 made its president. By accepting this trust and actively 
 discharging its duties, he not only honored himself and the 
 society, but he did much to vindicate his great reputation. 
 By it he showed that among the statesmen of his day he was 
 unseduced by sophistries and compromises, and remained true 
 to the doctrine of human rights and the self-evident truths of 
 the Declaration of Independence. It showed him, too, as dis 
 tinguished for his broad philanthropy as for his practical 
 sagacity ; indeed, that his philanthropy was the highest style 
 and development of that sagacity. 
 
 Thus reorganized and officered, it entered vigorously upon 
 its long and honorable mission. Among its first acts was the 
 distribution of copies of its constitution and the act for the 
 gradual abolition of slavery in Pennsylvania to the governors 
 of the several States. It also opened a correspondence with 
 eminent men in the United States, England, and France. It 
 
24 BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMEEICA. 
 
 was a live society, catholic in its membership, and national and 
 world-wide in the reach and range of its purposes and plans. 
 Thus, learning that vessels were still surreptitiously fitted out 
 in Pennsylvania for the slave-trade, it petitioned the legislature 
 for a supplementary law to prevent it ; and the law was en 
 acted. Hearing that slave-ships were fitted out in Rhode 
 Island for a similar purpose, it at once called the attention of 
 the citizens of that State to the disgraceful traffic. In 1790 it 
 addressed a memorial to Congress, signed by its distinguished 
 president, asking that body to " step to the very verge of its 
 power " in behalf of those held in bondage. Year after year, 
 for almost half a century, it continued to memorialize Congress 
 against oppression, and in the interests of humanity and free 
 dom. It brought a case before the Supreme Court of Pennsyl 
 vania involving the question "whether slavery in any modi 
 fication whatever is not inconsistent with the constitution of 
 the State." Though the decision of the court was adverse, this 
 effort revealed its activity and fidelity. 
 
 Ever on the alert, watching Congress, the State legislature, 
 the courts, and the movements in other States, it was always 
 ready, with remonstrance and advice, pecuniary or moral aid, 
 to help forward the cause for which it was organized. And it 
 was doubtless due to that zeal, watchfulness, and wide-spread 
 influence, that the representatives of Pennsylvania occupied a 
 position so honorable in their devotion to freedom and the 
 claims of humanity during the first twenty years under the 
 Constitution. But in the American Convention of Abolition 
 Societies, in 1804, a decline of interest in the cause of emanci 
 pation was admitted and deplored, and the absence of dele 
 gates and communications from Southern societies was made 
 the subject of regretful allusion. In 1809, after an active ser 
 vice of twenty-five years, it declared that " hitherto the ap 
 proving voice of the community and the liberal interpretation 
 of the laws have smoothed the path of duty and promoted a 
 satisfactory issue to our humane exertions. At present, how 
 ever, the sentiments of our fellow-citizens and the decisions of 
 our courts are less auspicious." 
 
 But, in spite of these inauspicious indications, the Pennsyl- 
 
ABOLITION AND ABOLITION SOCIETIES. 25 
 
 vania Abolition Society toiled bravely on. It made special 
 efforts against kidnapping ; educated and secured homes for 
 colored children. It examined laws respecting colored people, 
 noted their defects, and prepared bills for the legislature. It 
 memorialized Congress on the fugitive-slave law and the slave- 
 trade. In 1818 it examined and condemned the colonization 
 scheme, then just inaugurated. In 1819 it appointed a com 
 mittee to watch the struggle for the admission of Missouri ; 
 and in 1820 it obtained from the government a portion of the 
 school fund for colored children. In the same year it memo 
 rialized the legislature for the total abolition of slavery in that 
 commonwealth. Three years afterward it sent to Congress an 
 elaborate memorial against Southern laws imprisoning colored 
 seamen ; and in 1827 it " succeeded in procuring the erasure 
 of the most obnoxious features " of a fugitive-slave bill intro 
 duced into the State legislature. In 1830 it procured a " sup 
 plementary law" to the act against kidnapping. Under its 
 lead the American Convention met in Baltimore in 1828, and 
 in Washington in 1829. 
 
 In the year 1833 it received a letter from the New Haven 
 Antislavery Society, one of the first of the modern societies on 
 the basis of immediate and unconditional emancipation. This 
 veteran abolition society, which had been the leader in anti- 
 slavery movements for half a century, cordially welcomed its 
 new coadjutor. It took occasion, however, to refer to " the 
 apathy which has so generally pervaded the United States 
 upon this subject," "a state of torpor and insensibility." 
 Referring to the year 1794, when a convention of abolition 
 societies was held in Philadelphia, it said, " Since that time 
 we have seen one after another discontinue its labors, until we 
 were left almost alone." From that time the society has con 
 tinued steadfast in its support of the objects for which it was 
 organized before the formation of the general government. 
 Caring for the lowly ones by such methods as an earnest pur 
 pose and the wisdom of experience suggested, it has ever been 
 mindful of the general interests of emancipation. Though 
 long the acknowledged head of movements for the freedom 
 and elevation of the African race, and long among the faitli' 
 
26 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 less found faithful only itself, yet, when the antislavery cause 
 came up under other auspices, and on a basis more clearly 
 denned, and better adapted to meet the exigencies of the coun 
 try and the race, it gracefully relinquished the lead to those 
 who, with fresher impulses, were but carrying out the aims it 
 had so long and so faithfully pursued. 
 
 The New York Abolition Society was formed in January, 
 1785. Its officers were taken from the most illustrious men 
 of that day in that Commonwealth. John Jay, who had char 
 acterized slavery as a crime of " crimson dye," was chosen 
 president, and Alexander Hamilton secretary. Among its 
 earlier acts was the printing, for gratuitous circulation, of the 
 masterly argument of Dr. Hopkins, contained in his dialogue. 
 The legislature of New York had refused, in 1785, to adopt a 
 system of gradual emancipation. This society petitioned that 
 body year after year, until, in 1799, such an act was passed, 
 declaring all children born thereafter to be free, males on 
 becoming twenty-eight, and females on becoming twenty-five 
 years of age. 
 
 The Rhode Island Society was organized in February, 1789. 
 The first meeting for its formation was held at the house of 
 Dr. Hopkins, at Newport, though the organization was com 
 pleted at Providence. Several gentlemen of Massachusetts, 
 eminent for philanthropy and piety, were members, and a few 
 from other States, among whom was Jonathan Edwards, of 
 Connecticut. Although Rhode Island had provided that all 
 of African descent born after March, 1784, should be free, this 
 society found sufficient scope for its labors in carrying out the 
 objects of its formation, " the abolition of slavery, the relief 
 of persons unlawfully held in bondage, and for improving the 
 condition of the African race." 
 
 In 1790 the Connecticut Abolition Society was formed. Dr. 
 Ezra Stiles, president of Yale College, and Judge Baldwin, 
 were its president and secretary. Though Connecticut, like 
 Rhode Island, had passed an act in 1784 providing for the 
 gradual abolition of slavery, and though there were less than 
 three thousand slaves in the State, yet the strong proslavery 
 feeling and conservative interest which obtained there opened 
 
ABOLITION AND ABOLITION SOCIETIES. 27 
 
 a wide and important field for its service. Numbering among 
 its members some of the best and ablest men of a State which 
 could then boast of many distinguished for their piety, learn 
 ing, and political eminence, it labored with zeal and fidelity. 
 
 It was before this society that Jonathan Edwards the 
 younger, in 1791, proclaimed that " every man who cannot 
 show that his negro hath by his voluntary conduct forfeited 
 his liberty, is obligated immediately to manumit him." Here 
 was clearly promulgated the duty of immediate emancipation, 
 as distinctly as it has ever been enunciated by any antislavery 
 writer, orator, or society before or since. And this is a fact 
 of some significance, as well as of justice, to some of those 
 early pioneers in the cause of emancipation, because of the 
 impression sometimes conveyed that this is a doctrine of more 
 modern origin. Nor were the reasons assigned for this pro 
 nounced and unequivocal opinion less radical and uncompro 
 mising. " To hold a man," he solemnly avowed, " in a state 
 of slavery who has a right to his liberty is to be every day 
 guilty of robbing him of his liberty, or of man-stealing, and is 
 a greater sin in the sight of God' than concubinage or forni 
 cation." 
 
 Language more expressive of the essential wickedness of 
 slavery could hardly be employed. And it is to be remem 
 bered that this was the opinion, not only of one of the leading 
 minds of New England, but of a class of men which held with 
 him the duty of immediate repentance for sin, and of another 
 smaller but highly cultivated class which had accepted the new 
 philosophy of the French school. 
 
 An Abolition Society was formed in New Jersey in 1792, 
 which largely contributed to the extirpation of slavery in that 
 State. Such societies were formed in the more Southern and 
 more proslavery States of Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia. 
 Belonging to them and their auxiliaries were some of their 
 most eminent jurists and statesmen. They labored earnestly, 
 and looked forward hopefully to the day, then generally antici 
 pated, when slavery would yield to the benign influences of 
 the Christian religion and of republican institutions, and pass 
 away. 
 
28 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 The Baltimore Abolition Society declared the objects of its 
 association to be founded in " reason and humanity," and on 
 " an avowed enmity to slavery in every form." The Virginia 
 Abolition Society was equally clear and explicit in its avowal 
 that righteousness exalteth a nation ; and that slavery is not 
 only an odious degradation, but an outrageous violation of one 
 of the most essential rights of human nature, and utterly " re 
 pugnant to the precepts of the Gospel." 
 
 These early abolition societies embraced in their member 
 ship some of the purest philanthropists, the ripest scholars, 
 most eminent jurists and the honored statesmen of that age. 
 They were deeply imbued with the spirit of liberty, and were 
 loyal to the precepts of Christianity. Ever zealous, earnest, 
 and devoted, they labored effectively in the cause of emanci 
 pation and of the general elevation of the African race. For 
 several years national conventions, in which these societies 
 were represented, were annually held. Earnest arguments 
 and appeals were made by these conventions to Congress, to 
 the State legislatures, to the free people of color, and to the 
 country, to aid in the suppression of the slave-trade, the repeal 
 of inhuman statutes, the protection of free persons of color, and 
 the promotion of the general interests of freedom. 
 
 The antislavery National Convention of 1795 addressed 
 South Carolina, Georgia, and the people of the United States. 
 The address to South Carolina was written by Jonathan Ed 
 wards the younger, a delegate from Connecticut. In that ad 
 dress he made an earnest appeal in favor of " a numerous class 
 of men existing among them deprived of their natural rights 
 and forcibly held in bondage." He called upon them to amel 
 iorate their condition, and to diffuse knowledge among them. 
 He declared, as a necessary consequence of the traffic in man, 
 that " the minds of our citizens are debased and their hearts 
 hardened by contemplating these people only through the me 
 dium of avarice or prejudice." 
 
 In the address to the people of the United States the 
 Convention distinctly avowed its design to be " the univer 
 sal emancipation of the wretched Africans who were yet in 
 bondage." It thus appealed to the people of all the States : 
 
ABOLITION AND ABOLITION SOCIETIES. 29 
 
 " We cannot forbear expressing to you our earnest desire that 
 you will continue without ceasing to endeavor, by every method 
 in your power which can promise any success, to procure either 
 an absolute repeal of all the laws in your State which counte 
 nance slavery, or such an amelioration of them as will grad 
 ually produce an entire abolition. Yet, even should that great 
 end be happily attained, it cannot put a period to the necessity 
 of further labor. The education of the emancipated the no 
 blest and most arduous task which we have to perform will 
 require all our wisdom and virtue, and the constant exercise 
 of the greatest skill and discretion. When we have broken 
 his chains, and restored the African to the enjoyment of his 
 rights, the great work of justice and benevolence is not accom 
 plished. The new-born citizen must receive that instruction, 
 and those powerful impressions of moral and religious truth, 
 which will render him capable and desirous of fulfilling the 
 various duties he owes to himself and to his country. By edu 
 cating some in the higher branches of science, and all in the 
 useful parts of learning, and in the precepts of religion and 
 morality, we shall not only do away the reproach and calumny 
 so unjustly lavished upon us, but confound the enemies of truth 
 by evincing that the unhappy sons of Africa, in spite of the 
 degrading influence of slavery, are in no wise inferior to the 
 more fortunate inhabitants of Europe and America." 
 
 The Convention, in these thorough and radical sentiments, 
 unquestionably represented the views, principles, and purposes 
 of the abolition societies of those days. As a mode of action, 
 they recommended periodical discourses " on the subject of 
 slavery and the means of its abolition " ; and they supported 
 their recommendation by considerations not often exceeded in 
 thoroughness, cogency, and forcible expression. " If to many 
 persons," they say, " who continue the hateful practice of en 
 slaving their fellow-men, were often applied the force of reason 
 and the persuasion of eloquence, they might be awakened to a 
 sense of their injustice and startled with horror at the enor 
 mity of their conduct." 
 
 While enlightened, liberal, and Christian statesmen and phi 
 lanthropists believed with Franklin that slavery was " an atro- 
 
30 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 cious debasement of human nature," and desired with Washing 
 ton to see some plan adopted by which it " could be abolished 
 by law," there was a powerful class, especially in the Carolinas 
 and Georgia, that actively and persistently resisted everything 
 that tended to the destruction of a system which secured to 
 them wealth, social distinction, and political power. It is in 
 deed true, that the best portion of the cultivated and Chris 
 tian mind of that day saw the essential injustice and enormity 
 of slavery, and the duty of its discontinuance, as clearly as 
 they have ever been seen since. But the uneducated and 
 unreflecting masses, taking counsel of their feelings of indo 
 lence and avarice, and of those induced, in the language of 
 Jefferson, by their " quiet and monotonous course of colonial 
 life," largely influenced and led, too, by the dominant class, had 
 little sympathy with these abstract ideas of right, justice, and 
 humanity, and little disposition to legislate in harmony with 
 them. Mr. Jefferson wrote, near the close of life, that he 
 " soon saw that nothing was to be hoped from such " ; and he 
 added that, at the first or second session of the, Virginia legis 
 lature, of which he himself was a member, Colonel Bland, " one 
 of the oldest, ablest, and most respectable members, was de 
 nounced as an enemy to his country, and was treated with the 
 greatest indecorum," for moving " a moderate protection of 
 the laws to these people." 
 
 Although the leading men of Virginia Washington, Jef 
 ferson, Henry, and Mason were hostile to slavery, and were 
 pronounced emancipationists, yet so powerful and despotic was 
 the slaveholding class, and so indifferent were the masses of 
 the people, that Washington, writing to Lafayette in 1785, 
 only two years after the close of the war fought in the name of 
 human equality, confessed that " petitions for the abolition of 
 slavery presented to the Virginia legislature could scarcely 
 obtain a hearing." Thus it happened that the same people, 
 speaking in the language of their most humane and culti 
 vated men, divines, philanthropists, statesmen, and illus 
 trious Revolutionary leaders, uttered the clear, ringing 
 words of liberty ; while by their legislation, under the malign 
 influence of slavery, they gave the lie to these utterances 
 and framed iniquity into law. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES. ORDINANCE OF 1787. 
 
 Public Domain. Cessions of Territory by the States. Mr. Jefferson's proposed 
 Inhibition of Slavery in the Territories. Ordinance of 1787, reported by Na 
 than Dane. Adopted by Congress. Sanctioned by First Congress under the 
 Constitution. Efforts to suspend it in Indiana. Blessings of the Ordi 
 nance of 1787. Cessions of North Carolina and Georgia, with Limitations 
 concerning Slavery. The Mississippi Territory. Debate on Mr. Thatcher's 
 Antislavery Amendment. 
 
 THE Treaty of Peace, by which the independence of the thir 
 teen British Colonies was acknowledged, was signed at Paris 
 on the 30th of November, 1782. Beyond the western boun 
 daries of the States, and between the 31st and 47th parallels of 
 latitude, lay a vast and fertile territory, conceded to be em 
 braced within the limits of the new Republic. Not only were 
 these rich lands looked to as a source of revenue for the pay 
 ment of the debt incurred in the War of Independence, but 
 the far-seeing statesmen of that day saw that States carved 
 from this territory would exert a powerful, if not controlling 
 influence in shaping the destinies of the country. To the 
 future of the United States it was then a question of tran 
 scendent importance whether it should be organized into free 
 or slave States. Hence, among the first measures of the Con 
 tinental Congress, after the British forces had left the country, 
 was an effort to fix the condition of this immense public 
 domain. 
 
 The States of Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Vir 
 ginia, North Carolina, and Georgia each claimed severally, 
 under their respective charters, a portion of this territory. 
 These claims were warmly opposed by the landless States, 
 which justly held that this territory had been conjointly won, 
 and should therefore inure to the common benefit. 
 
32 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 On the first day of March, 1784, Mr. Jefferson presented to 
 the Continental Congress, then assembled in Annapolis, a deed 
 of cession of all the lands claimed by Virginia northwest of 
 the Ohio River. A select committee was appointed, consisting 
 of himself, Mr. Chase of Maryland, and Mr. Howell of Rhode 
 Island ; and this committee reported a plan for the govern 
 ment of the territory ceded, or to be ceded. This plan con 
 templated its ultimate division into seventeen States. It was 
 therein provided that, " after the year of the Christian era 
 1800, there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude 
 in any of these States, otherwise than in the punishment of 
 crime, whereof the party shall have been duly convicted." 
 
 This provision was stricken out on motion of Mr. Spaight 
 of North Carolina, seconded by Mr. Read of South Carolina. 
 It required the votes of nine States to retain it as a part of the 
 ordinance. Only six voted for it, New Hampshire, Massa 
 chusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, and Pennsyl 
 vania. Maryland, Virginia, and South Carolina voted against 
 it. North Carolina was divided. Delaware and Georgia were 
 not present. Mr. Dick of New Jersey voted to retain it ; but 
 as two members were required to give the vote of a State, that 
 State was not represented in the vote. Though sixteen mem 
 bers voted for the prohibition of slavery, and only seven voted 
 against it, yet then, as so often since, slavery, though in a 
 lean minority, gained a victory that should have fallen to the 
 other side. This important measure would have saved to 
 freedom not only the territory of the Northwest, but also Ken 
 tucky, Tennessee, Alabama, and Mississippi. 
 
 In March, 1785, Rufus King, a delegate from Massachusetts, 
 moved to modify the report made at the previous session, by 
 inserting therein a total and immediate prohibition of slavery ; 
 but his motion failed. In July, 1787, a committee, of which 
 Nathan Dane of Massachusetts was chairman, reported an 
 ordinance for the territory northwest of the Ohio, in which 
 there should be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude. 
 With it there was, however, a stipulation for the rendition of 
 fugitive slaves. This ordinance which consecrated to free 
 dom the fertile territory covered now by the great States of 
 
SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES. ORDINANCE OF 1787. 33 
 
 Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin was passed 
 on the 13th of July, 1787 ; every State voting for it, Mr. Yates 
 of New York alone voting against it. 
 
 In July, 1789, Mr. Fitzsimmons of Pennsylvania reported 
 in the House of Representatives a bill for the government of 
 the territory northwest of the Ohio River, which passed both 
 houses without opposition. This act gave the emphatic sanc 
 tion of the first Congress under the Constitution to the ordi 
 nance of 1787, prohibiting forever slavery in the territory north 
 west of the Ohio. 
 
 But, notwithstanding this prohibition was so solemnly and 
 with such unanimity adopted, the most persistent efforts were 
 subsequently made to give slavery a foothold in that region. 
 After the admission of Ohio as a free State, the remainder of 
 that territory was organized under the name of the Territory 
 of Indiana. Most of its settlers, coming from the slavehold- 
 ing States, with their former tastes, habits, and prejudices, 
 soon memorialized Congress for a temporary suspension of 
 the ordinance. The convention which sent this memorial was 
 held in 1802. Its presiding officer was Governor William 
 Henry Harrison, afterward President of the United States. 
 The memorial was referred by the House to a select commit 
 tee, of which John Randolph, the brilliant but erratic Virgin 
 ian, was chairman. This committee reported that it was 
 " highly dangerous and inexpedient to impair a provision 
 wisely calculated to promote the happiness and prosperity of 
 the Northern country." No action was taken, as the session 
 terminated the following day. 
 
 In the next Congress the subject was referred to a commit 
 tee of which Caesar Rodney of Delaware afterward Attor 
 ney-General of the United States was made chairman, and 
 it reported in favor of a suspension of the antislavery restric 
 tion for a limited time. Early in February, 1806, James M. 
 Garnett of Virginia, from a select committee, made a like 
 report, though, as in the previous case, no action was taken. 
 Another committee was appointed during the next year, of 
 which Mr. Parke, a delegate from the Territory, was chairman, 
 to which was referred a letter from Governor Harrison, with 
 
34 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 resolves from the Territorial legislature, favoring a temporary 
 suspension of the inhibition. On the 12th of February this 
 committee reported that the ordinance be suspended for ten 
 years from the 1st of January, 1808. Though this was the 
 third report proposing a temporary suspension of the ordinance 
 of 1787, Congress took no action upon either. 
 
 Governor Harrison and the legislature again united in a like 
 request, though at this time a portion of the inhabitants 
 remonstrated against granting it. The subject in the Senate 
 was referred to a select committee, consisting of Franklin 
 of North Carolina, Kitchell of New Jersey, and Tiffin of 
 Ohio. On the 13th of November, 1807, this committee re 
 ported a resolve, declaring it not expedient to suspend the 
 sixth article of the compact for the government of the terri 
 tory northwest of the Ohio. This report closed the efforts 
 made by an undoubted majority of the people of the Territory 
 to be at least temporarily relieved from the operation of this 
 ordinance. In this struggle it is to be noted that they had the 
 effective support and hearty co-operation of General Harrison, 
 their governor, whom the nation with so much enthusiasm 
 bore into the Presidential chair in 1840. Had their wishes 
 prevailed, however, and those imperial States been lost to free 
 dom, who can estimate the increased dangers that would have 
 imperilled the nation and darkened its pathway? Who can 
 comprehend the aggravated difficulties which would have 
 attended the then future, but now accomplished, work of 
 emancipation ? There is little danger of overestimating the 
 benefits which the ordinance of 1787 has conferred on the 
 Northwest, or the measureless perils from which it saved the 
 land. Its enactment must ever stand as one of the great 
 events of American history, one of the most important achieve 
 ments in behalf of freedom. 
 
 Virginia having retained her claim to the Territory of Ken 
 tucky, into which many of her citizens had taken their slaves, 
 a new slave State was early carved out of it and added to the 
 Union. North Carolina, too, laid claim to Western territory, 
 but ceded Tennessee, in 1789, upon the condition that " no 
 regulation made or to be made by Congress should tend to 
 
SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES. ORDINANCE OF 1787. 35 
 
 the emancipation of slaves." This deed of cession was laid 
 before the Senate in the winter of 1790, and referred to a 
 committee, of which Oliver Ellsworth, afterward Chief Justice 
 of the Supreme Court, was chairman. He reported a bill 
 accepting the cession, and providing that the ordinance for the 
 government of the Northwest Territory should be applied to 
 this cession, excepting, however, the clause prohibiting slav 
 ery. The bill passed the Senate without division ; was briefly 
 debated in the House, and concurred in with little opposition. 
 Slavery had already entered the Territory ; and Congress, con 
 senting with more or less reluctance to the hard conditions 
 imposed, gave assent to its continuance. 
 
 Georgia claimed the territory forming subsequently the 
 States of Alabama and Mississippi. She did not promptly 
 follow the example of her sister States in ceding her terri 
 torial claims to the general government ; as her cession was 
 not made until the 2d of April, 1802, and then upon the per 
 emptory condition that the ordinance of 1787 " shall, in all 
 its parts, extend to the territory contained in the present ces 
 sion, the article only excepted which forbids slavery." 
 
 Although Georgia had not previously relinquished her claim 
 to the Mississippi territory, still settlements had been made 
 there, and the duty was imposed upon Congress of legislating 
 for the government of the people of that region. In March, 
 1798, the House of Representatives proceeded to the consid 
 eration of the bill for the government of that Territory. It 
 expressly provided that a government similar in all respects to 
 that of the Northwestern Territory should be established, the 
 inhibition of slavery only excepted. Mr. Thatcher of Massa 
 chusetts remarking that he intended to make a motion touch 
 ing the rights of man, moved to strike out the excepting 
 clause. Mr. Harper of South Carolina said that this was not 
 a legitimate mode of supporting the rights of man. The 
 regulation prohibiting slavery in the Northwest was proper; 
 but it would not be so in Mississippi. It would be a decree 
 of the banishment of all persons settled there, and a decree 
 of the exclusion of all persons intending to go there. Mr. 
 Varnum, of Massachusetts, afterward Speaker of the House, 
 
36 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 declared that Mr. Harper's remarks showed that he did not 
 wish to support the rights of all men ; for " where there was 
 a disposition to retain a part of our species in slavery there 
 could not be proper respect for the rights of mankind." He 
 looked upon the practice of holding blacks in slavery in this 
 country to be equally criminal with the practice of the Alger- 
 ines in carrying American citizens into slavery. Mr. Rut- 
 ledge wished Mr. Thatcher to withdraw his motion. He 
 remarked that one gentleman called these men " property " ; 
 another said, " you hold these men in chains " ; and another 
 declared, " you violate the rights of man," and wished to 
 know if these men were not property, and held as such by the 
 Spanish government. 
 
 Mr. Otis of Massachusetts an early representative of that 
 class of Northern politicians who have always existed in suf 
 ficient numbers to betray their section in an emergency, and 
 give to slavery the victory expressed the hope that Mr. 
 Thatcher would not withdraw his amendment. He desired, 
 he said, that " an opportunity might be given to gentlemen 
 who came from the North to manifest that it was not their 
 disposition to interfere with the South in regard to that species 
 of property." He thought, he said, and thus invited the 
 very violence he seemed to deprecate, that if the amend 
 ment was adopted that no slavery should exist in the territory 
 it would be not only a sentence of banishment, but of war ; 
 that an immediate insurrection would take place, and that the 
 inhabitants would not be suffered to retire, but would be mas 
 sacred on the spot. 
 
 Mr. Foster, of the same State, thought that if the amend 
 ment was not withdrawn, a long debate might be had upon it. 
 To these remarks o*f his colleagues Mr. Thatcher replied that 
 he should not withdraw his motion. Believing his course to 
 be just, the more it was opposed the more obstinate he should 
 be in its support. Mr. Giles of Virginia then made the sug 
 gestion, often repeated since, that if the slaves of other States 
 were permitted to go to the Western States, and thus spread 
 themselves over a larger territory, there would be a greater 
 prospect of ameliorating their condition. Mr. Hartley of 
 
SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES. ORDINANCE OF 1787. 37 
 
 Pennsylvania felt compelled to. vote against the amendment, 
 although he desired to gratify the wishes of philanthropists 
 by doing away with the system of slavery altogether. 
 
 Mr. Gallatin of Pennsylvania, a gentleman of great learn 
 ing and capacity, who afterward rendered signal service to his 
 country as a financier and diplomatist, maintained that the 
 amendment striking out the provision of the bill which allowed 
 slavery in the Territory, could not be rejected for want of juris 
 diction. He confessed he could not see how forbidding slavery 
 in Mississippi could affect it in South Carolina, any more than 
 forbidding it in the Northwest Territory. If the amendment 
 was rejected, slavery was established for that country, not only 
 during its temporary government, but during all the time it 
 should be a State. The number of slaves would become so 
 large, by constant increase, that when the Territory became a 
 State the slaveholders would be able to secure a constitution 
 recognizing and protecting slavery, and thereby making it per 
 manent. Having determined that slavery would be bad policy 
 for the Northwest Territory, he saw no reason for a contrary 
 determination in respect to the Mississippi Territory. 
 
 Mr. Nicholas of Virginia thought that the rejection of the 
 amendment would be not only for the interest of the Territory, 
 but of the United States. But Mr. Thatcher firmly declared 
 that he could never be brought to believe that an individual 
 could have a right in anything that tended to the destruction 
 of the government ; that he could have a right in any wrong, 
 as " property in slaves was founded in wrong, and never could 
 be right." Slavery " must be put a stop to ; and the sooner it 
 was begun the better." The amendment was lost, only twelve 
 members voting for it. The bill, however, was amended, on 
 motion of Mr. Harper, so as to prohibit the introduction of 
 slavery into the Territory from beyond the limits of the United 
 States. 
 
 In this, the first debate in Congress on the question of per 
 mitting or excluding slavery in the Territories, members emi 
 nent as jurists and statesmen participated. Although they 
 entertained different views of its expediency, none of them 
 questioned or doubted its constitutionality. The power of Con- 
 
38 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 gress to prohibit slavery in the Territories was then conceded 
 by the statesmen of the South as well as by the statesmen of 
 the North. The dogma of " no power in Congress to prohibit 
 slavery in the Territories " had not then been invented. 
 
 By this legislation the character of all the territory of the 
 United States was then fixed. Mr. Jefferson's proposition, 
 made in 1784, would have prohibited slavery after 1800 in all 
 that territory. It has ever been a source of profound regret 
 to the friends of freedom that his proposition failed. In the 
 light of subsequent events, however, it is not at all clear that 
 more would have been gained to freedom by its adoption than 
 was secured by Mr. Dane's ordinance, which only applied to 
 the Territory northwest of the Ohio River. Had slavery been 
 allowed in the Northwest Territory till the year 1800, a more 
 powerful and persistent effort and perhaps one more success 
 ful would have been made for its retention than was actually 
 made by the emigrants from the South and the few old French 
 settlers, who, in spite of the ordinance, retained some in ser 
 vitude, and strove to legalize the system temporarily, and make, 
 if possible, Indiana and Illinois slave States. 
 
 After the adoption of the Constitution the slaveholding class, 
 from the Potomac to the Gulf, rapidly increased in wealth, 
 social influence, and political power. Emigrants from those 
 States settled the Territory south of the Ohio, and carried to 
 that region the habits, prejudices, and interests of their section. 
 They might have taken their slaves with them, made slave 
 laws and constitutions, and sought admission into the Union. 
 Perhaps the ordinance itself might have been temporarily, par 
 tially, or wholly set aside by the slaveholding class, which ob 
 tained control of the Federal government at the beginning of 
 the century, and held it for two generations. While Mr. Jef 
 ferson's proviso might and probably would have failed to secure 
 to freedom the territory south of the Ohio, it might have im 
 perilled it in the territory northwest of that river. Mr. Dane's 
 ordinance of 1787 probably won for freedom all that could have 
 been securely held, and will ever stand as one of the grandest 
 achievements in American history. 
 
CHAPTER IY. 
 
 COMPROMISES OF THE CONSTITUTION. SLAVE REPRESENTATION. 
 SLAVE-TRADE. RENDITION OF FUGITIVE SLAVES. 
 
 The Failure of the Confederation. Distress and Discontent of the People. 
 Assembling of the Convention to frame a Constitution. Difficulties and Dan 
 gers. Antagonism between Freedom and Slavery. Basis of Representation. 
 
 Debates thereon. Northern and Southern Parties developed. Slave- 
 holding Interest successful. Committee of Detail. Duties on Exports . 
 Regulation of Commerce. Slave-trade. South Carolina and Georgia demand 
 its Continuance. The Bargain. Slave Representation. Slave-trade to be 
 continued Twenty Years. Rendition of Fugitive Slaves. The Compromise. 
 
 The Slave Power developed. 
 
 WHEN the British forces had been withdrawn from the 
 country, the American army disbanded, and then, the common 
 danger removed, other evils revealed themselves and other 
 dangers menaced. The people were deeply embarrassed by 
 public and private indebtedness, by a depreciated currency, 
 and by the general derangement of business, resulting from 
 an exhausting warfare with the first power of the globe. It 
 became almost impossible to enforce the collection of debts or 
 to maintain public order. The distress and discontent of the 
 people revealed themselves in forcible attempts to obstruct the 
 action of the judicial tribunals, while the public disorders 
 threatened anarchy and civil war. Then, too, the Confedera 
 tion, which had so signally failed to command fully the resour 
 ces of the country during the war, more clearly manifested its 
 weakness. Then the statesmen and soldiers, whose wisdom 
 and valor had carried the country through the Revolution, 
 were profoundly concerned at the grave and ominous aspect of 
 national affairs. Under this pressure of difficulties arid dan 
 gers, which threatened to defeat and destroy much of what 
 had been gained and won by the blood and treasure, the hard- 
 
40 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ships and hazards of the contest, a convention was called to 
 revise the Articles of Confederation ; and it gave the country 
 the Constitution of the United States. 
 
 The convention assembled at Philadelphia in May, 1787. 
 It was a body of men of marked ability and large experience 
 in public affairs. It embraced many of the Revolutionary 
 leaders, from both council-chamber and field, while among 
 its younger members were several who at once took rank 
 among the foremost public men of the new Republic. Nor did 
 their abilities exceed their necessities, or transcend the greatness 
 of the occasion. To make " a more perfect union " of States 
 so widely scattered on a narrow strip of the Atlantic coast, so 
 diverse in origin and history, so alien in spirit and purpose, 
 so jealous of their own interests and fearful of the encroach 
 ments of others, impoverished and distressed by war, might 
 reasonably be expected to disclose difficulties of the gravest 
 import. In forming such a general government, of States so 
 unequal in territory, population, and wealth, there would nat 
 urally exist not merely the general rehictance to relinquish 
 their individual prerogatives as independent States, but also 
 the fear of the larger States, that in the government their 
 influence would not be commensurate with their relative size, 
 while the smaller States would hardly be satisfied with a share 
 graduated by any such standard. Their history immediately 
 preceding the assembling of the convention had but aggra 
 vated this natural tendency. State rights had been vigilantly 
 guarded, and State power reluctantly relinquished to the Con 
 tinental Congress, even under the pressing exigencies of war. 
 State pride, too, was intense ; State rivalries and jealousies 
 were active. Consequently, the more thoughtful members of 
 the convention apprehended that the main hindrances in the 
 way of success would spring from such sources, indeed, 
 that the great difficulty would be to reconcile the differences 
 between the larger and smaller States. The result, however, 
 revealed the fact that all these difficulties were, if not lost, 
 overshadowed by another issue far more serious and threaten 
 ing. The real obstacle was found in the antagonism between 
 freedom and slavery, between the States which had accepted 
 
COMPROMISES OF THE CONSTITUTION. 41 
 
 and were accepting the former and the States which clung 
 with such persistent determination to the latter. Indeed, we 
 have the statement of Mr. Madison himself that " the institu 
 tion of slavery and its consequences furnished the line of dis 
 crimination." Nor, in the lights of the present day and the 
 revelations of the nation's subsequent history, is this at all 
 surprising. 
 
 The theory of human equality had been enunciated by the 
 first Continental Congress, and proclaimed in the deathless 
 words of the Declaration of Independence. It had been incor 
 porated into the Bills of Rights of several of the States, and 
 had been illustrated by the judicial proceedings of several of 
 their courts. It was held by some of the most eminent mem 
 bers of the convention, and also by other leading statesmen of 
 that era. But there came into this convention of illustrious 
 men, assembled to frame a constitution for a Christian nation, a 
 powerful minority believing in and representing chattel slavery. 
 In that crisis of the country, when its very existence was 
 in peril, and the only alternative seemed to be a constitution 
 or anarchy, that minority made it a condition precedent to 
 their assent that the convention should comply with the 
 exactions of the slaveholding interest. The representatives 
 of that interest, able, arbitrary, and adroit, taking ad 
 vantage of the necessities of the country, wrung from the 
 convention fatal concessions, which then and thereafter 
 trammelled the hand of Liberty and armed the hand of 
 Slavery. 
 
 The framers of the Constitution have been sharply criticised 
 for their concessions to the slaveholding interest. These con 
 cessions, in direct antagonism with the doctrines of human 
 rights so grandly proclaimed in the Declaration of Indepen 
 dence, greatly embarrassed them then, and have been used with 
 fatal force by the Slave Power in its dominating and aggres 
 sive career since. But posterity, remembering the fearful stress 
 of circumstances under which those concessions were made, 
 and recalling the significant question of Alexander Hamilton, 
 "Is it possible to deliberate between anarchy and confusion 
 on one side, and the chance of good on the other ? " will min- 
 
42 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 gle large charity with its censure. Whatever may be the 
 judgments of coming generations, removed from the disturb 
 ing and distorting influences of the past and present hour, arid 
 occupying a higher plane of thought and feeling, concerning 
 the framers of the Constitution and their concessions to the 
 Slave Power under the terrible pressure to which they were 
 subjected, it does not become the men of later times, who have 
 made compromise after compromise, far greater sacrifices of 
 principle, and far more guilty concessions, with but a tithe of 
 that pressure resting upon them, to reproach them. Whoever 
 else may be, they are not the men to cast stones. 
 
 There was a great struggle in the convention touching the 
 basis of representation in Congress, in which the question 
 of slavery largely mingled. It originated in the strife be 
 tween the larger and smaller States, the latter contending for 
 an equal and the former for a proportional representation. The 
 Virginia plan proposed to base the representation on free inhab 
 itants and three fifths of all other persons. Twice the conven 
 tion voted in favor of a proportional representation. Having 
 failed to secure an equal representation in the House, the party 
 representing the smaller States made a strenuous effort to 
 secure an equality of representation in the Senate ; but the 
 proposition was defeated by a tie vote. The State-rights mem 
 bers, being defeated, manifested much dissatisfaction. 
 
 On motion of Mr. Sherman of Connecticut, a committee of 
 conference of one from each State was appointed. In this 
 committee Franklin proposed that the States should be equally 
 represented in the Senate ; while for the House the Virginia 
 proposition should be adopted, allowing one representative for 
 forty thousand inhabitants, slaves being counted in the ratio 
 of three fifths. 
 
 It having been determined that the States should not be 
 equally represented in the House, new questions arose, and 
 new divisions and parties were developed. A committee, con 
 sisting of Morris, Gorham, King, Randolph, and Rutledge, re 
 ported a proposition that future representation should be dis 
 tributed among the States in a compound proportion of wealth 
 and numbers. This report was referred to a committee of one 
 
SLAVE REPRESENTATION. 43 
 
 from each State ; and this committee reported the temporary 
 apportionment finally introduced into the Constitution, with a 
 House of sixty-five members. Future apportionments, how 
 ever, could not be easily determined. 
 
 Mr. Patterson of New Jersey, one of the leaders of the party 
 of State Rights, opposed the representation of slaves, because 
 it afforded an " indirect encouragement of the slave-trade." 
 He said that Congress, in its acts concerning the quota of troops, 
 was ashamed to use the word " slave," and substituted a descrip 
 tion. He could look upon slaves in no other light than as prop 
 erty, and strenuously opposed their representation. In reply, 
 Mr. Madison admitted the soundness of the general principle, 
 but thought it should forever silence the claims of the small 
 States ; and he suggested that the House should be based on 
 the whole number of free inhabitants, and the Senate, which 
 represented property, on the whole number, including slaves. 
 
 Mr. King expressed the opinion that the Southern States, 
 being the richest, would not league themselves with the North 
 ern unless some attention was paid to their wealth. It was 
 proposed by Mr. Eandolph that the future apportionments 
 should be regulated by a periodical census. It was then 
 moved, as a substitute, by Mr. Williamson of North Carolina, 
 to reckon in the census the freemen, and three fifths of all 
 other persons. It was strenuously insisted by Pierce Butler 
 and Charles C. Pinckney, of South Carolina, that slaves should 
 be counted like all other persons. Mr. Williamson's proposi 
 tion was supported by Mr. Gorham and Mr. Gerry, of Massa 
 chusetts. It was insisted by Mr. Butler that the labor of a 
 slave in South Carolina is as productive as that of a freeman 
 in Massachusetts ; that slaves are as valuable to the nation 
 as freemen, and that an equal representation ought to be 
 allowed. 
 
 Mr. Mason of Virginia thought slaves ought not to be ex 
 cluded in the basis of representation ; but that they were not 
 equal to freemen. The three-fifths clause was stoutly opposed 
 by Mr. Morris, as "an encouragement to the slave-trade, an 
 injustice to human nature." Mr. Wilson of Pennsylvania was 
 apprehensive that the people of his State would be disgusted 
 
44 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 V 
 
 by this " blending of blacks and whites." He thought, if slaves 
 were admitted as citizens, they should be admitted on an equal 
 ity with other citizens ; but if as property, then, he asked, why 
 not admit them as other property ? Mr. Butler's amendment 
 to count slaves equally with free persons was lost, Delaware, 
 South Carolina, and Georgia only voting for it. Mr. William 
 son's substitute, basing the House on a periodical census of the 
 inhabitants, slaves being counted in the ratio of three fifths, 
 was defeated, Massachusetts, New Jersey, Delaware, Mary 
 land, and South Carolina voting against it. South Carolina 
 voted against it because she demanded an equal representation 
 for slaves. The proposition of Mr. Randolph for a periodical 
 census was also defeated. It was then unanimously agreed, 
 on motion of Mr. Morris, that taxation should be in proportion 
 to representation. 
 
 Up to this point, though the struggle had been sharp, slavery 
 had rather lost than gained. The three propositions to count 
 the slaves according to their numbers, to count them in the ratio 
 of three fifths, and to have a periodical census taken had 
 been lost. The proposition now before the convention was to 
 base all future apportionments upon the compound ratio of 
 wealth and numbers. As parliamentary eloquence and tactics 
 had not succeeded, something more stringent was demanded. 
 The soft words of persuasion had failed ; the virtue of stones 
 must be tried. The ever-present and ever-potent argument of 
 the plantation the whip must be put in requisition. Nor 
 did it fail. The recusant members were at once brought to 
 terms, and the fatal lesson was taught and learned which was 
 not forgotten for nearly three quarters of a century. 
 
 General Davie of North Carolina, who had been a silent 
 member to that time, arose and emphatically declared, " It is 
 time to speak out. I see," he said, " that it is meant by 
 some gentlemen to deprive the Southern States of any repre 
 sentation of their blacks. I am sure that North Carolina will 
 never confederate on any terms that do not rate them at least as 
 three fifths. If the Eastern States mean to exclude them alto 
 gether, then the business is at an end." The menace was 
 effective, and secured at once what no amount of debate ha<7 
 
SLAVE KEPRESENTATION. 45 
 
 accomplished. Mr. Johnson of Connecticut at once arose 
 and hastened to declare that the whole population should be 
 counted. Mr. Randolph renewed the proposition to count 
 slaves as three fifths in the basis of representation. The prop 
 osition was now carried, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Mary 
 land, Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia voting for it ; New 
 Jersey and Delaware opposing it ; while Massachusetts and 
 South Carolina divided. By this vote it was provided that the 
 half a million slaves in the five Southern States, and their in 
 crease in coming years, should be counted in the basis of rep 
 resentation in the House, and in the Electoral College, in the 
 ratio of three fifths. 
 
 Thus, by this most illogical measure, by which votes were 
 given, in effect, to a portion of the community from which not 
 only the right of citizenship, but all rights, were studiously 
 withheld, and these votes not to be cast by themselves, and 
 for their benefit, but by their masters, for their injury, large 
 power was placed in the hands of the slaveholding class, which 
 was long used with terrible effect for its aggrandizement and 
 the nation's harm. In many of the sharply contested and 
 evenly balanced struggles between the friends and foes of free 
 dom it gave the latter the needed majority and turned the 
 scale against the cause of justice. In the great struggle of 
 1820, to make Missouri free, it gave to slavery its victory ; and 
 in that of 1854, to remove the landmarks of freedom, its 
 power for evil was equally decisive. In 1800 it decided the 
 presidential election, and gave it to the slaveholding Democ 
 racy, and thus enthroned the Slave Power in the General 
 Government, from which it was never dislodged until the elec 
 tion of Mr. Lincoln. 
 
 On the 24th of July a Committee of Detail was appointed, 
 consisting of Rutledge, Randolph, Gorham, Ellsworth, and 
 Wilson. To this committee was referred the work of the con 
 vention, embodied in twenty-three resolutions, and the proposi 
 tions offered by Mr. Charles Pinckney of South Carolina, and 
 also of Mr. Patterson of New Jersey. Mr. Charles C. Pinck 
 ney, one of the most eminent men of that age, the very em 
 bodiment and exponent of the rising Slave Power, perhaps 
 
46 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 emboldened by the success of the member from North Caro 
 lina, rose and pronounced another ultimatum of Southern de 
 mands. He reminded the convention that if it did not provide 
 proper security for Southern interests he should vote against 
 whatever report the committee should bring in. In other 
 words, it was a notice to the convention that the South would 
 demand not only an enumeration of slaves in the basis of 
 representation, but the right to continue their importation 
 without taxation, and such other guaranties as the exigencies 
 of their peculiar institution demanded. 
 
 On the 6th of August the Committee of Detail brought in 
 its report. It was in substance a sketch of the Constitution 
 as finally adopted. It provided that no duty should be laid 
 on exports, and that no navigation acts should be passed 
 except by a two-thirds vote. The importation of slaves was 
 not to be prohibited ; neither was any tax to be imposed upon 
 such importation. Those provisions were wholly in the inter 
 est of the slaveholders. The exports of rice, tobacco, and 
 indigo products of slave labor were not to be taxed. 
 Slaves were to be imported untaxed and without hindrance 
 from the Federal government. Foreign vessels were to 
 enter Southern ports and carry Southern products unembar 
 rassed by any discriminating duties in favor of Northern 
 shipping. 
 
 The avarice, the ambition, and the sagacity of the slave- 
 holding interest have never been more clearly revealed than in 
 this report of the Committee of Detail. At its head stood 
 John Rutledge, who completely embodied the pride, arrogance, 
 and dominating characteristics of the extreme South, and who 
 needed no hint from his colleague to watch over and guard its 
 interests. Had the subtle and adroit policy of that report 
 been fully indorsed and adopted by the convention and the 
 people, the ascendency of the slave States, and the consequent 
 humiliation and helplessness of the free States, would have 
 been complete. 
 
 The first Continental Congress, in the Articles of Associa 
 tion, had pledged the united colonies against the importation 
 of slaves ; and the Congress of 1776, in releasing the colonies 
 
THE SLAVE-TRADE. 47 
 
 From some of the provisions of the Articles of Association, had 
 resolved that " no slave be imported into any of the United 
 States." Most of the States had united in prohibiting the 
 slave-trade. North Carolina had imposed a duty on importa 
 tions ; while South Carolina and Georgia were in favor, not 
 only of perpetuating slavery, but also of continuing the slave- 
 traffic. Some Northern merchants, forgetful of the pledges of 
 the government, still employed their ships in the hateful trade. 
 Two years before the assembling of the convention, Dr. Sam 
 uel Hopkins had stated that portions of the people were " go 
 ing into the practice of that sevenfold abomination, the slave- 
 trade." While Maryland and Virginia agreed with the slave 
 holders of South Carolina and Georgia against taxing exports, 
 the products of slave labor, and were opposed to navigation 
 laws for the encouragement of the shipping interest, they 
 were opposed it is hardly uncharitable to believe, for the 
 twofold reason that they did not need foreign slaves, and 
 were themselves engaged in the domestic slave-traffic to 
 the reopening and continuance of the African slave-trade. 
 Consequently the slaveholding class was not a unit in support 
 ing the report of the Committee of Detail. 
 
 That report, dictated by the Carolinas and Georgia, deeply 
 aroused the feelings of delegates from the free States. Mr. 
 King of Massachusetts took the earliest opportunity to de 
 nounce " the admission of slaves " into the basis of apportion 
 ment. He stated that by the report of the committee " the 
 importation of slaves could not be prohibited, and exports 
 could not be taxed " ; that " there was so much inequality 
 and unreasonableness in all this that the people of the North 
 could never be reconciled to it. He never could agree to let 
 slaves be imported without limitation, and then be represented 
 in the national legislature. Either slaves should not be repre 
 sented, or exports should be taxable." 
 
 Gouverneur Morris followed in an eloquent denunciation of 
 slavery, emphatically declaring that " it was a nefarious insti 
 tution ; it was the curse of Heaven on the States where it pre 
 vailed." " Upon what principle is it," he asked, " that the 
 slaves shall be computed in the representation ? Are they 
 
48 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 men ? Then make them citizens, and let them vote. Are 
 they property ? Why, then, is no other property included ? 
 The houses in this city are worth more than all the wretched 
 slaves that cover the rice-swamps of South Carolina." He 
 declared that the inhabitants of the South, who went to the 
 coast of Africa, and, in defiance of the sacred laws of human 
 ity, tore away their fellow-creatures, and damned them to the 
 most cruel bondage, had more power than the citizens of the 
 North, who viewed with horror a practice so nefarious. He 
 added " that domestic slavery is the most prominent feature 
 in the aristocratic countenance of the proposed Constitution. 
 The vassalage of the poor has ever been the favorite offspring 
 of the aristocracy. And what is the proposed compensation 
 to the Northern States for a sacrifice of every principle of 
 right, every impulse of humanity ? They are to bind them 
 selves to march their militia, for the defence of the Southern 
 States, against those very slaves. The Southern States are 
 not to be restrained from importing fresh supplies of wretched 
 Africans at once to increase the danger of attack and the dif 
 ficulty of defence ; nay, they are to be encouraged to it by 
 having their votes .in the national government increased in 
 proportion, and at the same time to have their slaves and 
 exports exempt from all contributions to the public service." 
 He then emphatically avowed that he would " sooner submit 
 himself to a tax for paying for all the slaves in the United 
 States than to saddle posterity with such a constitution." He 
 closed his speech by moving to confine the basis of representa 
 tion to free inhabitants. 
 
 Roger Sherman opposed the motion ; and, in doing it, made 
 the very extraordinary declaration, for a New England man, 
 that he " did not regard the admission of negroes as liable to 
 such insuperable objections." Charles Pinckney, in reply to 
 Mr. Morris, asserted that he could demonstrate that the fisher 
 ies and the Western frontiers were more burdensome than the 
 slaves. Mr. Morris's motion was rejected, New Jersey alone 
 voting for it. 
 
 When the clause came up forbidding any restrictions on the 
 importation of slaves, Luther Martin of Maryland moved an 
 
THE SLAVE-TRADE. 49 
 
 amendment, allowing such importation to be taxed. He stated 
 that, as five slaves were equal to three freemen, the permission 
 to import them was an encouragement of the slave-trade. 
 " Slaves," he said, " weakened the Union which other parts 
 are bound to protect. The privilege of importing them is, 
 therefore, unreasonable. Such a feature in the Constitution is 
 inconsistent with the principles of the Revolution, and dishon 
 orable to the American character." 
 
 Mr. Rutledge, chairman of the committee, declared that he 
 " did not see how this section would encourage the importation 
 of slaves." In reply to the assertion that the Union was to 
 protect the slaves, he said that he would " readily exempt the 
 other States from every obligation to protect the South." He 
 averred that " religion and humanity have nothing to do with 
 this question. Interest alone is the governing principle with 
 nations. The true question is, whether the Southern States 
 shall or shall not be parties to the Union." Thus the issue 
 was distinctly made by the chairman of the Committee of De 
 tail, that the Southern States would enter the Union only on 
 the condition that the African slave-trade should be continued. 
 Appealing to commercial cupidity, he said that, if the North 
 ern States consulted their own interest, they would not oppose 
 the increase of slaves, because it would increase the commodi 
 ties of which they would become the carriers. Nor was the 
 appeal without effect. 
 
 Mr. Ellsworth, a member of the committee, immediately 
 avowed himself in favor of the provision as it stood. " Let 
 every State," he said, " import what it pleases. The morality 
 or wisdom of slavery are considerations belonging to the States. 
 What enriches a part enriches the whole, and the States are 
 the best judges of their particular interests. The old confed 
 eration had not meddled with this point ; and he did not see 
 any greater necessity for bringing it into the policy of the new 
 one." 
 
 Charles Pinckney, speaking for the slaveholding class, em 
 phatically asserted : " South Carolina can never receive the 
 plan, if it prohibits the slave-trade. In every proposed exten 
 sion of the powers of Congress, that State has expressly and 
 7 
 
50 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 watchfully excepted the power of meddling with the importa 
 tion of negroes." 
 
 George Mason of Virginia strongly denounced the slave- 
 trade, laying the blame of it on the avarice of British mer 
 chants, and lamenting that his Eastern brothers had from 
 the lust of gain embarked in the traffic. " Slavery," he said, 
 " discourages arts and manufactures. The poor despise labor 
 when performed by slaves. It prevents the emigration of 
 whites, who really enrich and strengthen the country. It pro 
 duces the most pernicious effects on manners, every master 
 of slaves is born a petty tyrant. It brings the judgment of 
 Heaven on a country. By an inevitable chain of causes and 
 eifects, Providence punishes national sins by national calami 
 ties." He then avowed that he held it essential in every point 
 of view that the general government should have power to 
 prevent the increase of slavery. 
 
 Mr. Ellsworth thought that, if the question was to be viewed 
 in a moral light, the convention should go further, and free 
 those already in the country. In Maryland and Virginia it 
 was cheaper to raise than to import ; but in the sickly rice- 
 swamps, he coldly said, foreign importation was necessary, and 
 it would be unjust to South Carolina and Georgia to prohibit 
 their importation. " Let us not," he said, " intermeddle. As 
 population increases, poor laborers will be so plenty as to ren 
 der slaves useless. Slavery in time will not be a speck in our 
 country." 
 
 Mr. Sherman joined Mr. Ellsworth in allowing the clause as 
 reported by the committee to stand. Charles C. Pinckney 
 avowed that " South Carolina and Georgia cannot do without 
 slaves. As to Virginia, she will gain by stopping importation. 
 Her slaves will rise in value, and she has more than she wants. 
 It would be unfair to ask South Carolina and Georgia to confed 
 erate on such unequal terms." The importation of slaves, he 
 maintained, would be for the benefit of the whole Union. The 
 more slaves, the more produce ; the greater carrying trade, the 
 more consumption, the more revenue. The delegation from 
 South Carolina united in the emphatic declaration that, if the 
 slave-trade was prohibited, South Carolina would not come into 
 
THE SLAVE-TRADE. 51 
 
 the Union. Mr. Baldwin of Georgia, too, avowed that his 
 State would not confederate unless she were allowed to import 
 slaves ; and Mr. Williamson joined in expressing the opinion 
 that, if South Carolina and Georgia were not allowed to import 
 slaves, they would not become members of the Union. Mr. 
 Wilson of Pennsylvania suggested that, " if negroes were the 
 only imports not subject to a duty, such an exception would 
 amount to a bounty." Gerry of Massachusetts and Lang- 
 don of New Hampshire would give no sanction whatever to 
 the slave-trade. 
 
 Mr. King thought the exemption of slaves from duty, while 
 every other import was subject to it, was an inequality that 
 could not fail to strike the commercial sagacity of the Northern 
 and Middle States. Mr. Charles Pinckney hastened to move 
 a recommitment, with a view to a tax on slaves equal to a tax 
 imposed on other imports. His motion was seconded by Mr. 
 Rutledge, his colleague. It was proposed by Gouverneur Mor 
 ris that the clauses relating to navigation laws and taxation on 
 exports should be referred, making the significant and preg 
 nant suggestion that " these things may form a bargain be 
 tween the Northern and Southern States." The commitment 
 was supported by Mr. Randolph, who avowed that he would 
 rather risk the Constitution than support the clause as it stood. 
 Mr. Sherman said that a tax on slaves implied that they were 
 property ; and Mr. Ellsworth continued 'to support the article 
 as reported by the committee. The motion to commit pre 
 vailed, and the matter was referred to a committee of one from 
 each State. This committee made " a bargain," and reported 
 it. The prohibition of export duties was retained, the restric 
 tion of the enactment of navigation laws was stricken out, and 
 the slave-trade permitted till 1800, subject to the imposition of 
 such a duty on slaves as Congress might determine. 
 
 This report was supported by Mr. Williamson and Mr. Gor- 
 ham ; but the tax was objected to by Mr. Sherman, because it 
 implied that slaves were property, and because the tax was too 
 small to discourage importation. But Mr. Gorham replied that 
 the tax should be regarded, not as implying that men were 
 property, but as a discouragement to their importation. Mr. 
 
52 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Madison " thought it wrong to admit into the Constitution the 
 idea that there could be property in man," and a change was 
 therefore made in the phraseology to remove that objection. 
 
 Mr. Charles C. Pinckney moved to extend the time of the 
 slave-trade from 1800 to 1808. This motion was seconded by 
 Mr. Gorham of Massachusetts, and was carried by the votes 
 of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Georgia, and 
 South Carolina ; against the votes of New Jersey, Pennsyl 
 vania, Delaware, and Virginia. The restriction on the enact 
 ment of navigation laws was then stricken out ; and Charles 
 C. Pinckney, Mr. Butler, and Mr. Rutledge gave the vote of 
 South Carolina in favor of striking out the restrictions, be 
 cause of the liberal conduct of the Eastern States in giving 
 them twenty years of extension to the slave-trade. 
 
 Thus New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Connecticut stand 
 on the record as parties to a dishonorable and humiliating 
 " bargain," by which, for a mere commercial consideration, 
 the removal of all restriction on Congress to enact navigation 
 laws, they gave twenty years to the African slave-traffic, unre 
 strained by national legislation. Opposition to giving Con 
 gress power to encourage, develop, and protect the commercial 
 and navigating interest of the nation sprung from the narrow 
 ness, jealousy, and all-pervading selfishness of slaveholding 
 society. Statesmanship demanded that such restrictions should 
 be excluded from the organic law of a free and commercial 
 nation. Duty to their own section, to their whole country, 
 required that the delegates from New England should resist 
 the incorporation of that plantation policy into the Constitution 
 they were framing for a continental empire. But it will ever 
 be a matter of regret, as well as of reproach, that those New 
 England States achieved their success by a surrender of prin 
 ciples in accord alike with the dictates of humanity and the 
 divine precepts of the Christian religion. And, as men cor 
 rectly apprehend the true nature of that " bargain," the real 
 significance and true value of Mr. Pinckney's damaging words 
 of praise will be appreciated, when he declared that " he had 
 had prejudices against the Eastern States before he came 
 here ; but he would acknowledge that he had found them as 
 
RENDITION OF FUGITIVE SLAVES. 53 
 
 liberal and candid as any men whatever." Nor will the record 
 seem any more flattering because other extreme Southern men 
 joined in that commendation. 
 
 It will be remembered that when the Committee of Detail 
 was appointed, to which were referred the results then reached 
 by the convention, Charles C. Pinckney rose and reminded the 
 body that, if the committee failed to insert some provision 
 against the abolition of slavery, he should be bound by the duty 
 he owed South Carolina to vote against its report. At that 
 time slavery had disappeared, or was disappearing, in the seven 
 Northern States, where it never had to any great extent ex 
 isted ; but there were more than half a million of slaves in 
 Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and 
 Georgia. While many of the most eminent men of those 
 States, especially of Virginia, believed slavery to be in every 
 form an evil, and desired the inauguration of a system of 
 emancipation ; the body of the people, influenced by pecuni 
 ary interests, and the pride, passion, and prejudices of race, 
 were in favor of its continuance. Statesmen, quick to discover 
 the drift of public sentiment, were then beginning to look to 
 the slaveholding interest as an element of political power. In 
 the work of obtaining securities for slavery the able statesmen 
 South Carolina sent to the convention took the lead. She 
 could enter no union, they said, accept no constitution, unless 
 slaves should enter into the basis of representation, the slave- 
 trade be continued, and provision be made for the rendition 
 of slaves escaping from their masters. 
 
 But the Committee of Detail reported no provision for the 
 rendition of fugitive slaves. When the article came under 
 consideration providing that the citizens of each State should 
 be entitled to all the privileges and immunities of the citizens 
 of the several States, Mr. Pinckney again demanded a provision 
 " in favor of property in slaves." The article, however, was 
 adopted without any such clause. 
 
 When the article respecting fugitives from justice escaping 
 from one State into another came up for consideration, Mr. 
 Butler, on behalf of South Carolina, moved to require " fugi 
 tive slaves and servants to be delivered up like criminala." 
 
54 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 This amendment was objected to by Mr. Wilson, for the incon 
 sequential reason that it would require the delivery to be made 
 at the public expense ; while Mr. Sherman remarked, with 
 little more appreciation of the magnitude of the question 
 involved, that he saw " no more propriety in the public seizing 
 and surrendering a servant than a horse." Mr. Butler then 
 withdrew his amendment, for the purpose of putting it in a 
 new form. But the next day, the 29th of August, he intro 
 duced it, and it was agreed to without a division. 
 
 This provision was inserted in the Constitution for the 
 express purpose of securing what did not exist under the 
 Articles of Confederation, the rendition of slaves escaping 
 from one State into another. General Pinckney, the expo 
 nent of that class of slaveholders who were in favor of the per 
 petuity of the slavery of the African race, demanded this 
 provision as a condition precedent to the adoption of the 
 Constitution ; and the convention yielded. In the convention 
 of South Carolina for its ratification General Pinckney em 
 phatically declared : " We have a right to recover our slaves 
 in whatever part of America they may take refuge. In short, 
 considering all circumstances, we have made the best terms 
 for the security of this species of property it was in our power 
 to make. We would have made better, if we could ; but, on 
 the whole, I do not think them bad." It was stated by Mr. 
 Madison, in the convention of Virginia, that " this clause was 
 expressly inserted to enable owners of slaves to reclaim 
 them." It was stated, too, in the North Carolina Convention, 
 by Mr. Iredell, afterward judge of the Supreme Court of the 
 United States, that, though the word " slave " was not men 
 tioned, owing to the peculiar scruples of Northern delegates 
 on the subject of slavery, the article was inserted to enable 
 masters to recover their slaves escaping into other States. 
 
 Thus was incorporated into the Constitution that fearful and 
 far-reaching provision which actually transformed the whole 
 territory of the Republic into one vast hunting-ground, in 
 which brutal men such as slavery alone can make might 
 range at pleasure, and, under cover of the cruel and inhuman 
 statutes it authorized, hunt, seize, and return to bondage men 
 
RENDITION OF FUGITIVE SLAVES. 55 
 
 and women whose only crimes were a desire to be free and a 
 heroism to dare the perils of escape for that priceless boon ; 
 while their friends, and the friends of justice and humanity, 
 could only look on, impotent for help, blushing at their 
 country's degradation, and sympathizing, though vainly, with 
 its victims. The only palliation to be urged for thus yielding 
 to the wicked demands and the imperious threats of slave- 
 masters was the weakness of faith and courage naturally aris 
 ing from the perils menacing the country, and the too confi 
 dent expectation that slavery was to be but a temporary sys 
 tem, soon to pass away. 
 
 From the opening of the War of the Revolution to the meet- 
 ing of the convention, the supporters of slavery had moved 
 with hesitating step. The clash of arms, and the enunciation 
 of the primal truth of human rights in the Declaration of 
 Independence, in the constitutions of several of the States, 
 and by eminent statesmen and philanthropists, threatened the 
 security and perpetuity of the system. Action against the 
 slave-trade, emancipation in several of the Northern States, 
 the permission of Virginia to humane masters to give freedom 
 to their slaves, the plan devised, but not adopted, for gradual 
 emancipation in Virginia by Thomas Jefferson and George 
 Wythe, the ordinance inhibiting slavery in the vast territory 
 northwest of the Ohio, showed the tendencies of the age, 
 weakened the confidence of slaveholders in the stability of 
 their system, while at the same time they begot a too credu 
 lous expectation among the friends of freedom of its speedy 
 downfall. 
 
 But the incorporation of the fatal concessions to slavery 
 into the fundamental law of the nation breathed into the sys 
 tem new life, and inspired new hope in those desirous of its 
 indefinite perpetuation. Little did the men of that conven 
 tion comprehend the full significance of their action in the 
 added vitality which these concessions imparted to the slave 
 system. Little did they anticipate the stimulus which would 
 be given to it by a stable government, the opening of fresh 
 territory, and the large increase of the cotton culture. Little 
 did they foresee the wonderful growth and expansion of a sys- 
 
56 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 tern that was to poison the fountain of national life and diffuse 
 its pestiferous influences throughout the land. Nor did they 
 at all realize that even then they were bowing before a new 
 born power, which would for more than two generations per 
 vert the government from the very purposes for which they 
 were establishing it, until at last it should perish in the vain 
 attempt to compass its overthrow. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 PROPOSED TAX ON SLAVES. FIRST SLAVERY DEBATES IN CON 
 GRESS. PETITIONS FOR EMANCIPATION. POWERS OF THE 
 GOVERNMENT DEFINED. 
 
 Meeting of Congress. Proposition to tax Slaves Imported. Debate on the 
 Amendment. Defeat of the Proposition. Petitions for Emancipation. 
 Franklin's Memorial. Excited Debate. Special Committee. Report of 
 the Committee. Southern Members defend Slavery and the Slave-trade. 
 Tone of the Debate. Powers of Congress denned and declared. Mr. Mif- 
 flin's Petition. Right of Petition violated. 
 
 THE first Congress under the Constitution met in the city of 
 New York, in March, 1789 ; though a quorum did not appear 
 until the 6th of April. It at once addressed itself to the 
 pressing duty of organizing the new government, and of pro 
 viding means for its support. When the bill imposing a duty 
 on imports was under consideration in the House of Repre 
 sentatives, Mr. Parker of Virginia moved an amendment, 
 imposing a duty of ten dollars on every slave imported. 
 This amendment excited much interest, especially among the 
 members from South Carolina and Georgia. Mr. Smith, of 
 the former State, hastened to express the hope " that such 
 an important and serious proposition would not be hastily 
 adopted " ; and he averred that " no one topic had been yet 
 introduced so important to South Carolina and the welfare of 
 the Union." 
 
 Roger Sherman of Connecticut expressed his approval of 
 " the object of the motion, but did not think it a fit subject to 
 be embraced in this bill. He could not reconcile himself to 
 the insertion of human beings as a subject of import among 
 goods, wares, and merchandise." He then earnestly urged 
 the withdrawal of the amendment, and suggested that it might 
 afterward be introduced as an independent proposition. 
 
58 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Mr. Jackson of Georgia declared that he was " not surprised, 
 however others might be, at the quarter whence this motion 
 came. Virginia, an old settled State, has her complement of 
 slaves, and, the natural increase being sufficient for her pur 
 pose, she was careless of recruiting her numbers by importa 
 tion. But gentlemen ought to let their neighbors get supplied 
 before they imposed such a burden." He expressed his con 
 fidence that, on account of the unsuitableness of the motion to 
 the business in hand, it would be withdrawn. Alluding petu 
 lantly to the " white slaves " " imported from all the jails of 
 Europe," he contended that they should be " equally taxed " 
 with the African, and that such a course would be equally 
 constitutional and proper. 
 
 To the suggestion of withdrawing the amendment, Mr. Par 
 ker who had, on moving it, expressed his regret that the 
 Constitution prevented Congress from prohibiting altogether 
 the importation of slaves declared that, " having introduced 
 the motion on mature reflection, he did not like to withdraw 
 it." He proceeded further, and expressed the hope that 
 " Congress would do all in their power to restore to human 
 nature its inherent privileges ; to wipe off, if possible, the 
 stigma under which America labored ; to do away the incon 
 sistency in our principles justly charged upon us ; and to 
 show by our actions the purer beneficence of the doctrine held 
 out to the world in our Declaration of Independence." 
 
 Mr. Sherman again avowed his opposition to the amendment, 
 as it was inconsistent with the principle of the bill, which was 
 to raise revenue, while the principle of the amendment was 
 to correct a moral evil. Fisher Ames of Massachusetts ex 
 pressed his detestation of " slavery from his soul ; but he had 
 some doubts whether imposing a duty on such importation 
 would not have an appearance of countenancing the practice." 
 
 Mr. Jackson further opposed the amendment. " It is," he 
 said, " the fashion of the day to favor the liberty of slaves. 
 I believe that they are better off as they are, and better off 
 than they were in Africa. Experience has shown that liber 
 ated slaves will not work for a living." He then asked if Vir 
 ginia would free her negroes, and declared that " when the 
 
FIRST SLAVERY DEBATES IN CONGRESS. 59 
 
 practice comes to be tried, then the sound of liberty will lose 
 those charms which make it grateful to the ravished ear." 
 
 The amendment was supported by Mr. Bland of Virginia, 
 who expressed the wish that slavery had never been introduced 
 into America, and was willing to join in any measure to pre 
 vent its extending further. Mr. Madison said that the clause 
 in the Constitution allowing a tax was inserted, he believed, 
 " for the purpose of enabling Congress to give some testimony 
 of the sense of America with respect to the African trade. 
 By expressing a national disapprobation of that trade, it is to 
 be hoped we may destroy it, and so save ourselves from re 
 proaches and our posterity from the imbecility ever attendant 
 upon a country filled with slaves. This is as much the inter 
 est of Carolina and Georgia as of any other State. Every 
 addition they receive to their number of slaves tends to weak 
 ness and renders them less capable of self-defence. In case 
 of hostility with other nations, their slave population will be a 
 means, not of repelling invasion, but of inviting attack. It is 
 the duty of the general government to protect every part of 
 the Union against danger, as well internal as external. Every 
 thing, therefore, which tends to increase this danger, though it 
 might be a local affair, yet, if it involves national expense or 
 safety, becomes of concern to any part of the Union, and a 
 proper subject for the consideration of those charged with the 
 general administration of the government." 
 
 These views of Mr. Madison were humane, just, comprehen 
 sive, and statesmanlike. Had they been generally entertained 
 and adhered to by Southern statesmen, and accepted by 
 the Southern people, the amelioration, restriction, and extinc 
 tion of slavery, rather than its expansion and perpetuation, 
 would have been their chosen policy. But widely differing 
 counsels prevailed. Not only the nation, indeed, but Mr. 
 Madison himself, and the class of Southern men he repre 
 sented, failed to employ the powers here enunciated in behalf 
 of freedom and humanity, or to maintain the humane senti 
 ments here avowed. They soon yielded to the force of circum 
 stances, for which they had not calculated, and which they 
 seemed powerless to control; and became, if not the advo- 
 
60 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 cates, the consenting witnesses to the aggressive encroach 
 ments and assaults on human rights. They had not antici 
 pated and were not prepared for the soon disclosed fact, that 
 to the ordinary motives for the continued existence of slavery 
 there were to be added the stimulus of the greatly increased 
 industries developed and fostered by the new government. 
 Nor had they then realized how exacting and tyrannous the 
 slave-masters, flushed with their successes in the convention, 
 would soon become, and with what tenacity and persistency 
 they would press the advantages they then gained. They had 
 faint conceptions of the concessions made in the Constitution 
 to the slave interest. For from the time they were made 
 the demands of consistency and the logic of those concessions 
 were always against them. Consenting to the great wrong, 
 they lost too much of their moral power. Leaving the rock 
 of principle, they found no foothold on the shifting sands of 
 expediency and compromise, on which they could stand against 
 the compact forces of the Slave Power, however vile and des 
 perate its cause might be. Ever after these fatal concessions 
 in the Constitution the nation seemed like a strong man strug 
 gling in toils and meshes ; or, rather, like the giant shorn of 
 his locks, sleeping in the lap of the wanton who had lured him 
 to dishonor, if not to destruction. 
 
 At the suggestion of Mr. Madison Mr. Parker withdrew his 
 amendment, with the understanding that it should be after 
 ward brought up as a distinct measure. The subject was sub 
 sequently referred to a committee, of which he was made 
 chairman. He reported a bill which was referred to the next 
 session ; but it was never acted upon. The men who extorted 
 from the framers of the Constitution the permission to continue 
 the slave-trade for twenty years were in no mood to allow a 
 tax of ten dollars on every imported African. They were not 
 only jealous of any action on the part of the Federal govern 
 ment, but they determined to secure the full benefits of the 
 traffic in human flesh. 
 
 Within one year after the organization of the first Congress, 
 memorials were presented deploring the evils of slavery and 
 praying for immediate action for their abatement. They re- 
 
PETITIONS FOR EMANCIPATION. 61 
 
 vealed a deep sense of justice, a high regard for the rights of 
 man, and a profound recognition of the claims of morality and 
 religion. On the llth of February, 1790, a petition was pre 
 sented from the Quakers to the House of Representatives. 
 The memorialists alluded to the fact that " the same religious 
 society addressed, in 1783, the then Congress on the same sub 
 ject ; which body, though the Christian rectitude of the con 
 cern was by the delegates generally acknowledged, yet, not 
 being vested with the powers of legislation, declined " acting 
 on the subject. They say : " As professors of faith in that ever- 
 blessed, all-perfect Lawgiver, whose injunction remains of 
 undiminished obligation, 'Whatsoever ye would that men 
 should do unto you, do ye even so unto them ' ; and firmly be 
 lieving that unfeigned righteousness in public as well as pri 
 vate citizens is the only sure ground of hope of the divine 
 blessing ; .... we feel it incumbent on us, as a religious body, 
 to attempt to excite your attention to the affecting subject," 
 and induce you to " exert your upright endeavors to the full 
 extent of your power." They expressed the confident expec 
 tation that the exercise of that power " must produce the 
 abolition of the slave-trade." 
 
 Mr. Hartley of Pennsylvania moved that a petition coming 
 from u so numerous and respectable a part of the community " 
 should be referred to a committee. To this motion Mr. Smith 
 of South Carolina objected ; saying, however respectable the 
 petitioners were, there were others, equally respectable, op 
 posed to their object. Mr. Parker of Virginia expressed his 
 pleasure that " so many were attending to matters of such mo 
 mentous concern to the future happiness and prosperity of the 
 people." Mr. Madison thought it proper to receive and con 
 sider the petition, " because, if there is anything within the 
 Federal authority to restrain such violation of the rights of 
 nature and of mankind, it should be done." But Mr. Stone 
 of Maryland declared it "unfortunate that religious sects 
 seemed to imagine that they understood the rights of human 
 nature better than all the world besides " ; and Mr. Burke of 
 South Carolina, referring contemptuously to some Quakers 
 present, said, " The men in the galleries were meddling with 
 
62 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 what did not belong to them ; and, though he had great re 
 spect for the Quakers, he did not think they had more virtue 
 and religion than many others, perhaps not so much as some 
 others." 
 
 Mr. Jackson of Georgia, an Englishman by birth, an officer 
 in the Revolutionary army, and a delegate to the convention 
 which framed the Constitution, wanted " to know if the whole 
 morality of the world is confined to the Quakers ? Do they 
 understand the rights of mankind and the disposition of man 
 kind better than others ? The Saviour had more benevolence 
 and commiseration than they pretend to have, and he admitted 
 slavery." Mr. Gerry maintained the right of petition, and 
 defended the action of the Society of Friends, who wished to 
 see measures pursued by every nation to wipe off the indelible 
 stain brought upon all who were concerned in it. The memo 
 rial was finally laid upon the table, and thus ended the first 
 debate on antislavery petitions in Congress. 
 
 On the 12th of February, 1790, a memorial was presented 
 from the " Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition 
 of Slavery " signed and said to have been written by Franklin. 
 As this illustrious citizen died soon afterward, the American 
 people are justified in regarding it as the last and wisest of 
 the many sage counsels bequeathed by him to his countrymen. 
 After alluding to the origin, objects, and general constituency 
 of the society, being " of various religious denominations," and 
 to the gratifying circumstance that similar associations were 
 forming at home and abroad, the memorial proceeds : " That 
 mankind are all formed by the same Almighty Being, alike 
 objects of his care and equally designed for the enjoyment of 
 happiness, the Christian religion teaches us to believe, and the 
 political creed of Americans fully coincides with that position." 
 It quotes, too, from the preamble of the Constitution, as indi 
 cating one of the objects of that instrument for promoting " the 
 welfare and securing the blessings of liberty to the people of 
 the United States," which " blessings of liberty," it declares, 
 " ought rightfully to be administered without distinction of 
 color." " From a persuasion, too," it continues, " that equal 
 liberty was originally the portion and is still the birthright of all 
 
PETITIONS FOR EMANCIPATION. 63 
 
 men, we earnestly entreat your serious attention to the subject 
 of slavery ; that you will be pleased to countenance the restora 
 tion to liberty of those unhappy men who, alone in this land of 
 freedom, are degraded to perpetual bondage, and who, amidst 
 the general joy of surrounding freemen, are groaning in servile 
 subjection ; that you will devise means for removing this incon 
 sistency from the character of the American people ; . . . . and 
 that you will step to the very verge of power vested in you for 
 discouraging every species of traffic in the persons of our 
 fellow-men." 
 
 The memorial of the preceding day was called up, and both 
 were made the subject of an able and exciting debate. Mr. 
 Tucker of South Carolina was " surprised to see another me 
 morial upon the same subject, and that signed by a man who 
 ought to have known the Constitution better." The argument, 
 so often repeated since, was urged, that the movement would 
 aggravate the very evil it was sought to ameliorate and remove, 
 by buoying up the slave with hopes which must be disappointed, 
 and necessitating a severity which would not otherwise be re 
 quired. He parried the religious argument of the memorial 
 by urging the indorsement of the Southern clergy, who, he 
 said, did not condemn either slavery or the slave-trade. This 
 damaging reference was only too well deserved, and too signifi 
 cant of their subsequent and disastrous course, even up to and 
 throughout the Kebellion. With few exceptions, they failed 
 as religious teachers of educating the people up to the stand 
 ard of a scriptural morality, shirked the duties imposed upon 
 them by the claims of patriotism, humanity, and religion, 
 betrayed their sacred trust, and proved recreant alike to the 
 claims of benevolence and the Word of God. The weapons 
 they should have pointed against the cruel and wicked sys 
 tem they turned in its defence. Omniscience alone can esti 
 mate how much of the subsequent guilt, suffering, and even 
 the destruction of the South was due to their influence who 
 thus early became the blind leaders of the blind. There 
 were not wanting, likewise, at that early date, those who 
 urged the same arguments on which so many changes have 
 been rung since, the same deprecatory allusions to the 
 
64 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 danger of discussion, the same reminders of the compro 
 mises on which alone the Union was or could have been 
 based. Mr. Baldwin of Georgia, a native of Connecticut, and 
 one of the framers of the Constitution, reminded members 
 that this was " a subject of a most delicate nature " ; that in 
 the convention " the Southern States were so tender upon this 
 point that they had wellnigh broken up without coming to 
 any determination." It was emphatically declared by Mr. 
 Smith of South Carolina, that the Southern " States would 
 never have entered the Confederation unless their property 
 had been guaranteed to them." " When we entered into this 
 Confederacy," he said, " we did it from political and not from 
 moral motives. And I don't think my constituents want to 
 learn morals from the petitioners. I don't believe they want 
 improvement in their moral systems. If they do, they can 
 learn it at home." 
 
 On the other hand, Mr. Scott of Pennsylvania defended 
 the memorialists, and condemned in strong and unequivocal 
 language the slave traffic. " I look upon the slave-trade," he 
 said, " to be one of the most abominable things on earth ; and, 
 if there were neither God nor Devil, I should oppose it on 
 principles of humanity and the law of humanity. I cannot, 
 for my part, conceive how any person can be said to acquire 
 property in another. Perhaps in our legislative capacity we 
 can go no further than impose a duty of ten dollars. I do not 
 know how far I might go if I was one of the judges of the 
 United States, and these people were to come before me and 
 claim their emancipation ; but I am sure I would go as far 
 as I could." 
 
 To these humane and noble utterances Mr. Jackson of 
 Georgia replied : " If that gentleman is guided by religion, 
 he will find that it is not against it. He will see, from Genesis 
 to Revelation, the current setting strong the other way." In 
 reply to his declaration, that if he were a judge he would go 
 as far as he could in emancipating the people, he said : " I 
 believe that his judgment would be of short duration in 
 Georgia ; perhaps even the existence of such a judge would 
 be of short duration." 
 
POWERS OF THE GOVERNMENT DEFINED. 65 
 
 The memorials were referred to a select committee, consist 
 ing of Foster of New Hampshire, Gerry of Massachusetts, 
 Huntington of Connecticut, Lawrence of New York, Sin- 
 nickson of New Jersey, Hartley of Pennsylvania, and Par 
 ker of Virginia. From this committee Mr. Hartley made a 
 report, manifestly well considered and carefully drawn up. 
 In it the committee say that, from the nature of the matters 
 contained in the memorials, they were induced to examine the 
 powers vested in Congress under the present Constitution. 
 Their conclusion was that the general government was pro 
 hibited from interfering with the slave-trade until the year 
 1808, that it was prohibited from interfering with the eman 
 cipation of slaves, within the States, and that it had no 
 right to interfere with the internal regulations of particular 
 States. But they declared that Congress had power, if deemed 
 advisable, to lay a tax of ten dollars on each slave imported ; 
 that it had the power to interdict the trade for foreign sup 
 ply, and that it might regulate the home traffic in the inter 
 ests of humanity ; and that it might prohibit foreigners from 
 fitting out vessels in American ports. The committee closed 
 by informing the memorialists that, so far as Congress could 
 do it constitutionally, it would aim to promote their humane 
 objects " on the principles of justice, humanity, and good 
 policy." 
 
 A report, however, so guarded and carefully restrained by 
 the limitations of the Constitution, so moderate in tone and 
 temper, was received with marked demonstrations of hostility 
 by the representatives of the slaveholding class, and its con 
 sideration postponed for a week. When it was taken up, Mr. 
 Smith of South Carolina moved to " negative the whole 
 report." But it was taken up by paragraphs, and the same 
 line of argument, already sketched, was pursued. The great 
 est violence and impatience, with denunciation and threats, 
 came from South Carolina and Georgia, then, as since, the 
 self-constituted guardians and defenders of Southern inter 
 ests and Southern honor. They applied the same epithets to 
 the Quakers then which their successors have so freely used 
 in regard to all antislavery reformers. They stigmatized 
 
66 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 them, as they have Christians and philanthropists since, as 
 hypocritical pretenders to a sanctity they did not possess, as 
 factious intermeddlers with what did not concern them. They 
 declared the compromises of the Constitution to be the only 
 conditions on which the Union could be preserved ; and they 
 sternly demanded that freedom of discussion on the subject 
 of slavery should not be tolerated. 
 
 Among the champions of slavery, the most able and conspic 
 uous, as well as rancorous and violent, were Smith, Tucker, 
 and Burke of South Carolina, and Jackson and Baldwin of 
 Georgia. Mr. Smith made an elaborate defence of slavery 
 and the slave-trade on historical, scriptural, and humanitarian 
 grounds. He denied the " horrors of the Middle Passage," 
 and contended that slaves imported from Africa were benefit 
 ed by the change, as they were here saved from a worse fate 
 which awaited them in their native land. Freedom, however, 
 was not without its true and steady defenders, men who 
 enunciated with great boldness and force the fundamental 
 principles, the primal truths, not only of natural rights and 
 obligation, but of Christian morality and duty. Trammelled, 
 indeed, by those compromises which have always hampered 
 the advocates of human rights under the Constitution, even 
 the most conscientious and outspoken, they yet boldly de 
 nounced the system which had no sanction in reason or rev 
 elation. The most distinguished of these advocates were Yin- 
 ing of Delaware, and Scott and Boudinot of Pennsylvania. 
 
 This great and pregnant debate was closed on the 23d of 
 March, when a substitute for the report was adopted in com 
 mittee of the whole. On the suggestion of Mr. Madison, who 
 desired to quiet the fears of the South, by showing that Con 
 gress claimed no power to prohibit the slave-trade till 1808, 
 and no power to abolish slavery at all, the House, by a vote of 
 twenty-nine to twenty-five, entered on the journal the report 
 of the committee, and also the report of the committee of the 
 whole, as amendments to that report. The amendments 
 reported by the committee of the whole stood, therefore, as 
 the judgment of the House. 
 
 By these resolutions the House of Representatives declared 
 
POWERS OF THE GOVERNMENT DEFINED. 67 
 
 that the importation of such persons as any of the States 
 should admit could not be prohibited by Congress before 1808 ; 
 that Congress had no power to interfere with emancipation or 
 the treatment of slaves in the States ; but that it had author 
 ity to restrain the citizens of the United States from carrying 
 on the slave-trade to supply foreigners with slaves, and that it 
 had the power to make regulations for the humane treatment, 
 on their passage, of slaves imported by citizens into States 
 admitting such importations. Though these resolutions had 
 not the authority of a legislative enactment, yet in all the 
 subsequent conflicts growing out of the slavery question the 
 doctrines therein embodied have been generally recognized as 
 the true exposition of the Constitution, and of the powers of 
 Congress touching that matter. 
 
 This debate on slavery was strikingly characteristic and 
 significant. It clearly revealed in tone and temper, matter 
 and manner, thought and language, that difference between 
 the friends of freedom and the supporters of slavery, wiiich 
 has ever marked discussions growing out of their diversity of 
 interests, views, feelings, and purposes. On the one side the 
 debate was grave, dignified, and regardful of the rights of man 
 and the authority of God ; on the other, it was flippant, con 
 temptuous, and indifferent alike to the claims of humanity, the 
 courtesies of debate, and the binding obligations of a Christian 
 morality. 
 
 The abolition societies of Pennsylvania, New York, Rhode 
 Island, Connecticut, and Virginia, in 1791, presented memo 
 rials calling upon Congress to exercise those powers which the 
 House of Representatives had declared that Congress pos 
 sessed, in the resolutions of the committee of the whole, which 
 had been entered upon the journal. These memorials were 
 referred to a special committee of which Mr. Benson of New 
 York was made chairman. No action was taken by the com 
 mittee. At the next session other memorials of a similar 
 character were presented. But they were permitted to lie 
 without action or reference. 
 
 In November, 1792, Mr. Ames presented a petition from 
 Warner Mifflin, a Quaker gentleman of Delaware, setting forth 
 
68 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the injustice of slavery and the wrongs of the slave. Two 
 days afterward Mr. Steele of North Carolina called attention 
 to the petition, and moved that it be taken from the table and 
 returned to the petitioner, and that the record of its reception 
 be erased. Smith of South Carolina denounced the petition 
 as " the mere rant and rhapsody of a meddling fanatic, inter 
 larded with texts of Scripture." He declared the real object 
 of the petition to be to " create disunion among the States 
 and to excite the most horrible insurrections." Declaring 
 that petitions of that character were not calculated to amelio 
 rate the condition of the slaves, but to excite a spirit of rest 
 lessness, which made greater securities necessary, he called 
 upon the House to sustain the motion, and thus convince " this 
 troublesome enthusiast, and others who might be disposed to 
 communicate their ravings and wild effusions, that they would 
 meet the treatment they justly deserve." Mr. Ames disap 
 proved the object of the petitioners ; but defended the general 
 right of petition, and justified, on that ground, his presentation 
 of the memorial. The House sustained the motion to return 
 the memorial to the petitioner ; and Mr. Steele then withdrew 
 his motion to erase the record of its reception from the journal. 
 This high-handed measure was a clear and palpable violation 
 of the constitutional right of petition, a gross indignity to the 
 petitioner, and an insult to a free people. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT OF 1793. PROPOSED AMENDMENTS. 
 
 Bill for the Rendition of Fugitive Slaves. Bill passed the Senate, passed the 
 House. Petition of Free Colored Men to be protected against it. Exciting 
 Debate. Memorial of Colored Men of Philadelphia. Exciting and Violent 
 Debate. Disunion threatened by Mr. Rutledge. Action of the House. 
 Further Legislation demanded. Mr. Pindall's Bill. Amendment by Mr. 
 Rich. Mr. Storrs' Amendment. Debate on the Bill and Amendments. 
 Mr. Fuller's Amendments. Bill passed the House, passed the Senate, with 
 Amendments. House refused to take it up. Mr. Wright's Resolution. 
 Bill reported by Judiciary Committee. Debated. Recommitted to a Select 
 Committee. Reported, but not acted on. 
 
 BY their persistency the statesmen representing the Slave 
 Power secured from the framers of the Constitution the pro 
 vision for the rendition of fugitive slaves. Having obtained 
 the incorporation of this provision into the fundamental law, 
 they early and eagerly sought its enforcement. 
 
 In the Senate, in November, 1792, Mr. Johnston of North 
 Carolina, Mr. Cabot of Massachusetts, and Mr. Read of Dela 
 ware were appointed a committee for the consideration of mat 
 ters relating to fugitives from justice, and slaves escaping from 
 their masters. The committee reported a bill in December, 
 and on the 28th of the same month it was recommitted, and 
 Mr. Taylor of Virginia and Mr. Sherman of Connecticut 
 were added to the committee. On the 3d of January, 1793, 
 Mr. Johnston reported the original bill, with amendments. It 
 was considered several days, and passed without a division. 
 On the 4th of February the House proceeded to its considera 
 tion, and the next day it passed by a vote of 48 to 7. Thus 
 this act, which gave the slave-masters and their agents sum 
 mary power to seize, hold, and return to slavery their fugitive 
 bondmen, passed the Senate without a dissenting voice ; and 
 
70 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 in the House there were found only seven members to record 
 their votes against that dishonoring act, by authority of which 
 so many inhuman and wicked deeds have been committed. 
 
 Under this Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 many arrests of per 
 sons alleged to have escaped from servitude were made, and 
 much alarm among free persons of color was created. Many 
 free negroes, especially in the States of Pennsylvania and Del 
 aware, were kidnapped and sold into slavery. At the first ses 
 sion of the Fourth Congress a memorial was presented from 
 the legislature of Delaware, asking the protection of the gen 
 eral government against this kidnapping. It was referred to 
 the Committee on Commerce, which made a report asking for 
 instructions. 
 
 In December, 1796, on motion of Mr. Swan wick of Penn 
 sylvania, the report of the previous session was taken up for 
 consideration. Mr. Coit of Connecticut, a member of the 
 Committee of Commerce, thought the laws of the several 
 States fully adequate without further provisions. He did not 
 wish the United States to " intermeddle " in the case. To this 
 Mr. Swanwick replied that the State laws were broken with 
 impunity. He was for obliging masters of vessels when they 
 took negroes on board to have certificates of their freedom. Mr. 
 Murray of Maryland asked if the idea of preventing kidnap 
 ping meant the taking of " free negroes and selling them as 
 slaves, or the taking of slaves and making them free ? " To 
 this question Mr. Swanwick replied that it was " intended to 
 prevent both evils." Any action of Congress was opposed by 
 Mr. Smith of South Carolina, because the matter was a 
 municipal regulation, which should be left to the State legisla 
 tures. The House was reminded by Mr. Smith of New Jersey 
 that negroes had in many instances been taken upon ships at 
 night, and then carried to the West Indies and other parts of 
 the world and sold ; and that the existing State laws could not 
 prevent that fraudulent practice. 
 
 Mr. Sitgreaves and Mr. Swanwick earnestly urged immedi 
 ate action for the protection of unfortunate negroes and mulat- 
 toes exposed, by their color, to insult and injury. Mr. Smith 
 of South Carolina feared that the " use of the word i emanci- 
 
THE FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT OF 1793. 71 
 
 pation ' " by Mr. Swan wick would spread alarm through some 
 of the States. He would drop the subject altogether. Mr. 
 Nicholas of Virginia expressed the hope that the subject 
 would not be dismissed ; for if they of the Southern States 
 " unfortunately held slaves, they ought not to contribute to 
 make slaves of free men." After further debate the report 
 was recommitted to the Committee on Commerce ; and on the 
 18th of January, 1797, Mr. Swanwick, by the instructions of 
 the committee, though against his own opinion, reported that 
 it was not expedient to interfere with the existing laws of the 
 States on that subject. 
 
 In January, 1797, Mr. Swanwick presented a petition from 
 persons of African descent, natives of North Carolina, who 
 had been emancipated and re-enslaved. These persons set 
 forth that they had been liberated " under the hand and seal 
 of conscientious masters," by authority of a law pronounced 
 constitutional ; that another law had been enacted under which 
 men of " cruel disposition and void of principle " were seeking 
 to re-enslave them ; that they were reduced to the necessity of 
 separating from their nearest and most tender connections, and 
 of seeking refuge in other parts of the country, always liable 
 to be seized and reduced to bondage again, under the provisions 
 of the Fugitive Slave Act. " To you only," they say, " under 
 God, can we apply, with any hope of effect, for redress of our 
 grievances." 
 
 Mr. Swanwick desired that the petition should be referred to 
 a select committee ; but Mr. Blount of North Carolina hoped the 
 petition would not be received. A committee on the Fugitive 
 Slave Act had been appointed, and Mr. Thatcher of Massa 
 chusetts thought this petition should be referred to that com 
 mittee. He asserted that they were free people, and had an 
 undoubted right to petition and be heard. Mr. Swanwick 
 animadA^erted on the atrocity of a reward of ten dollars offered 
 for one of them if taken alive, and fifty dollars if found dead, 
 and no questions to be asked. He denounced that " horrid re 
 ward," which gentlemen could not hear without a " shudder," 
 as an encouragement to put an end to that man's life. Heath 
 and Madison of Virginia were in favor of letting the petition 
 
72 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 lie on the table ; but Mr. Rutherford of the same State favored 
 the reference of the memorial to a committee, as the " great 
 hardships " represented in the petition appealed closely to the 
 nicest feelings of the heart, and he " hoped humanity would 
 dictate a just decision." Mr. Gilbert of New Jersey thought 
 the petition " laid claim to the humanity of the House " ; but 
 Mr. Smith of South Carolina was in favor of sealing it up and 
 sending it back to the petitioners. 
 
 Mr. Thatcher said the Fugitive Slave Act had no authority 
 over that set of men who claim the protection of that House, 
 which ought " always to lean toward freedom." Though they 
 could not give freedom to slaves, yet he hoped gentlemen 
 would not refuse to lend their aid to secure freemen against 
 tyrannical imposition. Mr. Varnum of Massachusetts said 
 the petitioners had received injury under the provisions of the 
 Fugitive Slave Act, as well as under the laws of North Caro 
 lina, and they had an undoubted right to the attention of the 
 general government. If it should appear that they were free, 
 and had received injuries under the Fugitive Slave Act, that 
 Act ought to be amended. Mr. Kitchell of New Jersey main 
 tained that the question was not whether they were or were 
 not slaves, but whether a committee should inquire into the 
 improper enforcement of the Fugitive Slave Act in their case. 
 But the House refused to receive the petition, thirty-three vot 
 ing for it and fifty against it. 
 
 In December, 1799, Robert Wain of Pennsylvania presented 
 a petition from colored men in Philadelphia, praying for the 
 revision of the Fugitive Slave Act and the laws relative to 
 the slave-trade, and for the adoption of such measures as 
 should in the course of time emancipate their brethren. Its 
 reference was earnestly opposed by Mr. Rutledge of South 
 Carolina, who contemptuously observed that the gentlemen 
 who formerly came forward with their petitions had now put 
 them into the hands of the "black gentlemen." These peti 
 tioners reminded the House that black people were in slavery. 
 He " thanked God that they were ; if they were not, dreadful 
 would be the consequences." Mr. Smilie of Pennsylvania said 
 that these colored people were " a part of the human species, 
 
THE FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT OF 1793. 73 
 
 equally capable of suffering and enjoying, equally the objects 
 of attention, and they had a claim to be heard." 
 
 Harrison Gray Otis had never seen a petition presented 
 under a more dangerous aspect ; and he opposed the reference. 
 Henry Lee of Virginia, father of Robert E. Lee, the rebel 
 general, would have the petition returned to the gentleman 
 who presented it, " as Congress had no power over slavery but 
 to protect it." Mr. Brown of Rhode Island hoped that 
 Northern men would see the impropriety of encouraging 
 slaves to come from Southern States to " become thieves and 
 vagabonds." He was not a slaveholder, but he considered 
 " slaves as much property as a farm or a ship." John Ran 
 dolph, who had just entered Congress, desired that the action 
 of the House should be so decided as to deter persons from 
 petitioning on that subject thereafter ; and Mr. Christie of 
 Maryland hoped the petition would go " under the table, 
 rather than on it." He was in favor of taking up the Fugitive 
 Act, and, instead of weakening it, " making it stronger." 
 Robert Goodloe Harper thought the temper of revolt was 
 more perceptible among the slaves ; and Mr. Jones of Geor 
 gia hoped the petition would be treated with " the contempt it 
 merited, and thrown under the table." 
 
 In the course of the debate Mr. Thatcher fitly characterized 
 the remarks of his colleague, Mr. Otis, " as pitiful, mean, 
 virulent." Mr. Edmond of Connecticut said it was unjust 
 in the House, instead of giving a patient attention, to treat 
 the complaints of the petitioners with " an inattention that 
 passion alone could dictate." It was then proposed by Mr. 
 Goode of Virginia that the petition should receive the pointed 
 disapprobation of the House. To this proposition Mr. Thatcher 
 replied that this was the first time he had ever known a peti 
 tion, or a part of a petition, to receive the marked disapproba 
 tion of the House. If a petition in favor of objects so worthy 
 was not heard, it would be " a national indignity." Mr. Rut- 
 ledge, perhaps the ablest, certainly the most devoted and out 
 spoken of the champions of the slaveholding interest, emphati 
 cally proclaimed that the abolition of slavery would never 
 take place. " There is," he said, " one alternative which 
 10 
 
74 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 will save us from it, but that alternative I deprecate very 
 much, that is, that we are able to take care of ourselves ; 
 and, if driven to it, we will take care of ourselves." The House 
 then resolved that those parts of the petition praying Congress 
 to legislate on subjects from which the government is pre 
 cluded by the Constitution had a tendency to create disquiet 
 and jealousy, and ought therefore to receive no countenance or 
 encouragement. This resolution received the votes of eighty- 
 five members, the inflexible Thatcher alone voting in the 
 negative. 
 
 This hesitating and timid action seems a lame and impotent 
 conclusion of a debate so imbued with the spirit of humanity, 
 justice, and freedom on the one part, though revealing on 
 the other an utter disregard of the rights of man and the 
 claims of Christian morality. But is it, after all, when viewed 
 in the light of the compromises of the Constitution, a matter 
 of surprise ? The concessions then made were, and ever have 
 been, the weak and vulnerable points in all the conflicts be 
 tween freedom and oppression. The framers of the funda 
 mental law, avoiding the name of slavery, admitted into that 
 instrument " the guilty fantasy that man can hold property in 
 man." The slaveholders in their struggles ever claimed that 
 " it was so nominated in the bond," and persistently demanded 
 their " pound of flesh." And so the integrity, honor, and 
 even the Christianity of the nation were invoked, and too 
 often successfully, to sanction the schemes of inhumanity 
 and the injustice of men determined to make the most of 
 advantages surrendered by those fatal concessions. 
 
 Severe as were the provisions of this act, complaints were 
 continually made by slave-masters that it did not afford ade 
 quate facilities for the recapture of their escaped slaves. More 
 stringent provisions and a more rigid enforcement of the law 
 were still demanded. 
 
 In the House, in December, 1817, Mr. Pindall of Virginia, 
 Mr. Beecher of Ohio, and Mr. Anderson of Kentucky were 
 appointed a committee to devise more effectual means for the 
 reclamation of fugitive slaves. A bill for this purpose was 
 reported ; and the House, on the 26th of January, 1818, pro- 
 
THE FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT OF 1793. 75 
 
 ceeded to its consideration. Its provisions were explained by 
 the chairman of the committee. It was moved by Mr. Rich 
 of Vermont so to amend it as to prevent the transportation of 
 any person claimed as a slave without taking such person 
 before a court of record and furnishing sufficient proof that 
 such person was a slave, and the property of the person 
 attempting to remove him, under a penalty of ten thousand 
 dollars. Mr. Storrs of New York moved to amend the bill by 
 substituting, in lieu of the amendment of Mr. Rich, a new 
 section, providing that, if any person, without a colorable 
 claim, should procure a certificate or warrant to arrest or 
 transport any person not held as a slave, he should himself 
 be punished by imprisonment not exceeding fifteen years, or 
 by fine not exceeding five thousand dollars. Mr. Pindall 
 united with Mr. Storrs in supporting his amendment, and Mr. 
 Rich vindicated his own amendment on the ground of the 
 enormity of the crime of kidnapping ; but Mr. Storrs' s amend 
 ment was adopted by a large majority. 
 
 It was maintained by Mr. Claggett of New Hampshire that 
 existing laws secured to the claimants all the rights that the 
 Constitution guaranteed to them. If any legislation was neces 
 sary, it was to restrain the claimants from the abuse of power. 
 Mr. Pindall maintained that the duty of delivering up fugitive 
 slaves was imposed on the States, and that Congress could by 
 law define and regulate the action of State officers in the per 
 formance of that duty. Mr. Fuller of Massachusetts moved 
 to strike out the first section of the bill, because it transcended 
 the provisions of the Constitution ; and Mr. Strong spoke ear 
 nestly in opposition to the measure. Mr. Cobb of Georgia vin 
 dicated the rights of the holders of slaves as " inalienable and 
 inviolable." Mr. Hopkinson of Pennsylvania thought that free 
 men might be apprehended, unless proper means of redress 
 were provided. John Holmes of Massachusetts, afterward sen 
 ator from Maine, expressed the opinion that the bill could be so 
 worded as to be " unobjectionable " to any one. The nature 
 of slave property, its evils, and the rights of its possessors were 
 stated, defined, and illustrated by Mr. Clay. Mr. Baldwin of 
 Pennsylvania, a native of Connecticut, a lawyer of eminence, 
 
76 KISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 and afterward a judge of the Supreme Court, maintained that 
 the Constitution conferred upon Congress the power so to legis 
 late as to afford the fullest protection to the holders of slaves. 
 The amendment proposed by Mr. Fuller was rejected. 
 
 It was then moved by Mr. Rich to recommit the bill to the 
 committee to which was referred the memorial of the Quakers 
 of Baltimore, to report such action as would protect the free 
 people of color. The motion to recommit was defeated without 
 a division. John Sergeant of Pennsylvania, one of the most 
 distinguished advocates and statesmen of that day, then moved 
 to amend the bill by empowering the judges of the State in 
 which the person should be arrested, rather than the judges of 
 the State from which it was alleged he had escaped, to deter 
 mine whether such person owed service or labor. But this 
 amendment was defeated by a large majority. Mr. Rich offered 
 several other amendments to guard the rights of freemen, but 
 they were rejected. It was then, by a large majority, ordered 
 to a third reading. 
 
 The passage of the bill was strenuously opposed by Benjamin 
 Adams of Massachusetts, because it contained provisions " dan 
 gerous to liberty and to the safety of free persons of color " ; 
 and Mr. Livermore of New Hampshire opposed it because it 
 provided that alleged fugitives were not to be identified until 
 they reached the State where the persons claiming them re 
 sided. This provision would expose free persons of color to be 
 dragged from one part of the country to another. Jonathan 
 Mason of Massachusetts who had served in the Senate from 
 1800 to 1803, and who, though a Federalist, had been elected 
 to the House over Mr. Ritchie, son-in-law of Harrison Gray 
 Otis, by a few Federalists and by the Democratic party, and 
 who afterward betrayed his constituents by voting for the Mis 
 souri Compromise spoke at length in approval of the meas 
 ure. He thought the tribunals of the South would decide more 
 correctly than those of the North. So great was the leaning 
 against slavery in Massachusetts, that in ninety-nine cases out 
 of a hundred juries would decide in favor of the fugitive. He 
 did not wish, by denying just facilities for the recovery of fugi 
 tive slaves, to have the town where he lived " infested with the 
 runaways of the South." 
 
THE FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT OF 1793. 77 
 
 He was sustained by John Holmes, who did not think it 
 " competent in Massachusetts to try a question between a 
 Southern master and his slave," and he expressed the opin 
 ion that the freedom of no man in the North would be affected 
 by the passage of the bill. Mr. Storrs of New York followed, 
 and expressed his pleasure at the liberality manifested ; and 
 he hoped to see more of it displayed by gentlemen from the 
 North, as an assurance that they " were willing to sacrifice 
 some old prejudices to the spirit of harmony and mutual bene 
 fit." Mr. Whitman of Massachusetts denied the authority of 
 Congress to compel State officers to perform the duty of arrest 
 ing and returning fugitive slaves, and Mr. Williams of Con 
 necticut opposed that provision under which a freeman might 
 be dragged to another part of the country, and have his liberty 
 endangered, if not destroyed. " In attempting," he said, " to 
 guard the rights of property to one class of citizens, it was un 
 just that the rights of another class should be put in jeopardy." 
 The bill was then passed by fifteen majority. 
 
 In the Senate it was referred to a committee, of which John 
 J. Crittenden of Kentucky was chairman. He reported it with 
 amendments. The question was debated with much earnest 
 ness. Mr. Smith of South Carolina spok;e in its advocacy, 
 and sharply criticised the action of the Northern States. Mr. 
 Morrill of New Hampshire spoke at length in opposition to its 
 provisions ; and it was also strongly opposed by Mr. Roberts 
 of Pennsylvania and by Mr. Burrill of Rhode Island. It 
 passed by four majority, Mr. Otis of Massachusetts, Mr. 
 Sanford of New York, and Mr. Taylor of Indiana, voting for 
 it ; Mr. Horsey and Mr. Van Dyke, representing the slave State 
 of Delaware, voting against it. It went back to the House for 
 concurrence in amendments, and, though efforts were made 
 to take it up, it was suffered to lie on the table. Northern 
 members who had voted for it began to be alarmed at their 
 own inconsiderate action, and shrank from the consummation 
 of that cruel measure. 
 
 Four years afterward, in 1821, Mr. Wright of Maryland in 
 troduced a resolution into the House of Representatives for the 
 appointment of a committee to consider the expediency of pro- 
 
78 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 viding by law more effectually to secure the rendition of fugi 
 tive slaves. He warmly deprecated the interference of Quak 
 ers and others to prevent their reclamation, and significantly 
 hinted that, if effectual means were not taken to secure the 
 rights of Southern States, they might be driven to take up arms 
 in support of their rights. The House, on motion of Mr. Camp 
 bell of Pennsylvania, referred the resolution to the Judiciary 
 Committee, and a bill was reported. It was moved by Mr. 
 Colden of New York so to amend it as to limit the power ex 
 ercised under it to judges of courts of record. It was main 
 tained that the law of 1793 was " inadequate," and a bill was 
 " indispensably necessary." Mr. Colden then withdrew his 
 proposed amendment, and moved as a test question to strike 
 out the enacting clause. He declared that he was " not one 
 of those visionary philanthropists who would contend for im 
 mediate and universal emancipation," but he believed the bill 
 inconsistent with the principles of liberty, and would have a 
 direct agency in promoting the traffic of selling free blacks for 
 slaves which had been carried on to a great extent. On motion 
 of Francis Johnson of Kentucky the bill was recommitted to 
 a select committee, and again reported back with amendments ; 
 but no action thereupon was taken. Efforts to secure a law 
 more stringent than the act of 1793 were continued, however, 
 till they were crowned with success in the inhuman act of 
 1850. 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE SLATE-TRADE. ITS PROHIBITION. 
 
 Increase of the Slave-trade. Memorial of the National Convention of Abolition 
 Societies. Bill reported by Mr. Trambull and passed. Memorial of Penn 
 sylvania Quakers against the Ee-enslavement of Emancipated Negroes in North 
 Carolina. Exciting Debate. Mr. Sitgreaves' Eeport adopted. Mr. Hill- 
 house's Bill amendatory of the Slave-trade Act of 1794. Senate Bill referred 
 to a Select Committee in the House. Reported with Amendments and passed. 
 President Jefferson recommends the Prohibition of the Slave-trade. A 
 Bill reported and passed in the Senate. A Bill reported in the House. A 
 Debate thereon. Mr. Sloan's Amendment. Mr. Early's Threat. Mr. 
 Sloan's Amendment defeated. Mr. Bidwell's Amendment. Death Penalty 
 proposed by Mr. Smilie. Death Penalty defeated. Bill recommitted. 
 Bill reported. Laid on the Table. Senate Bill taken up, amended, and 
 passed. Mr. Randolph's Defiance. Further Legislation demanded. 
 
 THE compromises of the Constitution, by which the slave- 
 trade was allowed to continue till 1808, breathed new life into 
 that odious traffic. The moral obligation and restraining force 
 imposed by the early action of the Continental Congress in 
 prohibiting that traffic were greatly weakened or neutralized 
 by this constitutional provision. Many who, in the fervor of 
 the Revolutionary struggle, readily indorsed that noble action 
 were now led, if they did not engage in the odious traffic 
 themselves, to countenance those who were involved in it. 
 The rapid growth of the country under the new government, 
 the opening of fresh lands for settlement, and the increasing 
 demand for Southern products, enhanced the price of slaves 
 and stimulated the hateful trade. The ports of South Carolina 
 and Georgia were opened wide to welcome cargoes of newly 
 enslaved Africans. The prohibitory laws of the States were 
 weakened or rendered nugatory by selfish interests ; and 
 Northern capital, ships, sailors, and merchants shared in the 
 profits and in " the contamination of a traffic at which every 
 feeling of humanity must forever revolt." 
 
80 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 On the first day of January, 1794, a convention of delegates 
 of abolition societies was held at Philadelphia. Ten States 
 were represented. General Joseph Bloomfield of New Jersey, 
 afterward governor of that State, and a general in the War of 
 1812, presided. It recommended the institution of annual dis 
 courses on the subject of slavery, and also an annual conven 
 tion of delegates of abolition societies. It also sent forth an 
 address to the citizens of the United States from the pen of 
 that distinguished physician, philanthropist, and statesman, Dr. 
 Benjamin Rush. 
 
 A memorial, signed by the president of the convention, was 
 presented to the House of Representatives, praying Congress to 
 pass a law to prohibit the traffic carried on by American citi 
 zens to supply slaves to foreign nations, and to prevent foreign 
 ers from fitting out vessels in this country for the African slave- 
 trade. This memorial, a petition of the Quakers at the Yearly 
 Meeting, and also one from the Providence Society for the abo 
 lition of the slave-trade, were referred to a committee of five, 
 of which Mr. Trumbull of Connecticut, who had been Speaker 
 of the House during the preceding Congress, was chairman. 
 A bill was reported from this committee which, after being so 
 amended as to insert the word " foreign " before the word " ship," 
 or " vessel," was passed. When it reached the Senate, an unsuc 
 cessful motion for postponement was made, and it passed that 
 body. 
 
 In November, 1797, Mr. Gallatin of Pennsylvania pre 
 sented to the House of Representatives a memorial of the 
 Quakers of that State, setting forth that one hundred and 
 thirty-four slaves made free by the members of that society in 
 North Carolina had been reduced to slavery again by retroac 
 tive laws. The memorialists pronounced that act " an abom 
 inable tragedy, tending to bring down the righteous judgments 
 of Almighty God upon the land." They also called the atten 
 tion of Congress to the " solemn league and covenant made 
 with the Almighty," by which the first Continental Congress, 
 in 1774, decreed that they would neither import slaves nor 
 purchase slaves imported by others. They represented that 
 this solemn covenant had been contravened by the cruelties 
 
THE SLAVE-TRADE. ITS PROHIBITION. 81 
 
 and wrongs practised on the colored race ; and they prayed 
 Congress by timely and adequate legislation to redress these 
 wrongs and cause these cruelties to cease. 
 
 A sharp debate at once sprang up, in which, though the gen 
 eral geographical divisions of sentiment on the subject of slav 
 ery appear, which generally obtained through the long struggle 
 with increasing distinctness till its close, there were yet many 
 and marked exceptions in which the most hard and heartless 
 opinions fell from Northern lips, and generous and humane 
 sentiments were clearly pronounced by some men from the 
 South. Robert Goodloe Harper, one of the most eminent pub 
 lic men of that day, and then a representative from South 
 Carolina, led off in the opposition. He thought that Congress 
 and the State legislatures should set their faces against " re 
 monstrances complaining of what it was utterly impossible to 
 alter." 
 
 Mr. Rutledge of the same State, who had been nominated 
 Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, but 
 who had been rejected by the Senate, thought the Quakers 
 ought to be censured by a report of the committee. He avowed 
 that they were a set of men who attempted to seduce the ser 
 vants of gentlemen travelling to the seat of government, and 
 were constantly importuning Congress to interfere in a business 
 with which it had no concern. Mr. Macon of North Carolina, 
 who served more than thirty years in Congress, was Speaker 
 of the House, and President pro tern, of the Senate, petulantly 
 remarked that the Quakers, " instead of being peace-makers, 
 were war-makers," as they were continually endeavoring in the 
 Southern States to " stir up insurrection among the negroes." 
 Expressing himself sarcastically or very unreasonably, he said 
 it was extraordinary that the Quakers should come, session 
 after session, with their petitions ; for, if they were dissatisfied 
 with the laws of North Carolina, they had only to transfer their 
 negroes to Pennsylvania, where they would be immediately set 
 free. Even Mr. Sewell of Massachusetts, afterward Chief Jus 
 tice of its Supreme Court, denied that Congress could furnish 
 redress to the re-enslaved freemen, since it could not change 
 the law of North Carolina. 
 11 
 
82 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 On the other hand, the reference of the memorial was advo 
 cated by Mr. Thatcher of Massachusetts, whose twelve years 
 in Congress, from 1789 to 1801, were years of undeviating 
 devotion to freedom. He maintained that, if the Quakers 
 thought themselves aggrieved, it was their duty to present 
 their petitions " three, five, or seventy times," until their 
 grievances were redressed. Mr. Swanwick of Pennsylvania 
 expressed the opinion that the uncommon warmth which was 
 shown led many persons to believe that gentlemen were un 
 willing to have such matters looked into. Mr. Gallatin 
 scouted the idea that the petition would shake the property 
 of the country, when it was only a paper reminding them of 
 certain black men, not slaves, but freemen. Mr. Allen of 
 Connecticut trusted the petition would not be rejected, as its 
 rejection would be highly disrespectful to a society revered by 
 every man who sets a value on virtue and integrity. Mr. Liv 
 ingston of New York, afterward General Jackson's Secretary 
 of State, said that, if the petitioners were of the description 
 represented, if they had endeavored to raise insurrection in 
 one part of the country and practise robbery in another, he 
 should not be inclined to pay much respect to them. 
 
 Thus the debate ran on, revealing rather the individuality, 
 interests, and associations of the different participants than 
 the well-matured convictions and formally accepted, positions 
 of either persons or parties in the strife. In new and untried 
 circumstances they were evidently grappling with a question 
 they did not fully understand, whose height and depth, length 
 and breadth, they did but imperfectly comprehend. If they did 
 not jump at conclusions, evidently much that was said in that 
 debate was rather the utterance of first impressions than of 
 well-reasoned deductions, carefully drawn from a patient and 
 thorough examination. 
 
 Thus Mr. Parker of Massachusetts, afterward Chief Justice 
 of that State, opposed the reference of the petition because it 
 asked Congress to act upon a subject on which it had no 
 power to act ; while Mr. Bayard, a lawyer of great eminence 
 from Delaware, declared that he was warranted in saying that 
 the Constitution gave the House jurisdiction over the matter 
 
THE SLAVE-TRADE. ITS PROHIBITION. 83 
 
 of the re-enslavement of those made free by their masters, 
 for " no State had the right to make ex post facto laws." 
 Josiah Parker of Virginia insolently remarked that he would 
 consent to the petition's lying on the table or under the table. 
 Much more reasonably and frankly did Mr. Nicholas of the 
 same State declare that it would be for the honor of people 
 holding slaves to look into the matter, as "it was not for the 
 interest of slaveholders to cover improper practices." He 
 should, indeed, be sorry if his possessing property of that kind 
 obliged him to cover the violation of another man's rights. 
 
 Mr. Gordon of New Hampshire saw nothing in the memo 
 rial calling for the interference of Congress. Gentlemen were 
 reminded by Mr. Thatcher that, while they were opposing the 
 reading of the memorial, they were filing off in squads and 
 fighting to get a sight of it. Mr. Smith of Maryland coolly 
 said that the laws of Virginia permitting emancipation by the 
 masters made the slaves of neighboring States unhappy and 
 gave their masters considerable uneasiness. The memorial 
 was then referred to a committee of five, of which Mr. Sit- 
 greaves of Pennsylvania was chairman. After several confer 
 ences with the memorialists, and a careful examination of the 
 subject, the committee reported it as their opinion that it was 
 strictly a judicial question, with which Congress, as a legisla 
 tive body, could not legitimately intermeddle. Though Mr. 
 Rutledge and Mr. Thatcher expressed themselves dissatisfied 
 with the report, it was adopted by a large majority. 
 
 The act of 1794, to prevent the fitting out of vessels in the 
 ports of the United States engaged in supplying slaves to 
 foreigners, did not accomplish the purpose intended. Further 
 legislation was demanded. Accordingly, near the close of the 
 year 1799, Mr. Hillhouse of Connecticut moved in the Senate 
 for the appointment of a committee for the revision of the 
 law. The motion being adopted, a committee of three, con 
 sisting of himself, Dexter of Massachusetts, and Read of 
 Delaware, were appointed, who reported a bill which was 
 passed. 
 
 Near the close of April, 1800, the House proceeded to the 
 consideration of the bill received from the Senate. In the 
 
84 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 debate which followed New England found little occasion for 
 complacency when she compared the utterances of one of her 
 representatives, John Brown of Rhode Island, with those of 
 the representatives of Virginia and Delaware. Making the 
 extraordinary declaration that it was improper to prevent the 
 citizens of the United States from participating in a trade 
 enjoyed by all European nations, Mr. Brown said he well 
 knew that Congress was drilled into passing the previous act 
 by the well-known abolition society, otherwise the Society of 
 Friends, who were " very troublesome till they got the act 
 passed." He thought it poor policy to prevent a trade allowed 
 to be profitable ; and it ought to be considered wrong, in a 
 moral point of view, to prevent it, as the people themselves 
 profited by it. It ought to be a matter of national policy, as 
 it would bring in a revenue to the treasury. Avowing such 
 sentiments, he was, of course, in favor of postponing the fur 
 ther consideration of the measure. 
 
 In striking contrast with these heartless and immoral sen 
 timents were those of Mr. Nicholas of Virginia, who said 
 that, as a Southern man, he was obliged, in common with the 
 people of the South, to keep men in a state of slavery ; but 
 they were endeavoring to ameliorate the condition of that race. 
 Mr. Bayard agreed with Mr. Brown that the government could 
 derive a large revenue from the support of the slave-trade, 
 but he thought " a more dishonorable item of revenue could 
 not be imagined." He pronounced the bill, however, ex 
 tremely imperfect, and moved its reference to a select com 
 mittee. This motion, though opposed by Mr. Rutledge, was 
 adopted ; the bill was recommitted, reported back with amend 
 ments, and adopted, only five voting against it. The Senate 
 promptly concurred in the amendments, and it became a law. 
 
 Among the consequences of the insurrection and revolution 
 in San Domingo were the violent expulsion and expatriation 
 of large numbers of the defeated. Among them were negroes, 
 who sought and found refuge in the United States. The pres 
 ence of a few men of the African race who had fought for lib 
 erty and independence aroused alike the fears and passions 
 of the slave-masters. The horrors of a servile insurrection 
 
THE SLAVE-TRADE. ITS PROHIBITION. 85 
 
 loomed up before their excited imaginations ; and those who 
 saw thousands of slaves imported into South Carolina and other 
 Southern States, with no compunctions of conscience or solici 
 tude as to the result, were greatly alarmed and their zeal was 
 greatly quickened by the arrival of a few black men from San 
 Domingo with minds inflamed by dreams of liberty. Legisla 
 tion was demanded. Memorials were presented from North 
 Carolina, setting forth the dangers to the Southern States from 
 the immigration of this class of persons. These memorials 
 were referred to a committee, of which Mr. Hill of that State 
 was chairman. He reported a bill in January, 1803, forbid 
 ding under severe penalties the coming of such persons, already 
 forbidden by the laws of several of the States. 
 
 This advanced position and new demand, made in the inter 
 ests of slavery, excited both opposition and alarm, which would 
 have been largely increased had their full significance and bear 
 ing been clearly comprehended. Mr: Bacon of Massachusetts 
 was dissatisfied with the principles involved in that measure. 
 He emphatically declared that he was not to be " intimidated 
 by a personal reflection or affected sneers, nor yet by any inhu 
 man threats that can be uttered to supply the place of manly 
 discussion." He avowed that the proposed measure made 
 discriminations between citizens of the United States ; that 
 such citizens could not, for the purposes of commerce or in 
 case of distress, enter the ports of particular States, or sail 
 along their coasts, without subjecting themselves to the severe 
 penalties of the bill. He further declared that it made the 
 same discrimination between citizens of particular States as 
 between citizens of the United States. 
 
 Mr. Mott of New Jersey objected to it on the ground of its 
 unconstitutionality. Mr. Mitchell of New York moved its re 
 commitment for the purpose of amendment; which motion 
 was supported by several members, on the ground of its alleged 
 unconstitutionality, and because it abridged the rights of the 
 colored citizens of some of the States by prohibiting their en 
 trance into certain States, under the severe penalties of a fine 
 of a thousand dollars and the forfeiture of the vessel carrying 
 them. This recommitment was strenuously opposed by Hill, 
 
86 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Early, and Randolph, who acknowledged that " its penalties 
 were rigorous, but were only such as the imminent danger of 
 the Southern States called for." Though the motion for a recom 
 mitment was lost, another motion, by Mr. Nicholson of Mary 
 land, to recommit to a select committee was carried by a small 
 majority. Being reported in a new draft, with some modifi 
 cations, it was adopted by a vote of three to one. In the 
 Senate it was referred to a committee, which reported it 
 without amendments, and it became a law, inhuman as it 
 was, and inherently opposed to the then loudly vaunted doc 
 trine of human rights and to the fundamental principles of 
 the newly established republican institutions. 
 
 In 1803 South Carolina repealed her law prohibiting the im 
 portation of slaves. This action was deeply regretted by most 
 of her sister States, both on account of its intrinsic wrongful- 
 ness and inhumanity, and because it plainly revealed the drift 
 of her public sentiment to be, not toward the amelioration and 
 speedy extinction of slavery, as expected and predicted by the au 
 thors of the compromises of the Constitution, but rather a stride 
 in the opposite direction. To check and discourage this in 
 iquitous traffic, early in January, 1804, Mr. Bard of Pennsyl 
 vania introduced a resolution imposing a tax of ten dollars on 
 every slave imported. The House did not proceed to its con 
 sideration until the middle of the next month, when Mr. 
 Lowndes of South Carolina led off in the debate, which, like 
 the previous discussion, revealed what seemed to be crude and 
 hastily formed opinions, rather than the matured and sharply 
 defined argumentation of men who had long studied and delib 
 erately chosen the one or the other of the two sides of a mooted 
 question. He opposed the tax because, while it would not pre 
 vent the importation of a single slave, the fact of the govern 
 ment's deriving a revenue from it could be viewed in no other 
 light than a sanction of the traffic. Though opposed to the 
 slave-trade himself, he admitted that the Southern people felt a 
 deep interest in it, and that the acquisition of Louisiana, then 
 just made, would strengthen that interest. Mr. Bedinger of 
 Kentucky thought such a law would rather sanction than 
 discourage the trade ; and Mr. Macon, Speaker of the House, 
 
THE SLAVE-TRADE. ITS PROHIBITION. 87 
 
 opposed it as an impolitic measure. Roger Griswold of Con 
 necticut, a gentleman of large capacity and great influence in 
 the Federal party, declared his abhorrence of the slave-trade ; 
 but he opposed the tax because it would appear to the world 
 that Congress was raising a revenue from " a commerce in 
 slaves." 
 
 Mr. Bard, however, spoke earnestly in favor of his resolution, 
 and maintained that the tax proposed was designed to inter 
 pose every discouragement to the importation of slaves, and 
 was supported only incidentally as a source of revenue. It was 
 also eloquently supported by Mr. Mitchell of New York, who 
 reminded the House that in various parts of the country outfits 
 were made for slave voyages without secrecy, shame, or appre 
 hension ; that, countenanced by their fellow-citizens, who were 
 as willing to buy slaves as they were to collect and bring them 
 to market, merciless men, as greedy as the sharks of the ele 
 ment on which they sailed, " clandestinely embarked the sooty 
 offspring of the Eastern for the ill-fated soil of the Western 
 hemisphere." He estimated that during the preceding year 
 twenty thousand enslaved negroes had been added, by smug 
 gling, to the plantation stock of Georgia and South Carolina. 
 
 Mr. Stanton of Rhode Island, in a similar strain, expressed 
 his gratification to find honorable members in every part of 
 the House who " reprobate the infamous traffic of buying and 
 selling the human species." It was not his intention to crim 
 inate South Carolina, whose late conduct had created serious 
 and well-founded alarm ; but he could not " connive at a meas 
 ure that goes to shake the pillars of public security, threatens 
 corruption to the morals of our citizens, and tarnishes the 
 American character." Mr. Southard of New Jersey rejoiced 
 at the introduction of the resolution, because " it gave the na 
 tional legislature an opportunity to hear their opinions against 
 the increase of slaves." Even a South Carolina representative, 
 Mr. Thomas Moore, though he opposed the tax, expressed 
 the hope that the House would discourage the impolitic act of 
 his State by enacting a law expressive of its disapprobation. 
 
 There were others, however, more pronounced in their 
 opposition to the resolution because it was introduced in the 
 
88 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 interests of freedom. Thus Mr. Huger of South Carolina 
 maintained that the Constitution was " the offspring of con 
 cession and compromise," that under it South Carolina enjoyed 
 " the exclusive right of judging of the propriety of allowing 
 the trade or prohibiting it " ; and he felt sensibly the singling 
 out of his State for censure for doing what she had a right to 
 do. He emphatically asserted that the people of the North, 
 " who make the most noise upon the subject, are those who, 
 when they go to the South, first hire, then buy, and, last of all, 
 turn out the severest masters among us." This ill-natured 
 criticism was undoubtedly then, and has been unquestionably 
 since, too true. Of a similar spirit were the remarks of Mr. 
 Eppes of Virginia, son-in-law of President Jefferson, who 
 said that he lived in a State where slaves were as much the 
 subject of taxation as lands ; but he did not know that the 
 statute-books of Virginia were stained by imposing taxes upon 
 them. According to some estimates, one hundred thousand 
 slaves would be imported in four years. Accordingly, a 
 revenue of a million of dollars would accrue therefrom. Mr. 
 Early moved its postponement till the first Monday of May ; 
 and his motion was supported by Gregg of Pennsylvania, 
 Lyon of Kentucky, and Huger. But it failed, and the resolu 
 tion was adopted by a large majority, and referred to the Com 
 mittee of Ways and Means, which immediately reported a bill. 
 Mr. Lowndes moved that its consideration be postponed till 
 the first day of December, which was opposed by Mr. Eppes, 
 and supported by Mr. Jackson ; but it failed of securing the 
 necessary vote, though subsequently a motion of Mr. Findley 
 to postpone to the second Monday of March prevailed by a 
 majority of six. 
 
 During the debate Mr. Rodney of Delaware expressed his 
 gratification that " so inhuman a practice was justly repro 
 bated by all." He said that every gentleman from the South 
 as well as the East deprecated the act of South Carolina. But 
 he was in favor of delaying action till the sentiment of that 
 State could be ascertained. " No man," he said, " can ascribe 
 to me a friendship for slavery. I have been uniformly and 
 warmly opposed to it. To blot it out of the pages of our 
 
THE SLAVE-TKADE. ITS PROHIBITION. 89 
 
 country is one of the objects nearest my heart. In my own 
 State I have hitherto maintained an unequal conflict on this 
 subject. But great is the force of truth, and it will prevail." 
 Little did this distinguished son of Delaware then imagine 
 that his State would, when the trial came, be among the most 
 persistent in opposition to the policy of emancipation. Mr. 
 Elmer of New Jersey advocated the passage of the measure, 
 because it was predicated on a sound principle of morality and 
 economy. The bill, however, never came to a vote, owing to 
 the pressure of the representatives from South Carolina, to 
 allow her legislature to repeal the obnoxious act. But she 
 never retraced her steps ; and, though in that whole debate 
 not one word of apology or defence was raised in behalf of 
 her disgraceful action and position, she persisted in her policy, 
 and the infamous traffic was vigorously prosecuted under the 
 sanction of her laws. 
 
 The time fixed by the Constitution empowering Congress to 
 prohibit the African slave-trade was approaching. Mr. Jeffer 
 son, in his message to the second session of the Ninth Con 
 gress, in 1806, thus alluded to the subject : " I congratulate 
 you, fellow-citizens, on the approach of a period at which you 
 may interpose your authority constitutionally to withdraw the 
 citizens of the United States from all participation in the vio 
 lation of human rights which has been so long continued on 
 the unoffending inhabitants of Africa, and which the morality, 
 the reputation, and the best interests of the country have long 
 been eager to prescribe. Although no law you can pass can 
 take prohibitory effect until the first day of the year 1808, yet 
 the intervening period is not too long to prevent, by timely 
 notice, expeditions which cannot be completed before that 
 day." 
 
 The subject, however, like everything connected with slavery 
 and its recognition in the Constitution, was beset with difficul 
 ties, resulting from the abnormal state of affairs, and the per 
 tinacity of the slaveholders against any legislation which 
 threatened to interfere with their system. Rightly conclud 
 ing that there would be infractions of any law that could be 
 framed against the horrible but profitable traffic, it was, of 
 
 12 
 
90 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 course, needful to affix penalties against its violation, and 
 make some disposition of the victims found in the hands of 
 the guilty men who might be detected in that violation. 
 These two points were the subjects of special interest, as 
 they became the themes of much angry discussion. 
 
 So much of the President's message as related to the pro 
 hibition of the slave-trade was referred to a select committee, 
 of which Mr. Early of Georgia was chairman. A bill, too, 
 was promptly introduced into the Senate, to prevent the im 
 portation of slaves after the 1st of January, 1808. It was 
 referred to a committee, of which Mr. Bradley of Vermont 
 was chairman. He reported it back, and it became the subject 
 of an earnest and excited debate for three weeks, when it was 
 passed and sent to the House. A similar bill had been reported 
 in that body by Mr, Early on the 15th of the same month. It 
 had six sections. Among them was one making it unlawful 
 to import any person of color, with intent to keep or sell ; 
 another, forfeiting to the United States any person so im 
 ported ; and another still, imposing the forfeiture of vessels, 
 and fines upon persons fitting out such vessels. In the long 
 and earnest debate which followed was revealed the fact that 
 there was no dissent from the proposition to put an end to 
 the odious traffic. Whether from motives of policy, humanity, 
 or Christian morality, there was a general acquiescence in 
 the prohibition. The questions at issue were concerning the 
 proper penalties to be prescribed, and the proper disposition 
 to be made of any Africans who might be imported in contra 
 vention of the law. These were vehemently and passionately 
 discussed. The slave-masters, who had early acquired almost 
 complete ascendency in the government, seemed determined 
 that their cherished system should receive no damage from 
 this proposed prohibition. Whatever else might follow, slavery 
 must not be harmed. The debate, however, revealed great 
 diversity of views, even among those whose purposes were in 
 the main alike. 
 
 Mr. Sloan of New Jersey, a member of the Society of Friends, 
 moved to amend the bill by inserting after the word " for 
 feited " the words, " and such person or slave shall be entitled 
 
THE SLAVE-TRADE. ITS PROHIBITION. 91 
 
 to his freedom." Mr. Alston of North Carolina doubted the 
 power of Congress to free slaves imported into any particular 
 State when the laws directed they should be sold. Mr. Eppes 
 moved to amend the amendment, so as to provide that the for 
 feiture should take place in the States where slavery was not 
 permitted. Mr. Early thought there was an absurdity in Mr. 
 Sloan's amendment, providing that a person should be forfeited 
 and sold, and yet should be free. To this Mr. Sloan replied that 
 it ought to be the object of the bill totally to prohibit the impor 
 tation of slaves into the United States, or selling them therein. 
 
 The amendment was then vehemently opposed by Mr. Early, 
 who declared that " on the decision of this question would turn 
 another, whether the government would now prohibit the 
 slave-trade or not. It is true, if we pass this bill as it stands, 
 that persons imported will not only be forfeited, but be sold as 
 slaves, and be afterward kept as such. This is a melancholy 
 truth, melancholy because without such a provision we can 
 pass no law that can be effectual. What can we do with this 
 description of persons, in case they are brought into this 
 country in contravention of this act ? " "I am not prepared," 
 said Mr. Smilie of Pennsylvania, " to say what is best to be 
 done ; but I will never give my consent to the last section of 
 the bill. Shall we, while we are attempting to put a stop to 
 this traffic, take upon ourselves the odium of being slave- 
 traders ? " 
 
 The Speaker, Mr. Macon, expressed the opinion that the 
 sentiment was unanimous against the importation of slaves ; 
 but he confessed that there were grave difficulties in the way 
 of deciding what was to become of cargoes imported. Those 
 persons knew nothing about the country, could not speak its 
 language, and he desired to know what was to become of them. 
 Mr. Early, after saying that the most formidable aspect in 
 which this question could present itself was that of making 
 them free in slaveholding communities, emphatically pro 
 claimed that, if they were turned loose " upon us, we must 
 either get rid of them or they of us. I will speak out ; it is 
 not my practice to be mealy-mouthed on a subject of impor 
 tance. Not one of them will be left alive in a year." 
 
92 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Mr. Barker of Massachusetts thought the illegally imported 
 Africans should be made free and returned to their native land ; 
 but the amendment was rejected, only nineteen voting for it. 
 Mr. Bidwell of Massachusetts having moved to strike out the 
 forfeiture clause, Mr. Quincy of the same State opposed the 
 motion, remarking that this afforded the only way by which the 
 United States could get control of them. If they were im 
 ported into the South, they would be made slaves ; if into the 
 North, they would become vagabonds. Mr. Williams of North 
 Carolina sneeringly remarked that gentlemen were " com 
 pletely hobbled," that they must go on or stick where they 
 were. Mr. Pitkin of Connecticut strongly objected to forfeit 
 ing the imported Africans, and moved to recommit the bill to 
 a select committee. The motion was carried, and it was re 
 committed to a committee of seven, of which Mr. Early was 
 made chairman. Mr. Smilie, remarking that the captain of a 
 slave-ship was guilty of murder, proposed for the consideration 
 of the select committee a new section, providing that any one 
 duly convicted of violating the law should suffer death. 
 
 When the debate was resumed, Mr. Findley of Pennsylvania 
 advocated the binding out of the forfeited negroes for a term 
 of years. Mr. Bidwell opposed the forfeiture clause, because 
 it proceeded wholly on a false principle, and implied that the 
 importer had a right to his slave. As to the question what 
 should be done with the imported Africans, he was willing to 
 " agree to any practicable method." 
 
 Mr. Quincy made a long and very able speech. He regretted 
 that they could not devise some plan to which they all might 
 assent ; and he thought it might be effected " if gentlemen 
 would come down from their high abstract ground to the level 
 of things in their actual state." Alluding to the assertion that 
 the African prince and the slave-trader could acquire no right 
 of property in the captive prisoner of the former, or in the pur 
 chased slaves of the latter, he said : " Their conclusions are 
 correct ; their principles are solid. Refer the claim of either 
 to five hundred juries of New England, and five hundred ver 
 dicts would be obtained against it But the misfortune is 
 
 that, notwithstanding all these unquestionable principles, the 
 
THE SLAVE-TKADE. ITS PROHIBITION. 
 
 93 
 
 African prince does at this day, and after this law passes will, 
 sell his subjects. To all practical purposes a title is acquired 
 in them ; and they are passed, like other property, from one to 
 another in their native country. But this is not the worst. 
 A title to this description of persons is not only allowed in 
 Africa, but is and must be after your law passes, in a large sec 
 tion of your own country Now this is that real, practical 
 
 state of things to which we must look and on which we must 
 legislate. How ? Do all we can to prohibit. If you fail in 
 this, and such persons are imported, then forfeit, because 
 that is the surest mode of prohibition, by taking away the in 
 ducement to purchase ; because the government, with the title 
 in its own hands, can exercise its rights in the interests of 
 humanity. The objection " that it 4 admits a title ' is only in 
 seeming. All that is necessarily implied is that all of title 
 there is, more or less, passes into the hands of the general 
 government, to be used for their good. What the government 
 shall do with them may be left for future consideration." 
 
 Mr. Macon having said that this was a commercial ques 
 tion merely, with which the laws of nations have nothing to 
 do, Mr. Smilie remarked that this question is connected with 
 principles of a higher order than those merely commercial. 
 Repeating the self-evident truths of the Declaration of Inde 
 pendence, he inquired how these rights are connected with 
 commercial principles. The motion to strike out the clause 
 on forfeiture was lost by a large majority. The report of the 
 select committee coming up for consideration on the last day 
 of the month and year, a motion was made to substitute im 
 prisonment for not less than five nor more than ten years for 
 the penalty of death, for the violation of the proposed law. 
 Mr. Sloan remarked that there were many crimes inferior to 
 this punishable with death. Depicting the horrors of the 
 traffic, he affirmed that "there should be a proportion in 
 these things." 
 
 Mr. Ely of Massachusetts thought it the most heinous of 
 crimes, and he advocated so severe a punishment because 
 he wished to adopt the most effectual method to stop it. 
 Mr. Tallmadge of Connecticut expressed surprise that where 
 
94 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 there was such unanimity of purpose as to the end, there 
 should be such diversity of sentiment as to the means. " My 
 only wish," he said, " is to affix to it so exemplary a punishment 
 that we may, if possible, totally suppress it." Alluding to the 
 similarity between those laws early enacted in the civilized 
 world and those given to the Jews, he quoted the command : 
 " And he that stealeth a man and selleth him, or if he be 
 found iii his hand, he shall surely be put to death," and in 
 quired : " If this was the punishment by Heaven decreed for 
 man-stealers and man-sellers, then shall imprisonment and 
 fines be substituted now ? Shall we place this most abomi 
 nable traffic, which I fear erelong will call down the vengeance 
 of Heaven on our heads, in the list of minor offences ? " 
 
 Mr. Moseley of Connecticut, alluding to " the air of triumph " 
 with which Southern men charged the crime of this traffic to 
 the people of the Northern States who were importing slaves 
 into their markets, expressed wonder that they should be so 
 tender of these Northern men. He believed that if any of his 
 section were convicted of this grave offence, his constituents 
 would thank the South for hanging them. Alluding to the 
 fact that in some States " a man is put to death for stealing 
 fifty dollars," Mr. Smilie said : " Suppose some philosophical 
 historian, some ages hence, should find that we punish such 
 trifles with death, but this traffic with simple imprisonment, 
 would not such a paragraph in his history be an everlasting- 
 disgrace to our country ? " 
 
 But there were not wanting those who made no conceal 
 ment of the tendency and drift of their sentiments and 
 feelings, by counselling mild measures against even the vile 
 miscreants of the slave-traffic, some who, in their determi 
 nation to maintain and profit by its fruits, found an adequate 
 reason for dealing gently with those who only furnished them 
 these fruits. Thus, Mr. Early doubted the propriety of the 
 death penalty, because the people would not execute it. For, 
 he said, " Southern people do not regard this traffic a crime. 
 They are all concerned in slavery. They consider it an evil, 
 and apprehend, at some future day, mischievous consequences ; 
 but few consider it a crime. It is best to be candid on this 
 
THE SLAVE-TRADE. ITS PROHIBITION. 95 
 
 subject If they considered it a crime, they would 
 
 necessarily accuse themselves. I will tell the truth. A large 
 majority of them do not consider it even an evil." Indorsing 
 the same view, Mr. Holland of North Carolina went a step 
 further, and said, by implication at least, that there was no 
 essential difference, not only between the foreign and domestic 
 slave-trade, but he added, with damaging emphasis, between 
 it and the common practice of slavery itself. He said : " The 
 importer might say to the informer that he had done no worse, 
 nor even so bad, as he. It is true that I have these slaves 
 from Africa ; but I have transported them from one master to 
 another. I am not guilty of holding human beings in bond 
 age. But you are. You have hundreds on your plantation 
 in this miserable condition. By your purchase you tempt 
 traders to increase the evil. He might hold the same lan 
 guage to the jury and the judge who try him. Under such 
 circumstances the law inflicting death would not be executed." 
 
 Mr. Clay of Pennsylvania insisted that the death penalty for 
 the violation of this law could not be carried into effect even 
 in his State. And Mr. Stanton of Rhode Island said that 
 those who bought were as bad as those who import, and de 
 serve hanging just as much ; "but," he added, thus revealing 
 his sympathies upon the subject, " I cannot believe that a man 
 ought to be hung for only stealing a negro." The motion to 
 strike out the death penalty was carried by a vote of sixty- 
 three to fifty-two ; and it is to be noted that these damaging 
 admissions concerning slavery came from its defenders. It 
 was a friend, and not an enemy, who said that there was no 
 essential difference, not only between the foreign and domestic 
 slave-trade, but between it and the common practice of slavery 
 itself. It was an advocate who said that they who bought 
 were as bad as those who import, and " deserve hanging just 
 as much." 
 
 Early in January, 1807, Mr. Findley offered a proviso that 
 " no person shall be sold as a slave by virtue of this act " ; 
 but it was lost by the casting vote of the Speaker. The next 
 day the bill was recommitted, on motion of Mr. Bedinger, to 
 a committee of seventeen, who so amended it as to provide 
 
96 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 that all persons imported in violation of the act should be 
 sent to the free States, bound out for a limited time, and 
 made free. The Senate bill was also referred to the same 
 committee, and on the 9th of February the House proceeded 
 to the consideration of the measure. That portion of the 
 act authorizing the President to take such persons as were 
 forfeited and " indenture them as apprentices or servants, as 
 most beneficial for them and safe for the United States, out, 
 however, of the slave States" led to a heated and angry debate, 
 lasting the whole day. Even this mild and, it would seem, 
 favorable disposition of such persons was strenuously opposed 
 by Southern men. Mr. Early emphatically declared that " the 
 people of the South would resist this provision of the bill with 
 their lives " ; and he moved to amend it by providing that 
 negroes so imported should be delivered to the State authori 
 ties, to be disposed of as they may determine. His violent 
 utterances, however, were sharply rebuked by Mr. Smilie, who 
 reminded him that the House was not to be frightened by 
 threats of civil war. Mr. Early explained that he only meant 
 to say that troops would be necessary to enforce the act. 
 
 The House bill was laid upon the table. The Senate bill was 
 then taken up, and the death penalty stricken out, by a major 
 ity of nineteen. It forbade the transportation, for purposes of 
 sale, of any negro on board of any vessel under forty tons' 
 burden ; but, on motion of Mr. Early, it was amended so as to 
 exclude the Senate prohibition of the domestic slave-trade. 
 The Senate bill also provided that neither importer nor pur 
 chaser should gain any legal title to persons illegally imported. 
 Mr. Williams moved to substitute the word " retain " for the 
 word " have " or " gain " ; and the motion to strike out was 
 agreed to, but the word " hold " instead of " retain " was sub 
 stituted. Mr. Williams then vehemently declared that the sub 
 stitution of that word " hold " instead of " retain" would lead 
 to the destruction and massacre of the whites in the Southern 
 States. The Senate bill as thus amended was passed, only five 
 voting in the negative. 
 
 The Senate promptly concurring in the amendments, except 
 ing the proviso allowing the domestic slave-trade, the House 
 
THE SLAVE-TRADE. ITS PROHIBITION. 
 
 97 
 
 resumed the consideration of the bill. On the motion to recede 
 from the amendment, John Randolph, who had remained silent 
 during the debate, made a violent and defiant speech, declar 
 ing, u if the bill passed without the amendment, the Southern 
 people would set the law at defiance, and he would set the ex 
 ample." The House voted not to recede, and a committee of 
 conference was appointed. This committee adopted a modifi 
 cation, forbidding " the transportation of slaves coastwise in 
 vessels under forty tons with a view to sale." 
 
 The report caused a very acrimonious debate. Mr. Randolph 
 said " he had rather lose the bill, he had rather lose all the 
 bills of the session, he had rather lose every bill passed since 
 the establishment of the government, than agree to the pro 
 vision contained in this slave bill. It went to blow up the Con 
 stitution in ruins." " The whole bill," said Mr. Williams, " is 
 not worth a single farthing." After much acrimonious discus 
 sion, a vote was reached, and the modification was adopted by 
 a majority of fourteen. The Senate accepting the modification, 
 the bill was passed. Subsequently a committee was chosen, 
 on motion of Mr. Randolph, to prepare an explanatory act. 
 He reported a bill, which was referred to the committee of the 
 whole, from which it never emerged. 
 
 In defiance of the laws of Congress and the claims of 
 humanity, the foreign slave-trade continued to be stealthily 
 carried on ; and the domestic slave-trade, too, by land and sea, 
 was prosecuted with increasing vigor. It was estimated that 
 not less than fifteen thousand slaves were annually imported 
 into the Southern States. The domestic slave-trade was stim 
 ulated by the increasing demand from the Gulf States. To its 
 ordinary hardships and horrors were added those growing 
 out of an extensive system of kidnapping. The honor of the 
 country and the claims of humanity alike demanded additional 
 legislation. 
 
 13 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 DOMESTIC AND FOEEIGN SLAVE-TRADE. NEGOTIATIONS WITH 
 FOREIGN POWERS. 
 
 Extent of Domestic and Foreign Slave-trade. Cruel Character of the Traffic. 
 Slave-breeding. Prosecution of the Foreign Trade. Christian Sentiment. 
 
 Action of the Quakers. Motion of Mr. Burrell. Rufus King. Mr. 
 Morrill. Mr. Eaton's Motion. Mercer's Resolution. Passage of the Bill. 
 
 Mr. Gorham's Report. Co-operation with Foreign Powers recommended. 
 
 Treaty of 1815. British Proposition. Mr. Rush's Treaty. Action of 
 England. Dilatory Action of the Senate. Treaty amended. Mr. Clay's 
 Reply. Insincerity of the American Government. 
 
 AMERICAN slavery was multiform in its aspects and ca 
 pacities for evil. Among these various phases and features 
 stood out, in bold and black relief, the slave-trade, foreign 
 and domestic. This, in all its developments, from the first 
 sale of his captive by the robber chief in Africa, through 
 all the horrors of the middle passage and the slave coffle, till 
 the last transfer, was an essential part of the system. Not 
 only did many of the slave-masters make their most strenuous 
 exertions for its protection and preservation, but those exer 
 tions were too often connived at, if not aided, by the general 
 government. A true estimate, then, of the extent and blame- 
 worthiness of the national complicity in this great crime re 
 quires a glance at the character and amount of that commerce 
 in human beings. 
 
 After the peace of 1815 the demand for slave labor greatly 
 increased, and the price of slaves largely advanced. Conse 
 quently the slave-trade was prosecuted with renewed vigor. 
 Maryland, the District of Columbia, and Virginia became the 
 seat of the disgraceful traffic, the head-quarters and field of 
 operations of those who, in the prosecution of their terrible 
 business, here sought its victims and furnished supplies for the 
 
DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN SLAVE-TRADE. 99 
 
 Southwestern market. So cruel and shameless did the trade 
 become that many masters themselves and defenders of the 
 system revolted at such demonstrations, and entered their 
 earnest protests against the logical sequences of their own 
 theories. John Randolph denounced it as inhuman and abom 
 inable, and moved for a committee of investigation ; but noth 
 ing came of it. Even a governor of South Carolina, in a 
 message to his legislature, denounced " this remorseless and 
 merciless traffic, the ceaseless dragging along the streets and 
 highways of a crowd of suffering victims to minister to insatiable 
 avarice," and he, too, invoked legislative action. And this is 
 but a tithe of Southern testimony, not to be impeached by the 
 charge of abolition, prejudice, and extravagance. A Kentucky 
 synod of the Presbyterian church thus refers to the slave coffle, 
 often seen in that State, proclaiming, it said, " the iniquity 
 of our system." " There is not a village," it adds, " that does 
 not behold the sad procession of manacled victims." Mr. 
 Paulding, afterward Mr. Van Buren's Secretary of the Navy, 
 thus describes a party of these Northern slaves, which he met 
 in 1815, sold for a Southern market. " In a cart," he said, 
 " tumbled like pigs, were half a dozen half-naked black chil 
 dren, who seemed to have been actually broiled to sleep, fol 
 lowed by scantily clothed women, without shoes or stock 
 ings, and men, bareheaded, half clad, and chained together 
 with an ox-chain," followed by a white man with pistols in his 
 belt. A Southern editor wrote of the same kind of procession 
 as " with heavy, galling chains riveted upon their person, half 
 naked, half starved," these victims of man's unfeeling rapa 
 city, were travelling to a region where " their miserable condi 
 tion will be second only to the wretched creatures in hell." 
 
 Nor were these rare, extreme, exceptional cases. They were 
 the order of the day. The Border States had become slave- 
 breeding communities, making the raising of slaves a special 
 and fostered interest. Still quoting Southern testimony, a 
 Baltimore journal said : " Dealing in slaves has become a 
 large business ; establishments are made in several places in 
 Maryland and Virginia, at which they are sold like cattle. 
 These places of deposit are strongly built, and well supplied 
 
100 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 with iron thumb-screws and gags, and are ornamented with 
 cow-skins, oftentimes bloody." Thomas Jefferson Randolph 
 said in the Virginia legislature, in 1832, that the " State was 
 one grand menagerie, where men are reared for the market like 
 oxen for the shambles." Comparing the domestic and foreign 
 slave-trade, he pronounced the former " much the worse " ; for 
 while the latter, he said, only took " strangers in aspect, lan 
 guage, and manner," in the former, an individual takes those 
 he had " known from infancy," he might have put it far more 
 strongly, tears " them from the mother's arms," and sells 
 them " into a strange country, among a strange people, subject 
 to cruel taskmasters." Mr. Gholson admitted the like fact, 
 and added, " I do not hesitate to say that in its increase con 
 sists much of our wealth." Professor Dew, afterwards presi 
 dent of William and Mary College, in a review of the great 
 debate in the Virginia legislature, in 1831 - 32, on the slavery 
 question, felt called upon to answer the objection that this 
 traffic would depopulate Virginia of its black population, which 
 he did by saying that it added largely to its revenues, and thus 
 " becomes an advantage to the State, and does not check the 
 black population as much as at first view we might imagine, 
 because it furnishes every inducement to the master to attend 
 to the negroes, to encourage breeding, and to cause the greatest 
 number possible to be raised Virginia is in fact a negro- 
 raising State for other States." 
 
 Now when it is remembered that this was not spoken in 
 the heat of debate by a political partisan, but written by a cul 
 tivated, scholarly man in the calm retirement of his study, 
 an educator, too, of young men in the venerable college of his 
 State, discoursing of slave-breeding and slave-selling as if 
 they were mere matters of political economy, precisely as he 
 would write of raising stock and improved breeds of animals, 
 coolly putting the two abhorrent ideas together, the one as 
 indecent as the other was inhuman, and arguing that the 
 stimulus thus given to slave-breeding was an adequate compen 
 sation for the losses incurred by slave-selling, something of 
 the moral tendency of the system he defends and advocates 
 may be estimated. And what gives its deepest shading to 
 
DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN SLAVE-TRADE. 101 
 
 this dark picture is the fact that this increase was secured 
 by a persistent ignoring of the family relation, that these slaves 
 were born out of wedlock, and were the fruits of a promiscuous 
 concubinage. It this was the style of thought and feeling per 
 vading the upper strata of society, the sentiments of the lower 
 class must have been simply horrible, and the utter social 
 demoralization which the rebellion revealed ceases to be a mat 
 ter of wonder. In the prosecution of this terrible business, by 
 the confession of the slave-dealers themselves, the family tie 
 was disregarded, and infants were taken from the mother's 
 arms, while she was sold and they retained. And this traffic 
 had become so enormous that in 1836 it was estimated that 
 the number sold from the single State of Virginia was forty 
 thousand, yielding a return of twenty-four millions of dollars. 
 It was, in fact, the great business, licensed and protected by 
 laws, advertised in the papers, and recognized as one of the 
 branches of legitimate production and trade. Of course there 
 were those in whom the sense of justice, humanity, and shame 
 was not altogether extinct, and they realized its enormity. 
 Editors saw it and denounced it, ecclesiastical bodies con 
 demned it, judges charged juries, and juries presented it as a 
 grievance and nuisance. Thus Judge Morsell, of the Circuit 
 Court, charged the grand jury of Washington that " the fre 
 quency with which the streets of this city have been crowded 
 with manacled captives, sometimes on the sabbath, cannot fail 
 to shock all humane persons." 
 
 While these scenes were enacting in the interests of the 
 domestic slave-traffic, the foreign was still prosecuted with 
 vigor. Without adducing the facts, it may be sufficient to 
 quote the language of Judge Story, of the Supreme Court 
 of the United States, in a charge to a grand jury in 1819. 
 " We have," he said, " but too many proofs from unquestion 
 able sources that the African trade is still carried on with 
 the implacable ferocity and insatiable rapacity of former times. 
 Avarice has grown more subtle in its evasions, and it watches 
 and seizes its prey with an appetite quickened, rather than 
 suppressed by its guilty vigils. American citizens are steeped 
 to their very mouths I can scarcely use too bold a figure in 
 
102 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 this stream of iniquity." And the numbers thus smuggled 
 into the country at that time were estimated by a Southern 
 man at from thirteen thousand to fifteen thousand annu 
 ally. These statistics of the domestic and foreign traffic 
 are easily written, but who can measure the unmitigated 
 wrongs and untold wretchedness involved in the sale and 
 transportation of each one of the victims for whom they 
 stand ? If Mr. Jefferson's arraignment of slavery was not 
 extravagant, when he declared that one hour of the slave's 
 bondage was fraught with greater evil than ages of the oppres 
 sion of Great Britain, in revolt from which our fathers fought 
 through the Revolution, what shall be said of the superadded 
 horrors, not only of a single year's export from a single State 
 of forty thousand men, women, and children, but of the vast 
 aggregate of all the States and all the years of this iniquitous 
 trade ? And what shall be said of the scores of thousands of 
 smuggled victims of foreign and piratical expeditions, extend 
 ing over the same years, subjected not only to the ordinary 
 horrors of the slave-trade, but to sufferings greatly increased 
 and intensified by the outlawry and ban of the civilized world, 
 under which they must be conducted ? Surely it transcends 
 all human conception. 
 
 It was not strange, perhaps, that vile and rapacious men 
 were found ready and reckless enough to engage in this ill- 
 favored commerce in the bodies and souls of men, and that 
 for the extravagant profits which rewarded a successful ven 
 ture in the foreign trade there were those who would run 
 the risk of detection ; but it was a singular, an astounding fact 
 that a young and professedly Christian republic was found, 
 if not indorsing, yet consenting to it, if not protecting, at 
 least tolerating it. For the disgraceful record not only reveals 
 the fact that Congress, though often petitioned to abolish the 
 interstate slave-trade, always refused such prayers, not even 
 adopting any regulations in the interests of humanity in rela 
 tion to it, but it shows that " an official document was submit 
 ted," in 1819, by Mr. Nourse, Register of the Treasury, in 
 which he certified that, though the act of 1807, abolishing the 
 slave-trade, required the forfeiture to the government of the 
 
DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN SLAVE-TRADE. 103 
 
 Africans thus illegally introduced into the country, yet of the 
 more than a hundred thousand which, by Southern admission, 
 had been surreptitiously brought here, there were no records 
 in the Treasury Department of any forfeitures under the 
 act. When Anthony Burns was to be remanded to slavery, 
 the whole military and naval power of the general govern 
 ment was placed at the disposal of the slave-master, and he 
 was remanded to his cruel bondage. Of more than a hundred 
 thousand persons imported into the United States in violation 
 of law and entitled to their freedom by it, not one found it, at 
 least in the way provided in the statute. 
 
 Of course this wholesale and persistent outrage upon all law, 
 human and divine, excited the sympathy, the indignation, and 
 the apprehension of the humane and patriotic. Nor was the 
 country ever without earnest protestants and witnesses for the 
 right and against the wrong. The faithful Quakers and others 
 besieged Congress with their petitions, though generally with 
 unsatisfying and indifferent results. In March, 1817, Mr. 
 Roberts of Pennsylvania introduced a resolution asking for 
 the appointment of a committee to inquire into the expe 
 diency of making further provision against the introduction 
 of slaves. A committee was granted, which reported a bill 
 that passed both Houses. By its provisions the penalties of 
 the Prohibitory Act were applied to the fitting out of vessels for 
 the trade and the transportation of slaves to any country ; and 
 in all cases where negroes were found on shipboard, the burden 
 of proof was put on those in whose possession they were found. 
 
 Notwithstanding this legislation, however, the foreign and 
 domestic slave-trade went on unchecked. Further legislation 
 and the rigorous enforcement of existing laws were demanded 
 by the friends of freedom and humanity. The Quakers, as 
 ever on the alert, were foremost in calling for the suppression 
 of both the foreign and domestic traffic. The Yearly Meeting 
 of Friends sent a memorial to Congress near the close of the 
 year 1817, for further provision by law for the suppression of 
 the trade in negroes between the Middle and Southern States. 
 This memorial was referred by the Senate to a committee of 
 five, of which Mr. Goldsborough of Maryland was chairman. 
 
104 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWEE IN AMERICA. 
 
 A few days afterwards Mr. Burrill of Rhode Island moved 
 that the committee, to which had been referred the memorial, 
 be instructed to inquire into the expediency of amending the 
 laws concerning the slave-trade, and also to consider the expe 
 diency of consulting with other nations, with a view to the 
 entire abolition of that traffic. Mr. Troup of Georgia ex 
 pressed his readiness to enforce, within the jurisdiction of the 
 United States, the abolition of the African slave-trade, but he 
 was not ready to co-operate with other nations for its suppres 
 sion. But it was strenuously maintained by Mr. Burrill that 
 the slave-trade could be abolished only by concert and co-opera 
 tion with other nations. The venerable Rufus King, one of 
 the framers of the Constitution, thought the nation was bound, 
 by its principles and the promises it had made, to go farther 
 than it had ever gone for the suppression of a traffic so abhor 
 rent. He confessed he could not see how co-operation with 
 other nations for this purpose could lead to entangling allian 
 ces or jeopardize the country. 
 
 Mr. Campbell of Tennessee was opposed to such co-opera 
 tion. He asked, if we were to unite with France and England 
 to induce Spain and Portugal to give up the slave-trade, and 
 they should refuse, whether we were to attempt to compel 
 them to do it by force of arms. To this Mr. Burrill replied, 
 that no nation would be very likely to go to war for the slave- 
 trade. On the contrary, Spain and Portugal might be in 
 fluenced by the acts of other countries. It was asserted by 
 Mr. Barbour of Virginia that the State he represented took 
 the lead in the effort " to exterminate the horrible traffic." 
 He feared nothing from an alliance with any nation whose 
 only object was humanity. Through the Executive alone, 
 however, could the proper arrangements be effected with other 
 nations. He then moved to strike out the clause of the resolu 
 tion seeking the co-operation of other nations. 
 
 Mr. Morrill of New Hampshire made an earnest and enthusi 
 astic speech in favor of the termination of slavery itself. He 
 maintained that " we were a Christian nation, that the Bible 
 was our moral guide, that its principles were sacred, its pre 
 cepts salutary, and its commands obligatory. The frowns of 
 

 DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN SLAVE-TRADE. 105 
 
 Heaven and the threatenings of God rested on men for their 
 ingratitude to their fellow-mortals. Babylon the great had 
 fallen, for she had a traffic in the souls of men. To avert the 
 judgments of Heaven, let the inhuman traffic be abolished to 
 the ends of the earth." Senators were reminded by Mr. King 
 that the concert proposed with other nations was not the union 
 of arms, but of opinions, of example, and of influence, for the 
 purpose of inducing Spain and Portugal to accede to the com 
 pact already made with other nations, to put an end to the 
 African slave-trade. The motion to strike out the clause 
 relating to concert with other nations was lost by one vote, 
 and the resolution was then adopted. 
 
 At the next session, in December, 1818, on motion of Mr. 
 Eaton of Tennessee, the Senate appointed a select committee 
 to inquire whether any and what amendments to existing laws 
 were necessary to prevent the importation of slaves. Early in 
 February Mr. Eaton reported a bill supplementary to the act 
 of 1817. 
 
 In the House Mr. Mercer introduced two resolutions calling 
 upon the Navy and Treasury Departments for information con 
 cerning the slave-trade. On the 13th of January Mr. Middle- 
 ton of South Carolina, chairman of the committee to which 
 had been referred so much of the President's message as re 
 lated to the slave-trade, reported a bill in addition to the sev 
 eral acts prohibiting that traffic. The House proceeded to its 
 consideration. The sections of the bill providing bounties for 
 the crews of vessels capturing slaves imported, and for inform 
 ers whose evidence should lead to the conviction of smugglers 
 of slaves, were strenuously opposed by Mr. Strother of Vir 
 ginia ; but the bill was defended by Mr. Mercer in all its parts. 
 On motion of Mr. Pindall of the same State, the House 
 amended it so as to punish with death every person who 
 should import, or aid and abet the importation of, any African 
 negro, with intent to sell or use such negro as a slave, or who 
 should purchase such negro so imported. It was then passed. 
 In the Senate Mr. Eaton reported it from the committee with 
 an amendment, striking out the provision making the violation 
 of the law punishable with death. This amendment was agreed 
 
 14 
 
106 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 to, the bill was passed, the House concurred, and it became a 
 law. 
 
 At the ensuing session in December, 1819, the House ap 
 pointed a select committee on the slave-trade. Mr. Mercer 
 reported three resolutions authorizing the President to nego 
 tiate with foreign powers. The first of the three was agreed 
 to by a large majority, but was lost in the Senate after a brief 
 debate, in which it was earnestly supported by Burrill, King, 
 and Lowrie of Pennsylvania, and opposed by Smith of South 
 Carolina, and Walker and King of Alabama. 
 
 In the month of April, 1822, Mr. Gorham of Massachusetts, 
 from the committee to which had been referred so much of the 
 President's message as related to the slave-trade, made an able 
 report, closing with the recommendation that the President be 
 requested to make arrangements with one or more of the mari 
 time powers of Europe for the more effectual suppression of 
 the slave-trade. But this humane proposition was resisted. 
 Mr. Poinsett of South Carolina stated that the resolution was 
 carried by a bare majority of the committee, and that he did 
 not concur in the measure recommended. 
 
 At the next session, in December, the President in his an 
 nual message again called the attention of Congress to the 
 African slave-trade. On motion of Mr. Taylor of New York 
 that portion of the message was referred to a select committee. 
 Mr. Gorham, who had reported at the previous session in favor 
 of concert with foreign powers, was made chairman. A reso 
 lution was introduced by Mr. Mercer, ever an earnest and con 
 sistent advocate of measures tending to the utter extinction 
 of the traffic, requesting the President to prosecute negotia 
 tions with the maritime powers of Europe and America for its 
 effectual abolition, and for its ultimate denunciation as piracy, 
 under the law of nations, by the consent of the civilized world. 
 He expressed the opinion that not less than thirteen thousand 
 negroes were even then annually, smuggled into the Southern 
 States. He emphatically denounced the African slave-trade as 
 a" crime, begun on a barbarous shore, claimed by no civilized 
 state, and subject to no moral law ; a remnant of ancient barba 
 rism, a curse extended to the New World by the colonial policy 
 
NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE FOREIGN POWERS. 107 
 
 of the Old." He would fix upon the African slave-dealer the 
 guilt and stigma of being a pirate and a felon, and he implored 
 the House to sustain the policy of such a legal characterization. 
 Mr. Wright of Maryland would have the " government listen 
 to the voice of distressed humanity, and unite with the powers 
 of Europe in a qualified search, proposed by Lord Castlereagh 
 in his noble agency for the suppression of the African slave- 
 trade." Mr. Mercer's resolutions were then agreed to with only 
 nine dissenting votes. 
 
 In the House, in December, 1823, so much of the President's 
 message as related to the slave-trade was referred to a select 
 committee, of which Mr. Govan of South Carolina was chair 
 man. On motion of Mr. Mercer, it was instructed to consider 
 the expediency of prohibiting citizens of the United States, 
 under the severe penalties of existing laws, from fitting out 
 slave-trading expeditions in foreign ports. A bill to this effect 
 was reported by the committee, but the House took no action 
 thereupon. 
 
 But the representations of President Monroe, the efforts of 
 the humane and just in and out of Congress, did little to ar 
 rest the prosecution of a traffic nurtured by the avarice and 
 stimulated by the slave system of the United States. Thus 
 had it ever been. Though the legislation and attempted legis 
 lation implied both desire and design to prevent it, they did 
 in fact but keep the promise to the ear and break it to the 
 hope. 
 
 As the sensitiveness and jealousies of the slave-masters had 
 rendered abortive all attempts at home to secure practical 
 legislation against the slave-traffic, so were the pretended 
 efforts put forth by the government to accomplish a like 
 object through negotiations with foreign powers equally futile. 
 Though it seemed to be earnest and honest of purpose in its 
 attempts, they never became effective. It always contrived to 
 present its plans and purposes in such shape, or coupled with 
 such conditions, that they never reached any satisfactory con 
 clusion. 
 
 In the Treaty of Peace of 1815 it was declared that the 
 traffic in slaves was irreconcilable with the ]? inciples of 
 
108 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 humanity and justice, that the two governments were desir 
 ous of continuing their efforts for its entire abolition ; and the 
 two contracting parties pledged themselves to use their best 
 endeavors to accomplish that object. Three years after the 
 ratification of the treaty Lord Castlereagh proposed to the 
 American Minister, Mr. Rush, to concede to each other's ships 
 of war a qualified right of search, with the power of detaining 
 vessels of either country found with slaves actually on board. 
 To this fair and just proposition a positive refusal had been 
 returned by the American government. In 1819 Parliament 
 requested the Prince Regent to renew his beneficent endeavors 
 with the United States for the suppression of the traffic ; but 
 these practical propositions of the British government did not 
 meet with a favorable response. 
 
 On the 29th of January, 1823, Mr. Stratford Canning, the 
 British Minister at Washington, reminded Mr. Adams, Secre 
 tary of State, of the pledge given at the Treaty of Ghent, 
 requesting the American government to assent to a plan pro 
 posed by Great Britain, or to suggest some other in its stead. 
 He was informed that the United States proposed a mutual 
 stipulation, making the penalty of slave-trading piracy. To 
 this proposition Mr. Canning replied that his government 
 desired that any British subject who defied the law and dis 
 honored his country by engaging in a trade of blood should 
 be detected and brought to justice " even by foreign hands, 
 and from under the protection of her flag." But he proposed 
 that the mutual right of search should be conceded for a lim 
 ited time, be restricted to certain parts of the ocean, and be 
 confined to a certain number of cruisers on each side, to be 
 proportioned by mutual consent. This proposition, too, so hon 
 orable to the British government, was rejected. Despatches, 
 however, were forwarded to France, Spain, Portugal, Russia, 
 Netherlands, Buenos Ayres, and Colombia, expressing the 
 desire of this government to make the slave-trade piracy by 
 the common consent'of the civilized world. 
 
 In June, 1823, Mr. Rush was instructed to conclude a treaty 
 with Great Britain for the suppression of the slave-trade ; and 
 the draft of a convention was forwarded to him, authorizing 
 
NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE FOREIGN POWERS. 109 
 
 him to propose and conclude a treaty " on the basis of a legis 
 lative prohibition of the slave-trade by both parties, under the 
 penalty of piracy." But the British Minister, confident of the 
 action of Parliament, said Mr. Rush in his letter to Mr. Adams, 
 gave " their unhesitating consent to the principle denouncing 
 the slave-trade as piracy." On the 13th of March, 1824, a treaty 
 was signed at London, which was nearly a verbatim draft of 
 that sent from Washington. Parliament hastened to pass an 
 Act in compliance with the conditions exacted by the United 
 States. In this Act it was declared that all British subjects, 
 found guilty of slave-trading, " shall suffer death without benefit 
 of clergy, and loss of lands and goods' and chattels, as pirates, 
 felons, and robbers upon the sea ought to suffer." It was pro 
 vided in this treaty that the cruisers of the United States and 
 Great Britain, on the coast of Africa, America, and the West 
 Indies, might seize slavers under the British or American flag, 
 and send them to the country where they belonged to be tried 
 as pirates. 
 
 This treaty, made in the interests of humanity and of 
 civilization, the ratification of which would have been alike 
 honorable to England and America, was laid before the 
 Senate of the United States on the 30th of April. That body 
 hesitated and delayed action. On the 16th of May the 
 British Minister addressed a letter to the Secretary of State, 
 reminding him that the treaty had originated with this gov 
 ernment, and that England had, without hesitation, com 
 plied with the condition by making the slave-trade piracy. 
 Thus pressed, the President sent a message to the Senate, in 
 which he reminded that body that the rejection of the treaty 
 would subject the nation, the Executive, and Congress to the 
 charge of insincerity and inconsistency. He also expressed 
 the conviction that it would be impossible to detect the pirates 
 without entering and searching the vessels, and that it would 
 be inconsistent in us, with the statute of piracy in our hands, 
 to deny the common right of search for the pirates. But 
 the Senate still hesitated, and, after long debates, changed, 
 mutilated, and then ratified the treaty. So much as pro 
 vided for the right of search on the coast of America, 
 
110 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IK AMERICA. 
 
 and so much as applied to chartered vessels, or to the 
 citizens of either country carrying on the trade under the 
 foreign flag, were stricken out. Few vessels, however, direct 
 from Africa, landed slaves in the United States. They were 
 generally landed on some of the West India Islands and 
 taken to the United States in small vessels ; so that all that 
 was necessary for them to do was to charter vessels instead of 
 owning them, and to run up a foreign flag instead of their 
 own. Of course the treaty, thus emasculated, could do little 
 to arrest the trade. 
 
 The British government refused to assent to the treaty thus 
 mutilated and weakened, though it offered, through its minis 
 ter at Washington, to give its assent on the condition of allow 
 ing the mutual right of search on the coast of America. To 
 this proposition Mr. Clay, Secretary of State, replied that, from 
 the views entertained by the Senate, it was inexpedient to con 
 tinue the negotiations. He reminded the British Cabinet that a 
 similar connection had been formed with Colombia on the 10th 
 of December, 1824, the coast of America being excepted from 
 its operation, and yet, notwithstanding this conciliatory feature, 
 the Senate had, by a large majority, refused to ratify it. 
 
 This language of Mr. Clay, from his high position, his ante 
 cedents, and connection with a Northern President, clearly in 
 dicated not only the manifest drift of the government, but the 
 strong pressure upon the aspiring public men of those days. 
 It revealed, too, that of which Mr. Monroe so much dreaded 
 the imputation, the nation's " inconsistency and insincerity." 
 For it became manifest that it not only merited the sarcasm of 
 the British caricature, representing it with the Declaration of 
 Independence in the one hand and a brandished whip over 
 affrighted slaves in the other, but the charge of a pretended 
 interest in an object it did not wish to see accomplished. But 
 why this vacillating and equivocal policy ? Foremost among 
 the reasons was, the large and powerful minority in the ex 
 treme South, who loved slavery and everything tending to in 
 vigorate and support it, a minority inflexible and imperious 
 in its demands. The Border slave States opposed it, but their 
 opposition was based upon interest rather than upon moral con- 
 
NEGOTIATIONS WITH THE FOREIGN POWERS. Ill 
 
 siderations. The Northern States, indeed, opposed it from 
 principle. But there was even there a large commercial class, 
 either implicated in the trade itself, or anxious to conciliate 
 Southern interest and secure Southern favor. This class was 
 never hearty in its opposition to Southern demands, however 
 irrational and extreme. And then there was a class of politi 
 cians, ever anxious to obtain and retain power. They were 
 obsequious to those determined Southern men who, with their 
 Northern auxiliaries, then and since, made and unmade parties 
 and their candidates. Surely, from such a composite, harmony 
 and consistency in right, or even in wrong, could hardly be ex 
 pected. For, diffused everywhere was. the recognition of the 
 fact always weakening the right and strengthening the wrong, 
 that slavery and the slave-trade were essentially alike, and that 
 hearty opposition to the latter was illogical and untenable so 
 long as the former was enshrined in the Constitution and pro 
 tected by the government. 
 
 Here, then, lay the difficulty, as here is found the key to the 
 mysteries of American diplomacy. The nation attempted the 
 impossible feat of moving at once in opposite directions, per 
 sonating on the same stage, at the same time, the angel of lib 
 erty and the demon of slavery. Hence its policy was little 
 better than a masquerade, made up of feints and disguises, 
 either cloaking under fair pretences the most shameless of 
 purposes, or, where concealment was impossible, avowing a 
 policy in direct antagonism to every avowed principle of its 
 form of government. Of the British rule in India an Eng 
 lish writer has said : "A government cannot be administered 
 according to the standard of the moral law, which violated, in 
 its establishment, every principle of the Decalogue." Equally 
 difficult was it for the government of the United States to do 
 justly and love mercy so long as it was bound by the com 
 promises of the Constitution to recognize and maintain " the 
 sum of all villanies." It could not do right so long as the origi 
 nal sin remained unrepented of and unforsaken. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 FOREIGN RELATION OF THE GOVERNMENT INFLUENCED BY SLAVERY. 
 
 American Government humiliated by Slavery. Treaty of 1783. Demands on 
 England. Jay's Treaty. Free Negroes of San Domingo. Demands of 
 Napoleon. Monroe Doctrine. Congress at Panama. Report of the Com 
 mittee on Foreign Affairs. Debate. "War of 1812. Randolph's Speech. 
 Instruction to the Peace Commissioners. Treaty of Ghent. Demands on 
 the Commander of the British Squadron. Position of the British Govern 
 ment. Persistent Demands of the American Government for Payment of 
 Slaves. Decision referred to Russia. Proposed Invasion of Cuba by Mexico. 
 Intervention of the Government of the United States. Debate in the 
 Senate. Instructions of Mr. Clay to the Panama Commissioners. 
 
 THE necessities of slavery not only brought it into constant 
 contact with freemen and free institutions at home, but often and 
 seriously disturbed the foreign relations of the American govern 
 ment. Perhaps among the most mischievous and mortifying 
 of its influences was the humiliating attitude in which it placed 
 the nation before the world. Indeed, the saddest page of the 
 history of the Slave Power is the record of the nation's diplo 
 matic correspondence with other governments upon this sub 
 ject. The persistent and shameless requirements of the slave- 
 masters forced it ever to compromise its dignity, consistency, 
 and conscience by registering their edicts at home, and boister 
 ously demanding their execution abroad. It was not a paid 
 agent indeed, for, like that of the slaves themselves, its service 
 was an unrequited toil, its only rewards being the disgrace it 
 incurred and the increased rigors of the despotism by which 
 it was bound. Even a cursory survey of its course in these 
 foreign relations will reveal ample and mournful evidences of 
 the national subserviency and sacrifices to those vile behests. 
 At the very outset, before the government was fairly launched, 
 or the Treaty of Peace signed, even in the very efforts to secure 
 
FOEEIGN RELATIONS INFLUENCED BY SLAVERY. 113 
 
 it, this solicitude was revealed, as if the conservation of slavery 
 was more important than the salvation of the country. 
 
 During the progress of the war many slaves, having escaped 
 from their masters, found refuge on board British vessels, and 
 were carried away. At the critical moment of negotiating this 
 treaty the slave-masters, for both pecuniary and political rea 
 sons, seized this most inopportune juncture to press their claims 
 for compensation for such slaves. They found one subservient 
 to their wishes, in Henry Laurens of South Carolina, who was 
 one of the commission^ consisting of himself, Franklin, Adams, 
 and Jay, sent to Paris on this important and delicate errand. 
 At his suggestion the seventh article was inserted in the 
 Treaty of Peace, by which it was provided that the British 
 army " should not carry away any negroes or other property." 
 
 Mr. Chief Justice Jay was afterward appointed to negotiate 
 a treaty of amity and commerce. He was instructed by the 
 government to demand compensation for these slaves. Lord 
 Granville resisted the demand and declined its payment. In 
 communicating the fact to this government Mr. Jay character 
 ized the claim as " an odious one," and the treaty was made 
 without the provision. It consequently encountered stern op 
 position in the Senate. Mr. Gunn of Georgia presented a 
 resolution affirming that " many negroes and other property " 
 had been carried away by the British army in contravention 
 of the Treaty of Peace. The President was required to renew 
 negotiations to secure indemnity for such losses ; and the com 
 missioner was further instructed, if he failed to secure the 
 desired compensation under the treaty, to press the claim on 
 the ground that to grant it would " tend to produce the desired 
 friendship between the two governments." And this perti 
 nacity in its demands was only a representative fact, indicating 
 the deep and determined purpose of the Slave Power, even in 
 its beginnings, to inaugurate a policy that was never remitted, 
 until the power itself was stricken down by the very conflict it 
 had itself evoked in its own behalf. 
 
 One of the consequences of the French Revolution was the 
 investiture of the free blacks of San Domingo with the privi 
 leges of citizenship. This application of the revolutionary 
 
 15 
 
114 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 watchwords of that stormy period, its " Liberty, Equality, Fra 
 ternity," excited great commotion and opposition in that 
 island, especially among its white inhabitants. This commo 
 tion was fostered by British aid, and, with the varying for 
 tunes of war, continued until 1798, when the negroes, left in 
 full possession of the island, free and emancipated, organized 
 the government of Hayti. Though Napoleon sought to resub- 
 jugate the island, and sacrificed in the attempt some forty 
 thousand troops, the French commander was forced to surren 
 der to the victorious Haytien armies in 1802, and Hayti 
 became an independent nation, subsequently acknowledged 
 as such by the governments of France and England. 
 
 Of course the existence of such a government on the very 
 borders of this nation necessarily provoked demonstrations 
 and responses from the American government. The natural 
 supposition should have been that a government with such an 
 origin and history, with so much resembling its own, would 
 have kindled into a warm and glowing enthusiasm the sympa 
 thy and good wishes of the United States. She should have 
 eagerly welcomed this young republic to her side as one of the 
 accompanying fruits of her own struggle. The welcome ac 
 tually extended was, however, wholly different. Though the 
 Haytien government had been established for several years 
 without the presence of a single hostile soldier, and without 
 even one alleged offence, the American Congress passed, in 
 1806, an Act to suspend commercial intercourse. The reasons 
 of this unfriendly act against a young republic, trying the ex 
 periment of free government' under circumstances so peculiar 
 and difficult, were more unworthy than the act itself. The 
 French Emperor, irritated by his defeat and great losses, 
 sought to secure unworthy concessions from the American 
 government, and to gain by diplomacy what he had so sig 
 nally failed to secure by arms. He meant to starve into 
 subjection a brave people whom he could not coerce. He 
 accordingly demanded of the United States the immediate 
 cessation of commerce with those he styled " the rebels 
 of San Domingo, that race of African slaves, the reproach 
 and refuse of nature," affirming also that he expected " from 
 
FOREIGN RELATIONS INFLUENCED BY SLAVERY. 115 
 
 the dignity and candor of the government of the Union, that 
 an end be put to it promptly." How was that imperious de 
 mand received ? With the dignity which should have marked 
 the conduct of a nation basing its claims to nationality on 
 the public proclamation of the great doctrine of human rights 
 and equality ? On the contrary, the demanded legislation was 
 rushed through Congress with indecorous haste in less than 
 two months. 
 
 The same temper and purpose of the government were 
 exhibited in its attitude towards Hayti in connection with the 
 Panama Congress. In his Annual Message to Congress, in 
 1823, Mr. Monroe announced as the policy of the United 
 States, that European powers would not be permitted to inter 
 fere in the affairs of the nations on the American Continent, 
 and that this continent should not be considered as subject to 
 future colonization by those powers. That declaration, known 
 as the " Monroe doctrine," inspired Mexico and the nations 
 of South America, struggling for independence, with great 
 confidence in the government of the United States. An invi 
 tation was extended on the 2d of November, by the Colombian 
 Minister at Washington, to the government of the United 
 States, to send commissioners to the proposed Congress at 
 Panama. Among the topics proposed for consideration was 
 the adoption of more effectual means for " the entire abolition 
 of the African slave-trade, by a more general and uniform 
 co-operation." There was more of force and significance 
 in this request, from the fact that the United States had pro 
 posed a convention with Colombia for this very purpose, to 
 which the latter had acceded, though as yet the United States 
 had withheld its final ratification. That invitation was ac 
 cepted by Mr. Adams ; and John Sergeant of Pennsylvania 
 and Richard C. Anderson of Kentucky were nominated as com 
 missioners, and William B. Rochester of New York as secre 
 tary. The President in his first Annual Message, in 1825, 
 called the attention of Congress to the Panama Mission, and 
 so much of his Message as related to that subject was referred 
 to the Committee on Foreign Affairs. It had been announced 
 in the invitation, that among the subjects to be considered at 
 
116 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Panama were the slave-trade and the condition of Hayti, 
 Cuba, and Porto Rico. This committee, through its chairman, 
 Mr. Macon of North Carolina, made an elaborate report, writ 
 ten by Mr. Tazewell of Virginia, a member of the committee, 
 against the expediency of the mission. The proposition to 
 meet the South American States in the proposed Congress at 
 Panama intensely excited and aroused the slaveholding in 
 terests. The Committee on Foreign Affairs consequently em 
 bodied and expressed in their report the opinions and purposes 
 of the Slave Power. The committee declared that the policy 
 of the government towards Hayti had been fixed for more 
 than a third of a century. " We purchase," says the report, 
 " coffee from her and pay for it ; but we interchange no con 
 suls or ministers. We receive no mulatto consuls or black 
 ambassadors from her ; and why ? Because the peace of 
 eleven States in this Union will not permit the fruits of a suc 
 cessful negro insurrection to be exhibited among them. It 
 will not permit black consuls and ambassadors to establish 
 themselves in our cities, and to parade through our country, 
 and to give their fellow-blacks in the United States proof in 
 hand of the honors that await them in a like successful effort 
 on their part. It will not permit the fact to be seen and told, 
 that for the murder of their masters and mistresses they are 
 to find friends among the white people of the United States." 
 The report proceeded to declare emphatically that the question 
 of Haytien independence had been determined ; that it could 
 not be discussed " in this chamber on this day " ; and that 
 Congress should not advise and consult in a council with five 
 nations, who had put a black man on an equality with the 
 white, " five nations, who have at this moment black gen 
 erals in their armies and mulatto members in their con 
 gresses." 
 
 The report of the committee, declaring it inexpedient to 
 send commissioners to Panama, was defeated by five majority, 
 and the Senate, on motion of Mr. Mills of Massachusetts, 
 proceeded to consider the nominations. The question elicited 
 a very able debate, in which senators representing the inter 
 ests of slavery enunciated very explicitly the opinions and 
 
FOREIGN RELATIONS INFLUENCED BY SLAVERY. 117 
 
 purposes of the slaveholding oligarchy. In that debate Rob 
 ert Y. Hayne of South Carolina took the lead. He asserted 
 that the question of slavery was a domestic question, and that 
 the language of the United States to foreign nations ought 
 to be, " We cannot permit it to be touched." He declared 
 that he considered the rights of the slaveholding States 
 " in that species of property as not open to discussion either 
 here or elsewhere " ; that " to call into question our rights 
 is grossly to violate them, to attempt to instruct us on this 
 subject is to insult us, to dare to assail our institutions 
 is wantonly to invade our peace." As to the slave-trade, 
 he congratulated the Senate that treaties with England and 
 Colombia had failed. He said that the question of the inde 
 pendence of Hayti could not be considered in connection 
 with revolutionary governments, who had marched to victory 
 under universal emancipation, and had colored men at the 
 head of their armies, in their legislative halls, and in their 
 executive departments. He insisted that the government 
 should direct " all our ministers in South America and Mex 
 ico to protest against the independence of Hayti." He de 
 nounced Mr. Sergeant as " a distinguished advocate of the 
 Missouri restriction, an acknowledged abolitionist," sent to 
 plead the cause of the South at the Congress of Panama. 
 
 Mr. Hamilton of South Carolina affirmed the sentiments of 
 the Southern people to be that " Haytien independence is not 
 to be tolerated in any form." Mr. Johnson of Louisiana was 
 equally explicit and decided. Indeed, he went a step further, 
 and avowed that the nation should not recognize the indepen 
 dence of Hayti, but that it should remonstrate with the South 
 American governments and Mexico against such acknowledg 
 ment. 
 
 In 1838, twelve years later, a petition was presented, pray 
 ing for the usual recognition of international relations with 
 that republic. But it was received with the same hostile 
 demonstrations. Mr. Legare' of South Carolina characterized 
 the petition as treason, and the petitioners " as traitors, not to 
 their country only, but to the whole human race." Mr. Wise 
 of Virginia was equally violent, denouncing the desire as 
 
118 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 " the abolition spirit " that would have men of such an origin 
 recognized by commercial and international reciprocity. "Nor 
 would he do it," he said, " if they had been free for centuries." 
 And this persistent and intolerant opposition was maintained 
 before the world, not only to the manifest damage of national 
 reputation, but also to the detriment of the commercial inter 
 ests of the country. " We stand aloof," says Mr. Grennell, 
 " as if they were a lawless tribe of savages. While all other 
 powers have long since acknowledged them as an independent 
 sovereignty, we refuse to recognize them. Others profit by 
 their commerce at our expense." 
 
 The war of 1812 against England, in its inception, progress, 
 and final treaty of peace, afforded another occasion for similar 
 demonstrations on the part of the slave interest, and a similar 
 subserviency on the part of the government. The number of 
 slaves at the time of the declaration of war exceeded twelve 
 hundred thousand. From the organization of the government 
 under the Constitution, in 1789, they had doubled in numbers 
 and increased at least fivefold in value. Although the slave- 
 trade had been prohibited for more than four years, several 
 thousands of slaves were annually smuggled into the country, 
 and the domestic slave-trade had largely increased under the 
 stimulating influences of the Louisiana purchase, the opening 
 of new lands, and the rapid increase of the cotton culture. 
 The South, then under the complete control of the slave-mas 
 ters, was gaining a like ascendency over the Federal govern 
 ment, and a dominating influence over the non-slaveholding 
 States. 
 
 On the eve of the declaration of war John Randolph, speak 
 ing in opposition to it, bitterly denounced the idea of a war for 
 maritime rights, by the invasion of Canada, while the coast of 
 the Southern States was exposed to the enemy. " While talk 
 ing," he said, " of Canada, we have too much reason to shud 
 der for our safety at home. I speak from facts, when I say that 
 the night bell never tolls for fire in Richmond, that the fright 
 ened mother does not hug her infant more closely to her bosom, 
 not knowing what may have happened." He denounced " the 
 infernal principles of French fraternity," declared that there 
 
FOREIGN RELATIONS INFLUENCED BY SLAVERY. 119 
 
 were not " wanting members of this House to preach on this 
 floor the doctrine of imprescriptible rights to a crowded audi 
 ence of blacks in the galleries ; teaching them that they are 
 equal to their masters ; in other words, advising them to 
 cut their masters' throats." Similar doctrines, he said, are 
 spread throughout the South by Yankee pedlers ; and there 
 are even owners of slaves so infatuated as, by the general tenor 
 of their conversation, by their contempt of order, morality, and 
 religion, unthinkingly to cherish these seeds of destruction. 
 He asserted that the whole South had been thrown, by the 
 spreading of these infernal doctrines, into a state of insecurity, 
 and that men, dead to the operation of moral causes, had taken 
 from the slave the habits of loyalty and obedience which light 
 ened his servitude, and were now trusting to " the mere physi 
 cal strength of the shackle " that holds him. " You have de 
 prived him of all moral restraint," he said ; " you have tempted 
 him to eat of the tree of knowledge just enough to perfect him 
 in wickedness ; you have opened his eyes to his nakedness ; 
 you have roused his nature against the hand that has fed him 
 and has clothed him and has cherished him in sickness, that 
 hand which, before he became a pupil in your school, he was 
 accustomed to press to his lips with respectful affection ; you 
 have done all this, and now you point him to the whip and 
 the gibbet as incentives to sullen, reluctant obedience." He 
 said there was not a spot on all the shores of the Chesapeake 
 Bay, the city of Baltimore alone excepted, safe from attack or 
 capable of defence ; and he expressed the hope that God would 
 forbid that the Southern States should ever see on their shores 
 an enemy with these " infernal principles of French frater 
 nity "in the van. 
 
 Whether the slaves had imbibed the infernal principles of 
 French fraternity or not, many availed themselves of the 
 presence of British blockading vessels in Southern waters, es 
 pecially in the Chesapeake Bay, to leave the enforced service 
 of American masters and accept offers to enter the British ser 
 vice, or to become free settlers in the British Possessions. 
 It is stated by Mr. Hildreth, in his History of the United 
 States, that a plan to take possession of the isthmus between 
 
120 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWEB IN AMERICA. 
 
 the Delaware and Chesapeake Bays, and there train a black 
 army, was only rejected because the British, being slavehold 
 ers themselves, did not like to encourage insurrection else 
 where. 
 
 In the year 1814 peace commissioners were appointed. In 
 the instructions given these commissioners by Mr. Monroe, Sec 
 retary of State, they were directed to be watchful of the inter 
 ests of the slaveholders. In his instructions of the 28th of 
 January, 1814, he said " the negroes, taken from the Southern 
 States, should be returned to their owners, or paid for at their 
 full value." Indeed, this was one of the conditions on which 
 they were to insist in the proposed negotiations. In the treaty 
 of peace, negotiated at Ghent, the restoration of slaves was 
 expressly provided for. When it was ratified, on the 17th 
 of February, 1815, three commissioners were immediately 
 appointed, to repair at once to the British squadron in the 
 Chesapeake Bay, with authority to receive absconding slaves on 
 board such vessels. The commander of the squadron promptly 
 and peremptorily refused their surrender. The officer in tem 
 porary command maintained that the treaty had no reference 
 to slaves who had sought protection on board British vessels, 
 and that it only applied to slaves " originally captured in forts 
 or places, and who were remaining in such forts or places at 
 the time of its ratification by the two governments." 
 
 On the arrival of Admiral Cockburn the demand was re 
 newed ; but he gave the same interpretation to the treaty, 
 though at the same time he surrendered eighty slaves found 
 on Cumberland Island when it was captured by the British 
 forces, and who had not been removed at the time of the 
 ratification of the treaty. Mr. Monroe, Secretary of State, at 
 once applied to the English Charg des Affaires at Washington, 
 requesting him to direct the British naval commander to sur 
 render the fugitives. But that officer, putting the same con 
 struction upon the treaty as had been put upon it by the British 
 naval officers, refused to comply with the request. The British 
 squadron sailing for Bermuda with the fugitives on board, the 
 government immediately despatched an agent, with author 
 ity to demand of the governor of that island their surrender. 
 
FOREIGN RELATIONS INFLUENCED BY SLAVERY. 121 
 
 To this demand of the government of the United States for 
 the surrender of men who had sought liberty and protection 
 under the flag of England, the British governor emphatically 
 replied that he " would rather Bermuda, with every man, woman, 
 and child in it, were sunk under the sea, than surrender one 
 slave that had sought protection under the flag of England." 
 Notwithstanding this brave and manly response, worthy alike 
 of the individual and of the representative of the British gov 
 ernment, the American agent still persisted in his claim, and 
 addressed the Admiral then in those waters, offering to furnish 
 him a list of the slaves. But Admiral Griffith assured Mr. 
 Spaulding, the agent of the United States, that there was no 
 one at Bermuda or any other British port " competent to de 
 liver up persons who, during the late wars, had placed them 
 selves under the protection of the British flag." Repulsed by 
 both the civil and naval officers of England, the government 
 of the United States demanded of the British Cabinet the ex 
 ecution of the treaty, as it understood it, by the surrender of 
 fugitive slaves who had taken refuge from oppression on board 
 the vessels of that government. But the demand was promptly 
 rejected, and the American government was assured by Lord 
 Castlereagh that England would never have consented to a 
 treaty that required the delivery of persons who had sought its 
 protection. 
 
 The government of the United States, completely dominat 
 ed by the slaveholders, persisting in its demands, the British 
 government consented to refer the question to the decision 
 of the Emperor of Russia. The Emperor decided in favor 
 of the construction of the treaty made by the American gov 
 ernment. After further negotiations it was decided that com 
 missioners should be appointed, who should hold their ses 
 sions in Washington, receive and adjust the claims presented, 
 and decide upon the number and value of the slaves. The 
 commissioners, on the part of the United States, insisting on 
 interest, further negotiations were entered into, and the British 
 government paid over, by the convention of November, 1826, 
 more than twelve hundred thousand dollars, in full of all de 
 mands. Thus, during nearly twelve years, the government of 
 
 16 
 
122 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the United States pressed upon the British government the 
 payment in full for persons who had fled from the cruelty and 
 nameless wrongs of chattel slavery and found freedom and 
 protection on the decks of the British navy. To secure the 
 re-enslavement of the escaping fugitives, or payment in full 
 for the souls and bodies of these victims of oppression, the 
 American government made its demands at the negotiations 
 at Ghent, pressed them on British admirals, governors, charge 
 des affaires, and the British Cabinet, before the imperial mas 
 ter of Russia, and even higgled for interest before the joint 
 commission appointed to adjust and fix the price of human 
 chattels. 
 

 CHAPTER X. 
 
 INDIAN POLICY AFFECTED BY SLAVERY. EXILES OF FLORIDA. 
 
 Disgraceful Attitude of the Nation. Escape of Slaves into Florida. Eeturn 
 of Fugitives refused. Commissioners to negotiate a Treaty with the Creeks. 
 Action of Georgia. Protection demanded. Failure of Negotiations. 
 Treaty negotiated at New York. Stipulation for the Return of Slaves. 
 Spanish Authorities refuse to surrender Slaves. Misconduct of Georgia. 
 Claims on England for Fugitive Slaves. Commissioners appointed to meet 
 the Creeks in Washington. Annexation of Florida pressed by the Slave 
 Power. Amelia Island seized by Georgia. Expedition sent by Georgia into 
 Florida to capture Fugitives. Raid into Florida. Negro Fort. Order of 
 General Jackson to invade Florida. Negro Fort captured. Exiles killed, 
 captured, and reduced to Slavery. Disgrace of the Nation. General Jack 
 son enters Florida. Defeats the Indians. Acquisition of Florida. Treaty 
 of Indian Spring. Treaty of Camp Moultrie. Seizure of Slaves. Fugi 
 tives captured by the Army. Slave-catchers permitted to hunt Slaves. 
 
 IT was a standing charge against the Abolitionists that they 
 over-estimated the evils of slavery, exaggerated the wrongs of 
 the slave, the guilt of the master, and the complicity of the 
 government. No accusation was ever more unfounded. The 
 half was never told. As the civil war revealed a demoraliza 
 tion of slaveholding society never attributed to it or dreamed 
 of, so do careful researches into the history of the country un 
 fold a course of procedure indefensible according to any stand 
 ard of morality, however low, and unrelieved by any acts of 
 generosity, humanity, or true dignity of character. The dis 
 graceful and humiliating attitude of the government in its 
 dealings with foreign powers whenever the interests of slavery 
 were involved have been traced already. Its intercourse with 
 the Indians, whenever these interests were in issue, has exhib 
 ited the same determined devotion to the system, coupled with 
 deeds of wanton injustice and cruelty towards a few savages, 
 whose real offence was that of giving food and shelter to black 
 men escaping from their masters. 
 
124 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Spanish settlements were made in Florida in the year 1558, 
 and slaves were soon after introduced. Subsequently settle 
 ments were made on the Appalachicola River by slaves escap 
 ing from South Carolina and finding refuge there. Obtaining 
 lands from the Spanish government, they became a part of the 
 military defences of the country. They also found asylums 
 among the Creek Indians in the State of Georgia. As early 
 as 1738 South Carolina demanded of Georgia a return of 
 these fugitives ; but the demand was promptly rejected. 
 
 Early, too, slaves escaping from their masters in Georgia 
 found refuge with the Creeks, and with the fugitive slaves 
 there formed settlements upon the Appalachicola and Suwanee 
 rivers, acquired property and became the owners of flocks and 
 herds. Indeed, so frequent and annoying did these escapes 
 become, that the Council of Safety early sent a communica 
 tion to the Continental Congress, asking for troops to prevent 
 them. General Lee, too, called the attention of Congress to 
 the same evil, and also to the fact that these escaping fugitives 
 were finding asylums among the Indians and the Florida 
 exiles. Commissioners were, in consequence, appointed in 
 1785 to negotiate a treaty with the Creek Indians. They were 
 met at Galphinton by commissioners from Georgia. These 
 latter demanded a stipulation for the return of the slaves 
 who were then with the Indians, and of any who might there 
 after escape. As the Creeks were not represented, the United 
 States commissioners declined to act, and retired. After they 
 had left, however, the Georgia commissioners, in direct viola 
 tion of the Articles of Confederation, made a treaty with the 
 vepresentatives of two townships, out of about one hundred be 
 longing to the Creek nation. This treaty, negotiated by per 
 sons without authority on either part, provided that the Indians 
 should restore all negroes who were then or might thereafter 
 come among them, belonging to citizens of Georgia. The 
 commissioners, reporting their action to the legislature of their 
 State, received its formal thanks for what was done in plain 
 and palpable violation of its confederate obligations, while the 
 same body recorded their condemnation of the United States 
 commissioners) because they refused to be parties to a treaty 
 so fraudulent and unauthorized. 
 
INDIAN POLICY AFFECTED BY SLAVERY. 125 
 
 In attempting to enforce this treaty Georgia became involved 
 in Indian hostilities, forcing then, as so frequently afterwards, 
 the general government to action, and to espousal of her high 
 handed assaults, not merely upon the poor Creeks, but upon 
 itself, as it stooped to the ignoble service of recording and 
 enforcing the edicts of that ever-grasping and contumacious 
 State. The commissioners who were previously appointed 
 were now instructed to negotiate a treaty which should restore 
 all fugitive slaves belonging to citizens of the United States. 
 
 On the adoption of the Constitution of the United States, the 
 authorities of Georgia called upon the Federal government for 
 protection against the Indians, from whom she claimed territory 
 ostensibly ceded by the treaties of Galphinton and Shoulder 
 Bone, though they were wrongfully obtained and promptly 
 repudiated by those not fairly represented in the fraudulent 
 transactions. President Washington appointed commission 
 ers, and the governor of Georgia placed in their hands the 
 names of one hundred and ten negroes, alleged to have left 
 their masters during the Revolution, and to have found an 
 asylum among the Indians. Though they were received with 
 great respect by the Indians, their attempts at negotiation failed. 
 Colonel Willett, a Revolutionary officer, was then sent, who suc 
 ceeded in inducing a delegation to visit New York, where a 
 treaty was negotiated in August, 1790. Framed in the inter 
 ests of Georgia slaveholders, it stipulated for the return of 
 absconding slaves. Thus, by a characteristic fatality and 
 fatuity, which have ever marked its self-assumed vassalage 
 under the new Constitution, the government placed the brand 
 of its own dishonor upon its first exercise of the treaty-mak 
 ing power, by prosecuting its negotiations clearly and confess 
 edly in behalf of slavery. By this treaty the Creek nation 
 pledged itself to deliver to the commander of the United States 
 forces, stationed at a specified point, all negroes held by them ; 
 and it was further provided that if they were not delivered be 
 fore the 1st of June, 1791, the governor of Georgia might send 
 three persons to claim and receive them. By this treaty, also, 
 which the President fondly hoped had laid the foundations of 
 the future peace and prosperity of the Southwestern frontier, 
 
126 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the Creeks had made stipulations, claiming not only to bind 
 the Seminoles, another tribe, but that tribe residing in Florida 
 and under the jurisdiction of Spain. These latter, however, 
 denied this assumed authority, and utterly repudiated the pro 
 visions of the treaty the Creeks had presumed to make. Of 
 course the latter could not fulfil its stipulations without invad 
 ing Florida and forcibly seizing those who had sought to 
 secure their freedom under the Spanish crown. 
 
 In consequence of the persistent urgency of the Georgia 
 slaveholders, an agent was sent by the Creeks to negotiate for 
 the return of the exiles, but the Spanish authorities peremp 
 torily refused to surrender them again to slavery. The treaty 
 being thus repudiated by the Spanish authorities and the ex 
 iles, Georgia, failing to secure her escaping slaves, denounced 
 it herself, and declared that she would not be bound by 
 what had been adopted without consultation with her commis 
 sioners. Accordingly she sent a military force into the Creek 
 country, attacked one of their towns, killed some of the people, 
 and burned their dwellings. If this conduct could be stripped 
 of all the accessories of governmental prestige, and the forms 
 and dialect of courts, and be tested by the principles and claims 
 of simple morality, as applied to the ordinary rules of human 
 conduct, it would be difficult to equal it by any examples of 
 selfishness, dishonesty, wanton cruelty, and disregard of the 
 clearest claims of humanity, equity, and fair dealing. And 
 yet, notwithstanding all this, General Knox, Secretary of War, 
 in 1794, recommended to the President that Congress should 
 make an appropriation for the owners of these exiles, a 
 proposition indorsed by Washington in a special message in 
 its favor. No action, however, was taken. 
 
 By the Treaty of Peace it had been stipulated that the British 
 forces, in retiring from the country, should not carry away 
 any negroes or other property. The Southern slaveholders, 
 who had lost several thousands of slaves during the war, were 
 inspired with confidence that they would receive compensation 
 also for those who had escaped to the British West Indies, and 
 for those who had enlisted in the British army. The British 
 ministry, however, firmly refused to negotiate for any such 
 
INDIAN POLICY AFFECTED BY SLAVERY. 127 
 
 indemnification. Exasperated by this refusal, they pressed their 
 claims with still greater pertinacity, and by so doing greatly 
 embarrassed the successive administrations of the general gov 
 ernment. Failing to defeat Jay's Treaty, which they opposed 
 because it did not secure payment for their absconding slaves, 
 the Georgia slaveholders grew more and more clamorous for 
 the return of slaves who had found refuge in Florida. For, 
 increasing in numbers and prosperity, they exerted no incon 
 siderable influence upon their neighboring bondmen, who very 
 naturally desired to share with them the blessings of freedom. 
 Pressed, therefore, by the clamorous demands of the slave 
 holders, Washington, in 1796, appointed commissioners to 
 meet the chiefs and head men of the Creeks at Colerain, for the 
 purpose of forming a new treaty. This council was attended 
 by commissioners on the part of Georgia who, failing in their 
 attempts to control by their dictation the commissioners of the 
 United States, left the council before the close of its delibera 
 tions. The chiefs of the Creek nation maintained that they 
 were bound only to return negroes captured after the Treaty 
 of Peace. They declared that they had delivered up all they 
 could, and they expressed their willingness at some future time 
 to deliver up other negroes, when they could do so. Yet, 
 neither the commissioners of the United States nor of the In 
 dian chiefs at this council said anything about delivering up 
 the exiles who had fled into Florida ; nor is there any evidence 
 that the commissioners of Georgia, at this council, insisted on 
 the obligations of the Creeks to return the negroes residing 
 with the Seminoles in Florida. 
 
 Nor was there any other than the robber's right to make any 
 such demand. For nearly half a century from 1750, when 
 the Seminoles left Georgia they had refused any allegiance 
 to that State, had maintained their independence, and had 
 received the protection of the Spanish government. Such a 
 denial of prerogative, and such a maintenance of indepen 
 dence for so long a time, would have been sufficient answer 
 to any such claim among civilized nations. Could the far less 
 obvious and less defined coherence among savage tribes per 
 petuate an allegiance persistently denied, and invalidate an 
 
128 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 independence so long and so stoutly maintained ? Surely, 
 naught but the exigencies of slavery and the sublime impu 
 dence of its defenders could ever have conceived of such a 
 claim, much less have maintained it. And yet the unques 
 tionably false allegation that the treaty of New York recog 
 nized that claim was adhered to, and the interpretation of 
 Georgia then and years afterward was persisted in, that the 
 Seminoles were bound by this alleged compact of the Creeks, 
 though they were living under Spanish rule. 
 
 Little was done, however, during the administrations of 
 Adams and Jefferson, to disturb these exiles, and they in 
 creased in numbers and prosperity. But in 1802 it was 
 enacted, in a new law regulating intercourse with Indian tribes, 
 that the value of any slave escaping and taking up his resi 
 dence with any Indian tribe in the United States should be 
 secured to his master. Of course the slaves, who had escaped 
 into Florida from Georgia, with their children and grandchil 
 dren around them, excited the cupidity and hostility of the 
 Georgia slaveholders. But living on Spanish soil, and under 
 the protection of Spanish laws, they were beyond their reach. 
 To seek their re-enslavement by obtaining jurisdiction over this 
 territory became, then, the object of effort. The annexation of 
 Florida was, therefore, warmly pressed by the slaveholding in 
 terest upon the government. Consequently a law was passed 
 in secret session, in 1811, for taking possession of Florida ; and 
 General Matthews, a Georgia slaveholder, without either per 
 mission or negotiation, took possession of Amelia Island. The 
 government of Spain, of course, remonstrated, and the act was 
 disavowed by the President. Matthews was recalled, and Gov 
 ernor Mitchell appointed a commissioner, who continued to 
 hold forcible possession of the island, in violation of the claims 
 of national comity and good faith towards the Spanish govern 
 ment. 
 
 In 1812 the governor of Georgia, in like violation of na 
 tional faith, sent an armed force into Florida, under the com 
 mand of the adjutant-general of that State, for the utterly 
 indefensible and outrageous purpose of exterminating the 
 Seminoles, and recapturing the slaves whom the Indians would 
 
EXILES OF FLORIDA. 129 
 
 not surrender. But this force, meeting with little success, was 
 obliged to return after having stolen a large number of slaves 
 from their Spanish masters. Those thus deprived of their 
 slaves urged their demands for compensation ; and thirty years 
 afterward John Quincy Adams presented a list of more than 
 ninety slaves thus stolen. Georgia, still persisting in its pur 
 pose, resolved,* through its legislature, that Florida was neces 
 sary to its safety, and an act was passed to raise a military 
 force to reduce St. Augustine, and punish the Indians. A 
 military force was therefore raised, and another raid into 
 Spanish territory was made, a few towns were burned, and 
 cornfields were destroyed ; but the expedition returned, un 
 able either to conquer Florida, exterminate the Seminoles, or 
 capture the hated exiles. 
 
 Another circumstance occurred soon after, not only exhibit 
 ing the same determination on the part of the slaveholders, 
 but the humiliating alacrity of the general government to do 
 their bidding and execute their ignoble purpose upon the un 
 offending blacks and their kind protectors. During the war of 
 1812 a small British force, under Lieutenant-Colonel Nichols, 
 landed in Florida, and built a fort upon the Appalachicola River. 
 After the close of the war and the withdrawal of the British 
 forces this fort was left in possession of the exiles, whose plan 
 tations extended for many miles up the river. In the month 
 of May, 1815, General Gaines, commanding on the Southern 
 frontier, wrote to the Secretary of War that these exiles had 
 taken possession of that fort. He and other officers kept watch 
 of this " negro fort," and in their correspondence with the 
 government denounced the negroes as runaways and outlaws, 
 although they had committed no offence, and were peaceably 
 pursuing their own affairs. 
 
 This fort, though sixty miles from the frontiers of the United 
 States, greatly excited the attention of the military authorities, 
 who, like the government, were in full sympathy with the 
 slaveholders. In the month of May, 1816, General Jackson 
 wrote to General Gaines that the fort " ought to be blown up, 
 regardless of the ground on which it stands ; and," he added, 
 " if your mind has formed the same conclusion, destroy it, and 
 17 
 
130 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 return the stolen negroes and property to their rightful own 
 ers." This permission to invade the territory of a power with 
 which the nation was at peace was promptly acted upon by 
 General Gaines. Colonel Clinch with his regiment and a few 
 hundred Creek Indians, under Mclntosh, one of their chiefs, 
 entered Florida literally " to blow up the fort and return the 
 negroes to their rightful owners." Commodore Patterson de 
 tailed Sailing-Master Lewis, with two gunboats, to assist the 
 military forces in this slave-catching foray. This military and 
 naval force, on the 27th of July, assaulted this " negro fort," 
 in which had gathered three hundred and thirty-four persons, 
 many of whom were women and children, nearly all being 
 either negroes who had escaped from the United States or their 
 descendants. After a brief cannonade a hot shot entered the 
 powder-magazine, which blew up, instantly killing two hundred 
 and seventy, and injuring all but three others. Monette, in his 
 " History of the Valley of the Mississippi," says that nearly the 
 whole of the inmates were involved in indiscriminate destruc 
 tion ; not one sixth of the whole escaped. " The cries of the 
 wounded, the groans of the dying, with the shouts and yells of 
 the Indians, rendered the scene horrible beyond description." 
 Those who recovered from their wounds were delivered oyer to 
 claimants in Georgia. In some instances they were given up 
 to the descendants of those who claimed to have owned their 
 ancestors generations before. 
 
 More than twenty years afterward Congress assumed the 
 responsibility and guilt of this wicked and wanton act, and 
 passed without opposition a bill giving five thousand dollars 
 to the officers and crews of the gunboats for their gallant con 
 duct in this brutal and bloody massacre, which will stand, in 
 the words of Mr. Giddings, in his " Exiles of Florida," " as 
 one of the darkest crimes which stains the history of any civil 
 ized nation." In this massacre it is estimated that more than 
 one third of the Florida exiles perished, or were re-enslaved. 
 Mr. Clay and other senators and representatives condemned 
 this lawless invasion of Florida, as an act of hostility towards 
 Spain ; but not a voice was raised in condemnation of those 
 atrocities against the weak and comparatively defenceless 
 
EXILES OF FLORIDA. 131 
 
 blacks and the Indian friends who shared their fate. So 
 strangely oblivious had the nation become to the simplest 
 claims of humanity and justice. 
 
 Outrages so violent and unprovoked could of necessity be 
 neither forgotten nor easily forgiven. The sense of such 
 wronged and outraged humanity rankled in the breasts of the 
 Indians, and they could not but retaliate, however hopeless 
 their condition, and however mad their attempt against a peo 
 ple so much their superior in numbers and in the arts of war 
 fare. They did retaliate, though but feebly; and yet their 
 hostile demonstrations were seized upon as an occasion for 
 sending forces into their country in plain violation of inter 
 national law. In 1817 General Gaines was ordered to enter 
 Florida, and General Jackson took the field for the subjuga 
 tion of the Indians and the exiles. With a large force the 
 latter entered the country in April, 1818, defeated the Indians 
 and exiles, and destroyed several of their towns. The ne 
 groes, knowing there was no alternative but death or slavery, 
 fought bravely in several actions, but were finally defeated at 
 Suwanee River. The survivors retired towards the more 
 southern portions of the Territory. More than half of the 
 exiles had perished, and a vast amount of wretchedness was 
 occasioned by this lawless, cruel, and wicked invasion. Not 
 only were all domestic quiet and thrift at an end, and the 
 productive industry of these people checked, but their flocks, 
 herds, and other property were destroyed. An inconsiderable 
 number were captured and returned to their greedy masters. 
 But as a people they were unconquered. They had set the 
 government at defiance, and had baffled all its attempts to 
 subjugate them. Besides, slaves still escaping from Georgia 
 and Alabama were soon added to their numbers, and they 
 seemed to the excited and sensitive slave-masters a growing 
 menace on their southern border. 
 
 Baffled in their appeal to arms, the slave-masters were not 
 disheartened, but determined to seek through diplomacy what 
 they could not gain by military achievements. They therefore 
 demanded the annexation of Florida, and an obsequious gov 
 ernment purchased it by yielding its claim to Texas ; and 
 
132 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 thus the Seminoles and the exiles of Florida were brought 
 under a control they so much dreaded, and had so much rea 
 son to dread. As if that were not enough, the slaveholders 
 pressed with redoubled and scandalous importunity their 
 claims of indemnity for the slaves they had lost. Conse 
 quently, under the direction of Mr. Calhoun, Secretary of 
 War, a treaty was negotiated in 1821, with the Creek Indians 
 at " Indian Spring." By this treaty five millions of acres 
 of valuable land were ceded, and two hundred and fifty 
 thousand dollars were set apart for the payment for slaves 
 claimed by Georgia. Out of this fund the claims of Georgia 
 were paid in 1822. Thus Georgia, instead of the punishment 
 she so richly deserved for her violent and disloyal conduct 
 towards the general government, as well as for her wanton 
 outrages upon the Indians and the exiles, was paid for her 
 slaves from the proceeds of lands thus extorted from the 
 helpless victims of superior force ; and though the amount 
 received, according to Attorney-General Wirt, was three times 
 their actual value, yet they clamored for the one hundred and 
 forty-one thousand dollars held by the United States, which 
 really belonged to the Creeks. And this sum was afterwards 
 paid to them. 
 
 In September, 1822, General Jackson proposed another out 
 rage and act of tyrannous oppression upon the Seminoles ; 
 that they should be united with the Creeks arid returned to 
 the Creek nation, because, he said, these Indian settlements 
 " would be a perpetual harbor for our slaves." He also declared 
 that " these runaway slaves must be removed from the Flori- 
 das, or scenes of murder and confusion will exist." In nego 
 tiating the " Indian Spring " treaty with the Creeks, that 
 nation, as seen above, was held responsible for the conduct 
 of the Seminoles, who against their earnest protest were 
 deemed and held a part of the nation. But having obtained 
 compensation for runaway slaves from the Creeks, the govern 
 ment, with shameless audacity, changed its position and as 
 sumed that the Seminoles were an independent people. The 
 interests of slavery demanded this ; and Mr. Calhoun, regard 
 less of the inconsistencies into which it might lead him, was 
 
EXILES OF FLORIDA. 133 
 
 ever true to slavery. A treaty was negotiated with the 
 Seminoles in September, 1823, at Camp Moultrie. By this 
 treaty the Indians were to retire from the coast, where were 
 their homes and property and the graves of their dead, and 
 occupy a country south of Tampa Bay, where they were prom 
 ised protection by the government of the United States against 
 " all persons whatsoever." 
 
 By this treaty the Seminoles were compelled to stipulate 
 " to be active and vigilant in preventing the retreating to or 
 passing through the country assigned them of any absconding 
 slave or fugitive from justice ; and they further agree to use 
 all necessary exertions to apprehend and deliver the same to 
 the agent, who shall receive orders to compensate them agree 
 ably to the trouble and expense incurred." The country 
 which the exiles had cultivated and bravely defended was 
 given up to white men, and they were compelled to retire and 
 find their homes in the swamps and forests of the interior. 
 Unscrupulous oppressors not only seized the possessions of 
 their escaped fugitives, but whenever they could seize the fugi 
 tives themselves they made them their slaves. Slave-catchers 
 sought by fraud and violence to obtain possession of those 
 negroes wherever they could be found, as the presumption of 
 law was that every black man was a slave unless he could 
 prove himself free. The Indians held a few slaves, and these 
 were often seized by the whites. They justly complained, but 
 having no knowledge of legal proceedings, had no remedy. 
 
 The Secretary of War, in 1825, issued an order concerning 
 fugitive slaves among the Seminoles, and directed the Indian 
 agent at Tallahassee to take measures to enable the slave 
 claimants to identify their property so that it might be imme 
 diately restored. This Indian agent, in obedience to his in 
 structions, emphatically declared : " Let the chiefs distinctly 
 understand that they are not to harbor runaway negroes, and 
 that they will be required to give up such negroes as are now 
 residing within their limits." The military forces of the United 
 States being openly detailed to arrest fugitives, the Commis 
 sioner of Indian Affairs at Washington, in 1827, wrote to 
 the Indian agent in Florida, reproving him for his remissness 
 
134 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 in making such captures. He even went so far as to decide 
 particular cases, and to order the agent in Florida to capture 
 certain slaves then claimed by certain persons. The Indian 
 chiefs complained that, contrary to the stipulations of the treaty 
 made at Camp Moultrie, white men were in their country 
 searching for slaves. To these remonstrances of the savage 
 chief against the violation of the treaty the agent of the 
 United States had no other reply to make than to state the 
 fact that they were there by permission given them by the 
 Secretary of War. Thus these slave-catchers, unscrupulous, 
 heartless, and cruel, with the simple intent to make money, 
 were by the permission of the government roaming over the 
 Indian country, contrary to the sacred guaranties of the nation. 
 The rapacity of the slave-traders increased, and outrages 
 perpetrated upon the negroes and Indians continued. A com 
 plete despotism reigned. The Indians became alarmed and 
 indignant at these persistent aggressions, and war seemed 
 again inevitable. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE MISSOUEI STRUGGLE. THE COMPROMISES. 
 
 The Louisiana Purchase. Missouri Territory. Bill authorizing the Territory 
 to form a Constitution. Mr. Tallmadge's Amendment prohibiting Slavery. 
 Exciting Debate. Amendment agreed to. Inhibition of Slavery stricken 
 out by the Senate. Bill lost. Territory of Arkansas organized. Mr. Tay 
 lor's Amendment. Bill introduced by Mr. Scott to authorize Missouri to 
 form a Constitution. Maine and Missouri united in the Senate. Mr. Eob- 
 erts's Amendment for the Inhibition of Slavery. Debate in the Senate. 
 Mr. Thomas's Amendment. Amendment agreed to. Bill passed the Senate. 
 House disagree to Senate's Amendment. Mr. Taylor's Amendment. Bill 
 passed. Conference Committee. Prohibition of Slavery defeated in the 
 House. Prohibition of Slavery north of the Parallel of 36 30' agreed to. 
 Triumph of the Slave Power complete. 
 
 THE necessities of the West and the permanent interests of 
 the nation required that the United States should possess and 
 control the Mississippi River from its sources to the Gulf. 
 The acquisition of Louisiana in 1803, by which that control 
 was obtained, with the full possession of a vast and fertile ter 
 ritory, was a measure of transcendent importance. Wherever 
 settlements had been made, however, slavery had gained a 
 foothold, and it soon became apparent that the geographical 
 position and fertile soil of this extensive domain would greatly 
 strengthen the slaveholders, who had already secured a large 
 if not a commanding influence in the general government. 
 They who believed in the perpetuity of the system, and de 
 sired to see it protected and strengthened, enthusiastically 
 welcomed this large addition of territory, with the increased 
 value of their sla,ves which it promised, and the augmen 
 tation of political power it foretokened. But far-seeing states 
 men in the North, though conceding the national advantages 
 of the purchase, rightly dreaded, as the event proved, its in 
 fluence on the free institutions of the country. They plainly 
 
136 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 foresaw that it would intensify the haughty and exacting spirit 
 of the class that had assumed, all too successfully, to direct and 
 give character to the policy of the government. 
 
 The Louisiana purchase was divided by act of Congress into 
 two territories by the thirty-third parallel of latitude. That 
 part which lay south of the parallel was called Orleans, and 
 the part which lay north of it was called Louisiana. When 
 the Territory of Orleans was admitted as a State, in 1812, it 
 was called Louisiana, and the Louisiana Territory received the 
 name of the Missouri Territory. 
 
 On the 16th of March, 1818, petitions were presented to the 
 House of Representatives by citizens of Missouri, praying that 
 the Territory might be permitted to form a constitution and 
 be admitted into the Union. These memorials were referred 
 to a select committee, of which Mr. Scott, Territorial Delegate, 
 was chairman. This committee reported a bill on the 3d of 
 April ; but no action was taken at that session. At the next 
 session a memorial was received from the Territorial legisla 
 ture, praying that Missouri might be permitted to form a State 
 constitution ; and the House, in February, 1819, proceeded to 
 the consideration of a bill to authorize it to form a constitu 
 tion and enter the Union. 
 
 Mr. Tallmadge of New York offered an amendment provid 
 ing that all persons born after the admission of the State 
 should be free ; and also providing for the gradual emancipa 
 tion of persons then held as slaves. This amendment led to 
 a sharp and prolonged debate, when Mr. Tallmadge modified 
 his amendment so as to provide that the further introduction 
 of slavery be prohibited, and that all children born within the 
 State after its admission shall be free at the age of twenty-five 
 years. Mr. John W. Taylor of New York, afterward Speaker 
 of the House, maintained that Congress had full power to pro 
 hibit the introduction of slavery as a condition of admission, 
 and that it would be wise to use that power. He reminded the 
 opponents of prohibition that they had often disclaimed the sin 
 of the original introduction of slavery, and had thrown it back 
 upon their ancestors. " If they have tried slavery," he said, 
 " and found it a curse ; if they desire to dissipate the gloom 
 
THE MISSOUEI STRUGGLE. THE COMPROMISES. 137 
 
 with which it covers their land, I call upon them to exclude it 
 from the territory in question, plant not its seeds in this un- 
 corrupt soil ; let not our children, looking back to the proceed 
 ings of this day, say of us, as we have been constrained to say 
 of our fathers, ' We wish their decision had been different.' ' 
 
 Mr. Clay, then Speaker of the House, earnestly opposed the 
 amendment, and emphatically asserted that Congress had no 
 right whatever to prescribe any condition to the newly organ 
 ized States, but must admit them by a single act, leaving their 
 sovereign rights unrestricted. Mr. Fuller of Massachusetts, a 
 lawyer of eminence, father of Margaret Fuller D'Ossoli, thought 
 the amendment implied nothing more than that the constitu 
 tion of Missouri should be republican. He maintained with 
 clearness and ability that the exclusion of all colored men from 
 political freedom and making them property was a palpable 
 invasion of right and an utter abandonment of principle and 
 duty. 
 
 It was strenuously maintained by Philip P. Barbour of Vir 
 ginia, afterward Speaker of the House and judge of the Su 
 preme Court of the United States, that Congress had no con 
 stitutional right to enact the proposed amendment ; and, if it 
 had the power, it would be highly impolitic and unjust to ex 
 ercise it. This eminent lawyer and jurist, however, expressly 
 admitted that Congress, having the power to make all needful 
 rules and regulations respecting the Territories, had also the 
 power to " establish the principle now proposed " in the em 
 bryo State, while it continued to be a Territory. 
 
 " An opportunity is now presented," said Mr. Livermore of 
 New Hampshire, " if not to diminish, at least to prevent the 
 growth of a sin that sits heavy on the soul of every one of us. 
 By embracing this opportunity we may retrieve the national 
 character, and in some degree our own. But if we suffer it 
 to pass unimproved, let us at least be consistent, and declare 
 that our Constitution was made to impose slavery, and not to 
 establish liberty. Let us no longer tell idle tales about the 
 abolition of slavery ; away with colonization societies, if their 
 design is only to rid us of free blacks and turbulent slaves. 
 Have done, also, with Bible societies, whose views are extended 
 
 18 
 
138 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 to Africa and the East Indies, while they overlook the deplora 
 ble condition of our sable brethren within our own borders. 
 Make no more laws to prohibit the importation of the slaves, for 
 the world must see that the object of such laws is alone to pro 
 hibit the glutting of a prodigious market of the flesh and blood 
 of man, which we are about to establish in the West, and to 
 enhance the price of sturdy wretches, raised like black cattle 
 and horses, on our own plantations, for sale." The amend 
 ment was sustained by the Committee of the Whole by a vote 
 of seventy-nine to sixty-seven. 
 
 On the 16th of the same month this earnest and exciting 
 debate was resumed. Mr. Scott, the delegate from Missouri, 
 spoke at great length against the prohibition of slavery. He 
 talked of the Ides of March, and warned Congress that the 
 amendment was " big with the fate of Caesar and of Rome." 
 Mr. Colston of Virginia was especially excited and violent. 
 He accused Mr. Livermore of speaking to the galleries, and, 
 by his language, of attempting to excite a servile war ; and 
 insolently declared that he was " no better than Arbuthnot 
 and Ambrister, and deserved no better fate." During that 
 debate Mr. Cobb of Georgia asserted with much feeling that 
 if the friends of the amendment persisted the Union would 
 be dissolved. " They were kindling a fire," he said, " which 
 all the waters of the ocean could not extinguish. It could be 
 extinguished only in blood." 
 
 The debate was closed by the mover of the amendment in a 
 speech of great boldness and vigor. In reply to Mr. Cobb he 
 said : " If a dissolution of the Union must take place, let it 
 be so ! If civil war, which gentlemen so much threaten, must 
 come, I can only say, Let it come ! My hold on life is proba 
 bly as frail as any man who hears me ; but while that life lasts 
 it shall be devoted to the service of my country, to the freedom 
 of man. If blood is necessary to extinguish any fire which I 
 have assisted to kindle, I can assure gentlemen, while I regret 
 the necessity, I shall not forbear to contribute my mite." 
 The portion of the amendment forbidding the introduction of 
 slavery was then adopted by a vote of eighty-seven to seventy- 
 six. The second portion of the amendment, by which chil- 
 
THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE. THE COMPROMISES. 139 
 
 dren born after the admission of the State should be made free 
 at the age of twenty-five, was adopted by eighty -two to seventy- 
 six, and the bill was then passed by ninety-seven to fifty-six. 
 
 The Senate, on the 27th of February, struck out of the bill 
 that portion of Mr. Tallmadge's amendment making children 
 free, born after the admission of the State, by thirty-one to 
 seven ; and the portion excluding slavery, by twenty-two to 
 sixteen. 
 
 The House, by a majority of two, refused to concur with the 
 Senate in striking out the prohibition. The Senate, however, 
 adhering to its amendment, Mr. Taylor moved that the House 
 adhere to its disagreement, and sustained his motion by a 
 vigorous speech, in which he was strongly supported by Mr. 
 Tallmadge, and Mr. Mills of Massachusetts. The House 
 adhered by twelve majority, and the bill was lost. 
 
 In the following December Mr. Robertson of Kentucky 
 moved that the House appoint a committee to consider the 
 expediency of establishing a Territorial government over so 
 much of the Missouri Territory as lay south of the parallel 
 of 36 30'. The committee, being appointed, reported a bill 
 providing a Territorial government for the southern part of 
 the Missouri Territory, to be called the Territory of Arkan 
 sas. When it came up for consideration, Mr. Taylor moved 
 the prohibition of slavery in the proposed Territory. This 
 amendment gave rise to a heated debate. Mr. Clay expressed 
 his deep regret at its introduction, and charged its supporters 
 with being under the influence of negrophobia. Mr. Nelson 
 of Virginia charged its friends with fighting behind a masked 
 battery. It was, he thought, an entering wedge to prepare 
 the way for an attack by Congress on the property of masters 
 in their slaves in the several States. 
 
 An earnest appeal was made by Mr. Taylor for the inhibi 
 tion of slavery. Mr. Walker of North Carolina declared if 
 Southern men were prohibited from taking their slaves into 
 the Territory, their " land would be an uncultivated waste, a 
 fruitless soil " ; but if its slaves were freely permitted to go 
 beyond the Mississippi, then " your lands," he said, " will be 
 sold, your soil will be cultivated, and your country will flour- 
 
140 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ish." Louis McLane of Delaware denied the power of Con 
 gress to prohibit slavery in the Territories, or to make such 
 prohibition a condition of admitting a State into the Union. 
 He even maintained the extreme position of denying the right 
 of any State to emancipate slaves. He asked : " What would 
 be said of the legislature of the State of Delaware or Mary 
 land, if, by law, they were to declare all the slaves within 
 their limits to be free ? Could it be pretended for a moment 
 that they would have any right to do so ? " 
 
 So much of Mr. Taylor's amendment as prohibited the intro 
 duction of slavery was rejected by the close vote of seventy to 
 seventy-one ; but so much as provided that all children born 
 slaves should be free at the age of twenty-five was agreed to 
 by a majority of two. Mr. Williams of North Carolina moved 
 a reconsideration ; but his motion failed by the same majority. 
 It was then moved by Mr. Robertson to recommit the bill to a 
 select committee, with instructions to strike out the amend 
 ments ; and this motion was carried by the casting vote of the 
 Speaker. The committee to whom the bill was recommitted 
 consisted of Robertson of Kentucky, Silsbee and Mills of 
 Massachusetts, Burwell of Virginia, and Lowndes of South 
 Carolina. Thus Mr. Clay, who had been in favor of exclud 
 ing slavery from Kentucky, and who professed to believe 
 " slavery to be a wrong, a grievous wrong, no contingency can 
 make right," not only secured this recommitment by his cast 
 ing vote, but constituted the committee hostile to the humane 
 provisions of the amendment. This action reveals and illus 
 trates the sacrifices of principle and of conscience which the 
 aspiring public men of the nation have been compelled to 
 make, in order to secure the favor and support of the exact 
 ing and dominating Power which so long and so completely 
 dictated what the policy and who the rulers of the nation 
 should be. 
 
 The committee reported in favor of striking out the amend 
 ment ; but the House, by a majority of two, voted to sustain 
 it. It was then moved by Mr. Taylor that neither slavery nor 
 involuntary servitude should be introduced into the Territory. 
 This amendment was supported by Mr. Pitkin of Connecticut, 
 
THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE. THE COMPROMISES. 141 
 
 and opposed by Mr. Whitman of Massachusetts, who had voted 
 for the prohibition of slavery in Missouri. It was lost, how 
 ever, by a vote of eighty-six to ninety. It was then proposed 
 by Mr. Taylor to prohibit slavery in all the territory north of 
 36 30' ; but after an excited debate he withdrew his proposi 
 tion, and the bill passed without any restriction. When it 
 came up for consideration in the Senate, Mr. Roberts of Penn 
 sylvania moved to prohibit slavery. His amendment was 
 defeated by a majority of five, and Arkansas became a slave- 
 holding Territory, and the South again triumphed. 
 
 The XYIth Congress met on the 6th of December, 1819. On 
 motion of Mr. Scott, the memorials in favor of the admis 
 sion of Missouri as a State were referred to a select commit 
 tee, consisting of himself, Robertson of Kentucky, Terrill of 
 Georgia, Strother of Virginia, and De Witt of New York, one 
 member only being from the free States. On the 9th Mr. Scott 
 reported a bill for its admission on an equal footing with the 
 original States. 
 
 In the Senate the memorial of the Territorial legislature of 
 Missouri was referred to the Judiciary Committee, of which 
 Mr. Smith of South Carolina was chairman. This committee 
 reported the House bill for the admission of Maine, with an 
 amendment authorizing the people of Missouri to form a State 
 constitution. The bill coming up for consideration, Mr. Rob 
 erts of Pennsylvania moved to recommit it, with instructions to 
 leave out the amendment. This motion was supported by 
 Mellen and Otis of Massachusetts, Burrill of Rhode Island, 
 Dana of Connecticut, and opposed by Smith of South Caro 
 lina and Lloyd of Maryland, but was lost by a majority of 
 seven. 
 
 The consideration of the bill was resumed in the Senate, 
 and Mr. Roberts moved to amend it by the provision that the 
 introduction of slavery should be absolutely and irrevocably 
 prohibited, supporting his amendment in a very able and for 
 cible' speech. Mr. Elliot of Georgia, however, declared the 
 contemplated restriction to be " unauthorized by the Constitu 
 tion, in contravention of a solemn treaty ; and opposed by the 
 suggestions of sound policy." Mr. Lowrie of Pennsylvania 
 
142 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 said, if the alternative, as intimated by the opponents of 
 slavery restriction, were a dissolution of the Union or the 
 extension of slavery over the whole Western territory, " I 
 will choose the former, though the choice is one that fills my 
 mind with horror." The proposition was advocated by Mor- 
 rill of New Hampshire, Mellen of Massachusetts, and Burrill 
 of Rhode Island ; and opposed by Walker of Georgia, Macon. 
 of North Carolina, and Pinkney of Maryland. 
 
 Mr. Otis of Massachusetts, though he had voted for the 
 admission of Missouri at the previous session, now made a most 
 earnest and eloquent speech in favor of prohibition, closing with 
 the declaration that he was " unable to agree to any measure 
 which should counteract the spirit of the age by increasing the 
 mischief of slavery to a degree boundless in extent and per 
 petual in duration, and to entail on posterity a scourge for which 
 we reproach the memory of our ancestors." Mr. Ruggles of 
 Ohio declared, in * the same strain, that "this day's legislation 
 is not to perish with us, it is to endure for centuries. The 
 people of Missouri fifty years hence will trace, not to a British 
 king, not to a corrupt British Parliament, but to Congress, the 
 evils of slavery." 
 
 On the other hand, with equal if not greater positiveness 
 and feeling, Southern members opposed the amendment. Mr. 
 Smith of South Carolina characterized the efforts against the 
 extension of slavery as " the misguided influences of fanati 
 cism and humanity." Mr. Yan Dyke of Delaware, though 
 his State had adopted resolutions in favor of the restriction, 
 now made a constitutional argument against the amendment. 
 Mr. James Barbour of Virginia, afterward Secretary of War, 
 and Minister to England under the administration of John 
 Quincy Adams, spoke at great length against the restriction. 
 Though, like most of the Virginia statesmen of that day, 
 admitting that slavery was mixed with good and evil, the 
 latter greatly predominating, he charged that the advocates 
 of restriction were violating the Constitution, trampling under 
 foot the plighted faith of the nation, inflicting an immeasur 
 able act of injustice on one half of the country, and laying the 
 foundation of an incurable hatred. Richard M. Johnson of 
 
THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE. THE COMPROMISES. 143 
 
 Kentucky, afterward Vice-President of the United States, 
 declared that " the friends of prohibition would check the 
 progress of humanity, tighten the bands of the captive, pro 
 long the time of slavery, and augment its evils, excite every 
 discordant passion of the soul, and produce jargon, animosity, 
 and strife." The vote was then taken on Mr. Roberts' s amend 
 ment prohibiting slavery in Missouri, and it was defeated by 
 nine majority. 
 
 During the debate Rufus King, who had again entered the 
 Senate from New York, made two elaborate and powerful 
 speeches in favor of the inhibition of slavery in the new 
 States. They were regarded as the fullest, most thorough, 
 and exhaustive presentations made in that debate. John 
 Quincy Adams, who heard them, said that he unravelled with 
 ingenious and subtle analysis many sophistical tissues of the 
 slaveholders, and laid down the position of the natural lib 
 erty of man, and its incompatibility with slavery ; and that the 
 great slaveholders gnawed their lips and clenched their fists as 
 they heard him. William Pinkuey, the distinguished Mary 
 land lawyer and orator, who had declared, thirty years before, 
 that " if slavery continues fifty years longer its effects will be 
 seen in the decline of the spirit of liberty in the free States," 
 addressed the Senate for three hours, in a speech of great elo 
 quence and power, against its prohibition in Missouri. 
 
 The Senate having by a majority of two voted to join Maine 
 and Missouri in the same bill, Mr. Thomas of Illinois moved 
 an amendment providing that in all the country ceded by 
 France to the United States north of 36 30' there should be 
 neither slavery nor involuntary servitude. Mr. Trimble moved 
 to amend the amendment by excluding slavery from all the 
 territory west of the Mississippi River, excepting Louisiana, 
 Arkansas, and Missouri ; but it was rejected. Mr. Thomas's 
 amendment was adopted by a decided majority, and the bill 
 was passed by a vote of twenty-four to twenty. 
 
 The bill was taken up in the House on the 26th of January, 
 and Mr. Storrs moved to amend it so as to prohibit slavery 
 north of the parallel of 38 west of the Mississippi. Mr. Tay 
 lor, moving, as an amendment, that there should be neither 
 
144 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 slavery nor involuntary servitude in the State, made an elab 
 orate argument in its support. He was immediately followed 
 by Mr. Holmes, who, though a representative from Massachu 
 setts, was found willing to lead off in the opposition. He de 
 clared, if he was reduced to the alternative of holding slaves 
 in Missouri or violating the Constitution of his country, he 
 would not permit " a doubt to cloud his choice." Thus was 
 opened that remarkable debate in the popular branch of Con 
 gress which, estimated by the test of substantial ability or of 
 wide-spread and far-reaching results, finds few equals in the 
 legislative history of the nation. 
 
 Freedom found worthy representatives and advocates. Penn 
 sylvania, true to her then proud and traditional pre-eminence, 
 spoke manly words through the distinguished representative 
 and lawyer of Philadelphia, John Sergeant, who said that 
 he was not afraid of what is called popular excitement. 
 Believing that all history teaches that revolutions are not 
 the work of men, but of time and circumstances, he said : 
 " Nothing can present a more frightful indication than public 
 indifference to such a question as this. It is not by rigorously 
 maintaining great moral and political principles in their purity 
 that we incur danger." " Let the standard of freedom," he 
 said, " be planted in Missouri by the hands of the Constitution, 
 and let its banner wave over the heads of none but freemen, 
 men retaining the image impressed upon them by their 
 Creator, and dependent upon none but God and the laws. 
 Then, as our republican States extend, republican principles 
 will go hand in hand with republican practice, the love of 
 liberty with the sense of justice." 
 
 Mr. Hemphill, also of Pennsylvania, made a learned and ex 
 haustive argument in favor of Mr. Taylor's amendment. Mr. 
 Cook of Illinois believed the measure had originated in the 
 best and noblest motives, motives dictated by humanity and 
 the well-being of the nation. Though opposing the popular 
 feeling of Missouri, he said : " I believe, if the voice of futurity 
 could be heard, I should receive her approbation and her grati 
 tude. She might come from the wilderness, with her locks 
 wet with the dews of the night, and knock at your door for 
 
THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE. THE COMPROMISES. 145 
 
 admittance till she falls with weakness ; and, unless she comes 
 in the white robes of freedom and a pledge against the future 
 evils of slavery, with my consent she will not be admitted." 
 
 On the other hand, Slavery put forth her strong men to plead 
 her cause and dragoon the government into submission to 
 her haughty behests. Of course Mr. Clay's clarion voice was 
 heard loudest in the din of strife, summoning his countrymen, 
 in the sacred name of patriotic devotion to the nation, to fol 
 low his lead, as he consecrated talents, position, and influence 
 at the shrine of the exacting Power that claimed the cruel 
 sacrifice. He spoke for four hours against the expediency 
 and right of restriction. Mr. McLane of Delaware spoke in 
 the same strain. Mr. Reid of Georgia declared that the wel 
 fare and security of the citizens forbade emancipation ; though 
 he would hail the day as the most glorious in its dawning which 
 should behold, with safety to its white citizens, the black popu 
 lation placed on the high elevation of equal rights and clothed 
 with the privileges of American citizens. 
 
 Mr. Hardin of Kentucky accused the advocates of prohibi 
 tion of fighting under false colors. " It would be more mag 
 nanimous," he said, " to haul down the colors on which are 
 engraven humanity, morality, and religion, and unfurl the 
 genuine banner, on which is written a contest for political con 
 sequence and mastery." General Smythe of Virginia, whose 
 speeches were more remarkable for length and dulness than for 
 other qualities, declared that he would not apologize for the 
 length of his speech on that occasion ; for he had spoken " to 
 preserve our citizens from massacre, our wives and daughters 
 from violation, and our children from being impaled by the 
 most inhuman of savages." 
 
 John Tyler, afterward President of the United States, always 
 a pliant instrument of the Slave Power, and a rebel in the late 
 rebellion, appealed to the Northern republicans to pause and 
 remember that their triumph was to be over their firm and 
 steadfast friends of the South. He maintained that slaves 
 were guaranteed as property in the Constitution. Northern 
 gentlemen, he said, should " not forget themselves. Rail at 
 slavery as much as you please. I point you to the Constitu- 
 
 19 
 
146 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 tion, and say to you that you have not only acknowledged our 
 right to this species of property, but you have gone much fur 
 ther and have bound yourselves to rivet the chains of the slave." 
 He told the friends of prohibition that they might return to 
 their constituents and receive votes of thanks ; but, instead of 
 blessings, the deepest curses of posterity would be uttered 
 against their destructive policy. 
 
 In the midst of the debate, which had run for nearly a month, 
 the House bill for the admission of Maine was returned, with 
 an amendment authorizing the people of Missouri to form a 
 State government. Mr. Taylor moved that the House disagree, 
 while Mr. Scott moved that it be referred to the committee of 
 the whole, which had under consideration the Missouri bill. 
 After a brief debate, Mr. Scott's amendment was rejected by a 
 decisive majority. The House resuming the consideration of" 
 the Maine and Missouri bill, John Randolph made a long speech 
 against the Senate's amendment excluding slavery north of 36 
 30'. The next day the House disagreed to the Senate's amend 
 ment uniting the bills for the admission of Maine and Missouri, 
 while so much of the amendment as prohibited slavery from 
 territory north of 36 30' was disagreed to, and the debate was 
 resumed. 
 
 Mr. Plummer of New Hampshire, in reply to Mr. Clay, who had 
 warned the men of New England not to intrude upon him their 
 New England notions, declared that those notions were liberty, 
 equality, and the rights of man. " These are the notions," he 
 said, " which we must cast aside when we leave our happy 
 homes, and which, if by chance they find their way into this 
 hall, are to be repelled with the charge of fanaticism, folly, and 
 negrophobia. Sir, if there be any madness in this case, it is 
 the madness of those who hug slavery to their bosoms. If 
 there be any infatuation, it is the infatuation of those who are 
 willing to dissolve the Union rather than not extend this pestif 
 erous institution beyond the Mississippi." Mr. Fuller of Mas 
 sachusetts said, if Missouri would be strong in war, let her 
 invite only freemen, who will defend their families and their 
 freedom ; " not slaves, who can seek their own happiness only 
 by withering the arm that holds them in bondage." 
 
THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE. THE COMPROMISES. 147 
 
 On the 28th of February it was announced to the House 
 that the Senate insisted on its amendment ; when, on motion 
 of Mr. Taylor, it was voted to adhere to its disagreement by 
 a majority of twenty-one. Proceeding to the consideration of 
 the bill, the House rejected Mr. Storrs's amendment exclud 
 ing slavery from territory north of 36 30'. Mr. Allen of Mas 
 sachusetts moved to amend the bill by striking out the word 
 "white," so as to extend the ' privilege of voting to all male 
 citizens, supporting his amendment by a speech of some length. 
 His amendment, however, received only his own vote. Both 
 Mr. Clay and Mr. Storrs sought such a modification of Mr. 
 Taylor's amendment, already adopted, as to make it a mere 
 recommendation. Though they supported their proposition 
 with great earnestness, it failed of receiving the sanction of 
 the House. On the next day Mr. Storrs moved his amend 
 ment, providing that Mr. Taylor's amendment should be of 
 fered for the free acceptance or rejection of Missouri ; but it 
 was rejected. Mr. Taylor's amendment was then agreed to 
 by eight majority ; the bill was ordered to a third reading, and 
 on the 1st of March it was passed by a vote of ninety-one to 
 eighty-two. 
 
 On the same day the House agreed to a conference, asked 
 for by the Senate, on the bill for the admission of the State of 
 Maine. The Senate appointed on the Committee of Conference 
 Thomas of Illinois, Pinkney of Maryland, and Barbour of 
 Virginia. The House added Holmes and Parker of Massachu 
 setts, Taylor of New York, Lowndes of South Carolina, and 
 Kinsey of New Jersey. 
 
 The next day the Missouri bill was taken up in the Senate, 
 and, on motion of Mr. Barbour, so much of the bill as prohib 
 ited slavery was stricken out by twenty-seven to fifteen. Mr. 
 Thomas moved to amend the bill by adding a section exclud 
 ing slavery north of 36 30'. Mr. Trimble moved to amend 
 that amendment by prohibiting slavery in all territory ceded 
 by France, excepting Louisiana, Missouri, and Arkansas. His 
 motion, however, received only twelve votes, and the amend 
 ment of Mr. Thomas was adopted. 
 
 On the same day Mr. Holmes, from the committee of con- 
 
148 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ference, reported to the House that the Senate secede from its 
 amendment to the bill for the admission of Maine ; and that 
 the House strike out from the bill authorizing the people of 
 Missouri to form a constitution the prohibition of slavery, and 
 insert the inhibition of slavery in all the territories ceded by 
 France north of the parallel of 36 30'. The report was laid 
 upon the table, and the House proceeded to the consideration 
 of the Senate's amendments to the Missouri bill. The ques 
 tion was so divided as to be first taken on striking out the pro 
 hibition of slavery in that State. Mr. Lowndes spoke briefly 
 in support of the compromise recommended by the committee 
 of conference. He declared that its adoption would restore 
 tranquillity to the country, a result demanded by every con 
 sideration of discretion, of moderation, of wisdom, and of vir 
 tue. Mr. Holmes of Massachusetts spoke for the compromise, 
 and Mr. Adams of the same State against it. Kinsey of New 
 Jersey, Stevens of Connecticut, and Mercer of Virginia ear 
 nestly advocated the compromise. On the question of striking 
 out the restriction the vote stood yeas ninety, nays eighty- 
 seven ; not a single member from the slave States voting for 
 prohibition, and fourteen members from the free States voting 
 against it. Though the legislatures of New York, New Jersey, 
 and Pennsylvania had adopted resolutions in favor of such pro 
 hibition, seven members from those States recorded their votes 
 against the sentiments embodied in them. New England, too, 
 furnished seven representatives who thus proved themselves 
 false to the claims of humanity, the rights of man, and the 
 permanent interests of the country. The motion to concur 
 with the Senate in inserting in the bill the clause inhibiting 
 slavery in the territory acquired from France north of 36 30' 
 was then agreed to by a vote of one hundred and thirty-four 
 to forty-two. 
 
 Throughout the long struggle the President and his cabi 
 net had manifested the deepest interest. On the passage of 
 the bill he submitted to them the question : " Has Congress 
 the constitutional power to prohibit slavery in a Territory ? " 
 To this question an affirmative answer was given, though all 
 but Mr. Adams were of the opinion that the word " forever " 
 
THE MISSOUEI STRUGGLE. THE COMPROMISES. 149 
 
 in the prohibitory clause did not interfere with the right of any 
 State that might be organized from that territory to prohibit 
 or establish slavery. Having received from all the members 
 of his cabinet the opinion that the proviso forever prohibiting 
 slavery north of the parallel of 36 30' was constitutional, 
 President Monroe affixed his signature to the bill. 
 
 The victory of the Slave Power was now complete ; slavery 
 was fastened upon the Territory of Arkansas and the new State 
 of Missouri ; and the dark cloud, surcharged with its number 
 less wrongs and woes, rolled heavily across the Mississippi. 
 Under the skilful lead of her distinguished sons and cham 
 pions, in both the legislative and executive departments of gov 
 ernment, the slaveholding South imposed upon the country, 
 thus basely betrayed and subdued, another compromise," a 
 compromise, however, to be kept only so long as the interests 
 of the vile and false system which exacted it could be promoted 
 by it ; then to be ruthlessly broken and treated as a thing of 
 naught. 
 
 This Missouri struggle, which so aroused and called into ac 
 tion the vital forces of freedom and slavery, demonstrated the 
 startling fact that the race of Southern statesmen who believed 
 slavery to be a temporary evil, to be abolished at some future 
 time and in some yet unforeseen way, had passed away. It 
 revealed a new class, who had learned either to believe that it 
 was " a positive good," or so to " conquer their prejudices " as to 
 subordinate their convictions to the assumed necessities of the 
 system and the intolerant demands of that rapidly increasing 
 power. President Monroe, who believed that slavery " preyed 
 on the vitals " of the State which tolerated it, opposed the Mis 
 souri restriction. Several of his Cabinet actively labored to de 
 feat it. Even John Quincy Adams, Secretary of State, favored 
 the Missouri Compromise, " believing it to be," he said, " all 
 that could be effected under the present Constitution, and from 
 extreme unwillingness to put the Union in hazard." He stated 
 that " the impression produced on his mind by the progress of 
 the discussion was, that the bargain between freedom and 
 slavery contained in the Constitution of the United States was 
 morally and politically inconsistent with the principles on 
 
150 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 which alone our Revolution could be justified ; cruel and op 
 pressive by riveting the chains of slavery, by pledging the faith 
 of freedom to maintain and perpetuate the tyranny of the mas 
 ter ; and grossly unequal and impolitic by admitting that slaves 
 are at once enemies to be kept in subjection, property to be 
 secured and returned to its owners, and persons not to be rep 
 resented themselves, but for whom their masters are privileged 
 with nearly a double share of representation. The conse 
 quence has been that this slave representation has governed 
 the Union. Benjamin's portion above his brethren has ravened 
 as a wolf. In the morning he has devoured the prey, and in 
 the evening has divided the spoil." 
 
 Mr. Jefferson, who was the father of the party then in power, 
 wielding a potential influence in its councils, though he had 
 once prepared a plan for the prohibition of slavery which was 
 designed to secure to freedom all the territory from the Lakes 
 to the Gulf, became alarmed and shrunk appalled before the 
 fury of the strife, declaring that it fell upon his ear " like the 
 fire-bell at midnight." He, too, yielded to the pressure, and 
 condemned the men who were battling for the very principles 
 he had himself so grandly enunciated and ably defended. Mr. 
 Madison, also, the calm and judicious statesman who would 
 not allow the word " slave " to desecrate the Constitution, 
 trembled for the fate of the Union, menaced by the madness 
 of the slave-masters, and threw the weight of his great name 
 in favor of a policy which would subject Missouri to the same 
 influences which had so sadly blighted and despoiled his once 
 proud commonwealth. 
 
 Never before had the antislavery sentiment of the North 
 been so quickened and aroused. Popular meetings were 
 holden, in which Federalists and Democrats enthusiastically 
 and cordially united. Public addresses were made, and peti 
 tions and memorials were sent to Congress. The citizens of 
 Boston assembled and voted to memorialize Congress to 
 restrain the increase of slavery in new States to be admitted 
 into the Union. This memorial, drawn up by Daniel Webster, 
 set forth that " the happiness of unborn millions was at issue " ; 
 that the admission of slavery into a new country encouraged 
 
THE MISSOURI STRUGGLE. THE COMPROMISES. 151 
 
 " rapacity, fraud, and violence," tarnished " the proud fame 
 of the country," and rendered questionable all " professions 
 of regard for the rights of humanity or the liberties of man 
 kind." This calm and dignified paper, in which the issues 
 were put with great discrimination and emphasis, closed with 
 this manly and earnest appeal : " As inhabitants of a free 
 country, as citizens of a great and rising republic, as mem 
 bers of a Christian community, as living in a liberal and en 
 lightened age, and as feeling ourselves called upon by the 
 dictates of religion and humanity, we have presumed to offer 
 our sentiments to Congress on this question with a solici 
 tude for the event far beyond what a common occasion could 
 inspire." 
 
 These sentiments, so strongly and eloquently expressed, 
 were entertained with singular unanimity, not alone by the 
 people of Massachusetts, but by the people of New England 
 and of the entire North. The legislatures of New York, 
 New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Ohio, and Indiana 
 passed resolutions affirming the power and duty of Congress 
 to prohibit slavery in the States to be carved out of Western 
 territory. These resolutions, adopted with little opposition, 
 were based upon the indestructible principles of humanity, 
 justice, and liberty. The legislature of Pennsylvania, without 
 a dissenting vote, supported the humane and enlightened pol 
 icy of prohibiting slavery in Missouri. Their resolutions 
 proclaimed with emphasis that " they are persuaded that to 
 open the fertile regions of the West to a servile race would 
 tend to increase their numbers beyond all past example, would 
 open a new and steady market for the lawless venders of 
 human flesh, and render all schemes for obliterating this foul 
 blot upon the American character useless and unavailing." 
 They denounced the attempt to bring Missouri into the Union 
 as a slaveholding State as a measure " to spread the crimes 
 and cruelties of slavery from the banks of the Mississippi to 
 the shores of the Pacific." And they invoked the several 
 States, " by the duty they owe to the Deity, by the veneration 
 which they entertain for the memories of the founders of the 
 Republic, and by a tender regard for posterity, to protest 
 
152 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 against its adoption, to refuse to covenant with crime, and to 
 limit the range of an evil that already hangs in awful boding 
 over so large a portion of the Union." 
 
 Nor was the South less united and determined. Its lead 
 ers were, indeed, more persistent and adroit. Compact in 
 organization, united in purpose and plan, in full possession of 
 the government, and, as might be expected in support of such 
 a crime against nature and religion, not over-scrupulous, they 
 found means to alarm and persuade, if not to corrupt, North 
 ern men to betray their section, blight the hopes of their 
 people, and sacrifice the permanent interests of the whole 
 country. 
 
 Mortified at their betrayal, aggrieved at their defeat, and 
 apprehensive in view of these demonstrations of slaveholding 
 power, the more thoughtful Northern men began to compre 
 hend more clearly the radical incompatibility between slave 
 and free institutions. Governor Wolcott of Connecticut, in his 
 address to the legislature of that State, thus expressed the 
 growing conviction : " It cannot have escaped your attention 
 that a diversity of habits and principles of government exist 
 in this country ; and I think it is evident that slavery is grad 
 ually forming those distinctions which, according to invaria 
 ble laws of human action, constitute the characteristic differ 
 ence between aristocratical and democratical institutions." 
 These differences, wrought by slavery, in the ideas, social life, 
 and institutions of the North and South, so distinctly revealed 
 in the Missouri struggle, continued, in their development, to 
 become more and more antagonistic and divergent, until, after 
 the conflicts of forty years, the two systems grappled in the 
 bloody struggle of civil war. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 ADMISSION OF MISSOURI. ATTEMPT TO INTRODUCE SLAVERY INTO 
 
 ILLINOIS. 
 
 Constitution of Missouri. Resolution of Admission in the Senate. Mr. Eaton's 
 Proviso. Mr. Wilson's Proviso. Debate. Passage of the Resolution of 
 Admission. Report by Mr. Lowndes in the House. Remarks by Sergeant, 
 Storrs, Lowndes, Cook. House Resolution rejected. Senate Resolution re 
 ferred to a Committee of Thirteen. Report of Committee rejected. Speech 
 of Mr. Pinckney. Mr. Brown's Proposition. Appointment of Joint Special 
 Committee. Mr. Clay's Compromise adopted. Conditions accepted by Mis 
 souri. Slaves in Illinois. Slave Codes. Governor Coles. Defeat of the 
 Plot to make Illinois a Slave State. 
 
 THIS action of Congress having left Missouri free to estab 
 lish, guard, and perpetuate the slave system, the convention 
 for framing the constitution not only established slavery, but 
 provided in that instrument that it should be the duty of the 
 general assembly, as soon as might be, to pass such laws as 
 were necessary to prevent free negroes or mulattoes on any 
 pretext whatever from coming into or settling in the State. 
 Elated by their great triumph its framers proposed the viola 
 tion, not only of the common principles of humanity, but of 
 the rights of citizenship, as guaranteed by the Constitution 
 of the United States. 
 
 The second session of the XVI. Congress convened on 
 the 13th of November, 1820. The next day the President 
 sent to the Senate a copy of the constitution of Missouri. It 
 was referred to a select committee, of which Mr. Smith of 
 South Carolina was chairman. On the 29th the committee 
 reported a resolution for the admission of Missouri. The 
 chairman stated that the constitution was republican in form, 
 and he trusted it would at once be acted upon, and the mem 
 bers of the new State promptly admitted to the national coun- 
 20 
 
154 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 cils. Mr. Eaton of Tennessee moved that its consideration 
 be postponed, in order that he might examine it, to see if it 
 were conformable in all respects with the Constitution of the 
 United States. He suggested that " there were controverted 
 points in it." Richard M. Johnson of Kentucky did not 
 object to the postponement. " The question," he said, "swal 
 lows up, in fact, every other ; and, until it is settled, we can 
 not go on with the ordinary business of the session." It was 
 remarked by Mr. Barbour of Virginia that he had supposed 
 the question had been decided at the last session. So fully 
 persuaded was he of the fact that he had supposed that 
 " accursed would be the hand that would again open this 
 fountain of bitter waters." The motion prevailed, and the 
 question came up again on the 6th of December. Although 
 Mr. Barbour suggested that the mind of every senator was 
 fully made up, and the question could be decided without 
 debate, " the controverted points " in the constitution were at 
 once revealed. 
 
 Mr. Eaton moved to add a proviso that " nothing herein 
 contained shall be so construed as to give the assent of Con 
 gress to any provision of the constitution of Missouri, if any 
 such there be, that contravenes the clause in the Constitu 
 tion of the United States which declares that ' the citizens of 
 each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and immuni 
 ties of citizens of the several States.' ' : A proviso was then 
 moved by Mr. Wilson of New Jersey, referring specifically to 
 the objectionable clause in the constitution of Missouri ; but 
 it received the votes of only nine members. Mr. Eaton's pro 
 viso was then lost. 
 
 Mr. Burrill of Rhode Island, a dissenting member of the 
 committee, then addressed the Senate. He was a ripe scholar 
 and an eminent lawyer, by whose early death his State and the 
 nation sustained a serious loss. Speaking with clearness and 
 precision, he maintained that the act admitting Missouri was 
 in the nature of a contract between the United States and the 
 people of Missouri ; and it was competent for Congress, and it 
 was its duty, to see if that contract had been faithfully ful 
 filled. Referring to the obnoxious clause, he said he con- 
 
ADMISSION OF MISSOURI. 155 
 
 ceived it to be " entirely repugnant to the Constitution of the 
 United States. In Massachusetts there is no distinction of 
 color, and all possess precisely the same rights. Can it be 
 possible for Missouri, consistently with the Constitution, to ex 
 clude any of those citizens of Massachusetts from the State ? 
 The States of this Union are not independent nations. When 
 they framed the Constitution they used the language ' We, the 
 people.' Sanction this improper clause now, and you sanction 
 it for all time to come ; and, however we may desire hereafter 
 to avoid it, it will be irrevocably fixed." 
 
 Mr. Smith, chairman of the committee, followed in an elab 
 orate speech of great length. " The history of the ancient 
 world," he said, " affords no precedent. As no example is 
 found in the history of any other nation, and this being the 
 first time when this question has occurred in our own govern 
 ment, whether free negroes and mulattoes are citizens, we must 
 ascertain their status from the Constitution of the United States 
 and the State constitutions. They furnish a mass of evidence, 
 which none but a sceptic can doubt, that they have been con 
 sidered a part of the body politic neither by the general govern 
 ment nor the State governments." Of the self-evident truths 
 of the Declaration of Independence, he significantly asked : 
 " If this were a declaration of independence for the blacks as 
 well as the whites, why did you not all emancipate your slaves 
 at once and let them join you in the war ? " Referring to the 
 naturalization laws, he maintained that they were for white 
 persons only. He showed that in several of the free States 
 white inhabitants only were allowed political privileges. By 
 a full and mortifying recital of national as well as State legis 
 lation, he was able to show how strangely and cruelly the na 
 tion had discriminated for the whites and against the bla*cks. 
 He closed by presenting a tabular statement, procured from 
 the custom-house in Charleston, South Carolina, of the names 
 of all the vessels, and their owners, which had entered that 
 port during the four years ending in 1807. From that state 
 ment it appeared that citizens of Rhode Island had imported 
 eight thousand slaves, one fifth of all which had been brought 
 into the country ; " thus showing," he said, " that those people 
 
156 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 who most deprecate the evils of slavery and the traffic in hu 
 man flesh can sell human flesh with an easy conscience when 
 a profitable market can be found." 
 
 John Holmes of Maine, who had, as representative from 
 Massachusetts, at the preceding session, labored so efficiently 
 to defeat prohibition in Missouri and to compromise the rights 
 of freemen, now made a specious argument, in which he main 
 tained that Missouri had not impaired her claim for admission 
 by prohibiting the entrance of free negroes and mulattoes. 
 Asserting that States might enact laws against paupers and 
 vagabonds, he alleged that it was safe to assume that manu 
 mitted slaves would become such. He also maintained that 
 free negroes and mulattoes were not citizens within the mean 
 ing and intent of the Constitution, and contended that no one 
 could be a citizen unless he had an agency in the formation 
 and administration of the laws ; that free negroes and mulat 
 toes had not that agency, and therefore were not citizens ; 
 and hence their exclusion by Missouri was not an infraction 
 of the Constitution. 
 
 Mr. Otis of Massachusetts replied in a speech of great ele 
 gance and force. To Mr. Holmes' s definition of citizenship 
 and argument thereon he replied that if an unjust State gov 
 ernment might " create odious and other distinctions between 
 its privileged and other classes," that certainly could not 
 divest them of " the right of protection in life, liberty, and 
 property, of residence, and inheritable blood." The resolution, 
 after further debate, was passed by eight majority. 
 
 In the House of Representatives Mr. Scott, early in the 
 session, presented the constitution of Missouri, which was re 
 ferred to a select committee, of which Mr. Lowndes of South 
 Carolina was chairman. A report was promptly made in favor 
 of its admission as a State. It was the subject of continuous 
 debate for several days. Mr. Sergeant of Pennsylvania made 
 a very able speech in opposition to its adoption. Referring to 
 the clause of the Constitution giving to the citizens of one 
 State the privileges and immunities of citizens in other States, 
 he declared his inability to see how that could be constitutional 
 which forbade a citizen of Massachusetts " to set his foot in 
 
ADMISSION OF MISSOURI. 157 
 
 the State of Missouri." The simple privilege of locomotion 
 is all that is asked for now ; and surely that must be one of the 
 privileges and immunities of citizenship. This learned lawyer 
 and able and upright statesman said unequivocally that this 
 clause of the constitution of Missouri respecting free people of 
 color was " a plain and palpable infraction of the Constitution 
 of the United States " ; that " the plain course, then, was not 
 to receive the constitution" ; and that it was " the duty of this 
 House to reject it." 
 
 Mr. Storrs of New York, who had steadily voted, at the pre 
 vious session, against the restriction of slavery in Missouri, 
 avowed it to be his intention to vote against the admission of 
 that State, because her constitution was repugnant to the Con 
 stitution of the United States. He made a learned and able 
 speech, in which he maintained that the clause in the Consti 
 tution which secured to the citizens of each State the privileges 
 and immunities of the citizens of the several States is " laid 
 deep in the structure of the government," " is capable of no 
 construction which does not plainly denote the universality of 
 its operation and its uniform application to individual right 
 throughout every portion of the nation." The same senti 
 ments were maintained by Mr. Hemphill of Pennsylvania 
 and Mr. Mallory of Vermont. 
 
 These views were combated by Lowndes, by Philip P. Bar- 
 bour and Archer of Virginia, and by McLane of Delaware, in 
 elaborate but specious arguments. Mr. Barbour considered 
 free persons of color as a nondescript class. In some States 
 they have some civil rights, in others none ; in some States 
 they have some political rights, in others none. Mr. Lowndes 
 said : " No federal privileges had been conferred upon that 
 degraded caste of our population, rejected as they were in every 
 State from social and political privileges, either by the protec 
 tion of law or the feelings of society." 
 
 Mr. Cook of Illinois made the point, that Congress, in con 
 sideration of military services, had granted land bounties for 
 lands in Missouri, some of which had been received by free 
 people of color. They had thus acquired a fee simple of the 
 soil. These rights even the United States could not take away 
 
158 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 or infringe ; and yet Missouri, a subordinate power, proposed 
 virtually to do that very thing. This encroachment he pro 
 nounced " both unjustifiable and unconstitutional." 
 
 The debate was brought to a close on the 13th of December, 
 and the resolution of admission was rejected by a majority 
 of fourteen. This result produced much excitement. Mr. 
 Lowndes immediately arose and said, with deep feeling : " I 
 do not wish to be disrespectful to a majority of the House ; but 
 I feel it my duty to call on them, having rejected the resolution 
 proposed by a committee of their appointment, to devise and 
 propose the means necessary to protect the Territory.", The 
 deep emotion exhibited by Mr. Lowndes, one of the ablest and 
 certainly one of the most courteous and moderate of Southern 
 statesmen, was fully shared by the representatives and people 
 of the slaveholding States, who, with like feelings, were less 
 choice and courteous in their modes of expression. 
 
 In the latter part of January Mr. Eustis of Massachusetts 
 proposed that Missouri should be admitted on condition that 
 she should expunge from her constitution the clause discrimi 
 nating against free people of color. After various motions the 
 proposition was rejected by a vote approaching unanimity. Mr. 
 Clay, who had been absent during the first weeks of the ses 
 sion, then immediately arose and gave notice that he should 
 move to take up the Senate resolution. On the 29th he made 
 the promised motion, and supported it in an earnest and pow 
 erful argument, in which he denied that there was any repug 
 nance between the clauses so often referred to in the constitu 
 tions of the United States and of Missouri. 
 
 An amendment was then offered by Mr. Foote of Connecti 
 cut, providing that Missouri should be admitted on condition 
 that she should expunge the objectionable clause. This amend 
 ment, after various motions and modifications, was rejected by 
 a decided majority. Other amendments were offered, and the 
 debate ranged over the general subjects of the evils of slavery, 
 the rights of the South, the balance of power, and the obliga 
 tions and value of the Union. When the several amendments 
 which had been offered and debated were rejected, Mr. Clay 
 moved that the Senate resolution should be referred to a select 
 
ADMISSION OF MISSOURI. 159 
 
 committee of thirteen. This motion was agreed to ; the com 
 mittee was appointed, and he was made its chairman. 
 
 The committee made an early report. Referring to the 
 conflicting views entertained by members, this report declared 
 that the committee thought it best that, without either side 
 abandoning its opinion, an endeavor should be made to frame 
 an amendment to the Senate resolution, which, without com 
 promising either, should guard and guarantee the rights of 
 both. The gist of the resolution was contained in a funda 
 mental condition and two provisos. It declared that " the 
 said State shall never pass any law preventing any description 
 of persons from going to and settling in the said State who 
 now are or may become citizens of any State of the Union ; 
 provided that the State, by solemn public act, shall declare its 
 assent to this fundamental condition, and provided that this 
 act shall not be so construed as to take from Missouri any 
 right or power exercised by any of the original States." 
 After exciting debates and various proposed amendments, the 
 resolution was brought to a vote, and rejected by eighty yeas 
 to eighty-three nays. This vote was strangely significant of 
 the state of public sentiment, and the almost even balance of 
 parties in that excited contest. Thus the report of the select 
 committee was at first rejected in the committee of the whole, 
 then accepted by the House, then rejected on the third read 
 ing, reconsidered, and then finally defeated by six majority. 
 
 During this close and desperate struggle several earnest 
 and powerful speeches were made. Among them was one by 
 Charles Pinckney. Referring to the fact that he was a mem 
 ber of the convention that framed the Constitution of the 
 United States, he avowed that " the article on which so much 
 stress is laid, and on the meaning of which the whole of the 
 question is made to turn, and which is in these words, < The 
 citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the privileges and 
 immunities in every State,' having been made by me, it is 
 supposed I must know or perfectly recollect what I meant by 
 it. In answer, I say that at the time I drew the clause of the 
 Constitution I knew that there did not then exist such a thing 
 in the Union as a black or colored citizen ; nor could I then 
 
160 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 have conceived it possible such a thing could ever have existed 
 in it ; nor do I now believe one does exist in it." In defence 
 of this explicit statement, he proceeded to define what consti 
 tuted a citizen in his own State, in which the black man was 
 certainly not so regarded. He then charged upon the North, 
 upon the New England States even, that the black man was 
 not so regarded after the abolition of slavery there. Referring 
 to the cruel laws and practices of the free States, he main 
 tained that, so far from treating free colored persons as citi 
 zens, the people of those States deemed any admixture of 
 blood or any connection with them to be a disgrace. 
 
 This second defeat of the proposition for the admission of 
 Missouri deepened and intensified the sectional feeling in 
 Congress and in the country. Mr. Brown of Kentucky sought 
 by resolution to repeal the slavery restriction embodied in the 
 Missouri Compromise of the preceding session. He made an 
 elaborate speech in support of his proposition ; but it was 
 defeated by a decisive vote. 
 
 On the 22d of February Mr. Clay made another effort to 
 secure the admission of Missouri by moving for the appoint 
 ment of a joint special committee of the two Houses to con 
 sider the subject and report what action can be taken or 
 agreed upon concerning it. After an hour's debate the mo 
 tion was agreed to, and a committee of twenty-three on the 
 part of the House was chosen by ballot. The Senate con 
 curred in the vote by a large majority, and chose seven men, 
 at the head of whom was John Holmes of Maine. The joint 
 committee reported a resolution, which its chairman, Mr. 
 Clay, considered as being the same in effect as that reported 
 by the committee of thirteen. It was very briefly considered, 
 the previous question was moved, and the bill passed by a 
 majority of six. The resolution was sent to the Senate, and 
 passed by the decided vote of twenty-eight to fourteen. Thus 
 the determined purpose, persistency, and tact of the Slave 
 Power, sustained by the active influences of the President 
 and his cabinet, again triumphed. 
 
 The legislature of Missouri promptly complied with the 
 conditions of the compromise, which required " that the 
 
ATTEMPT TO INTRODUCE SLAVERY INTO ILLINOIS. 161 
 
 fourth clause of. the twenty-sixth section of the third article of 
 the constitution submitted on the part of said State to Con 
 gress shall never be construed to authorize the passage of any 
 law, and that no law shall be passed in conformity thereto, by 
 which any citizen of either of the States in this Union shall 
 be excluded from the enjoyment of any of the privileges and 
 immunities to which such citizen is entitled under the Con 
 stitution of the United States." 
 
 Thus was closed the Missouri controversy, which had lasted 
 more than two years, and which had stirred the country to its 
 profoundest depths. The debates were earnest, able, and 
 often eloquent. Seldom has any question drawn out a debate 
 in Congress so elaborate and exhaustive. Not only were the 
 conflicting principles of freedom and slavery at issue, and the 
 interests of the two sections at stake ; but the passions, preju 
 dices, and pride of both sides were thoroughly aroused. The 
 personal and pecuniary interests of the Southern members 
 and those they represented were immediately and seriously 
 involved. The South was a unit. Her representatives were 
 therefore impelled to put forth the most strenuous efforts. In 
 that great struggle it was admitted that slavery, rather than 
 freedom, commanded the services not only of the most earnest 
 but of the most eloquent debaters of both Houses, and of 
 statesmen of the largest experience and most commanding 
 influence in the country. 
 
 During this Missouri struggle a conspiracy was formed to 
 make Illinois a slave State. Both of her Senators were 
 natives of the South, and they had pertinaciously opposed 
 the prohibition of slavery in Missouri, while her Representa 
 tive was its earnest and eloquent advocate. A majority of its 
 settlers at that time unquestionably approved of the action of 
 their Senators. 
 
 Illinois had been largely settled by emigrants from the 
 South, who carried with them their love of slavery and their 
 unreasoning prejudices against free negroes. In 1807 the 
 Territorial legislature of Indiana made it lawful for any owner 
 or possessor of any negroes or mulattoes above fifteen years 
 21 
 
162 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of age to bring them into that Territory, which then included 
 the present State of Illinois. Within thirty days he was 
 required to take such negro before the clerk of the county 
 court and enter into an agreement with the latter by which 
 he was to serve him a given number of years. If the negro 
 refused to enter into such an agreement, he was to be taken 
 back within sixty days to the place from which he came. 
 This act provided, further, that any owner or possessor of ne 
 groes under fifteen years of age was authorized to hold the 
 males till they were thirty-five, and the females until they 
 were thirty-two years of age, " to service and labor." It also 
 provided that the children born of these registered servants 
 should be held to like service, the males till they were thirty 
 years and the females till they were twenty-eight years of age. 
 When Illinois became a Territory it reaffirmed these laws. 
 By their inhuman provisions Southern masters could take their 
 slaves into this Territory, and compel them to enter into con 
 tracts to serve them a number of years, exceeding their nat 
 ural lives, or be sent back to perpetual servitude. Their 
 children under fifteen years of age and those born after enter 
 ing the Territory were also doomed to the same service for 
 a period of years. This was practically involuntary servitude, 
 and in direct violation of the ordinance of 1787. Such was 
 the public sentiment, and so great were the difficulties in the 
 way of asserting their rights, that many negroes were held in 
 a bondage as severe as any that prevailed in the Southern 
 States. 
 
 By the constitution of Illinois, adopted in 1818, suffrage was 
 limited to free white persons ; the introduction of slavery was 
 forbidden, and it was provided that no contracts should be 
 made for a longer period than one year. It provided, how 
 ever, that all preceding contracts should be valid ; but it re 
 quired that the children of such registered servants should 
 become free at the lawful age. On the admission of the State 
 the legislature had hastened to enact a code of black laws, 
 most of which were taken from the slave codes of Virginia and 
 Kentucky, from which States most of the settlers had emigrated. 
 Fines were imposed upon persons bringing negroes into the 
 
ATTEMPT TO INTRODUCE SLAVERY INTO ILLINOIS. 163 
 
 State ; and negroes found without certificates of freedom were 
 doomed to be sold into slavery for one year. Free negroes 
 were compelled to give sureties, and when convicted of any 
 petty offences, they were to be punished with stripes. These 
 degrading laws were often cruelly enforced, and for more than 
 forty years they continued to disgrace the statute-book of that 
 rising State. 
 
 After the admission of Missouri, emigrants from Virginia 
 and Kentucky, with their long trains of teams and negroes, 
 passed through nortions of the State on their way to Missouri. 
 Many of them were men of wealth and education, and as they 
 passed along with their droves of negroes, they did not fail to 
 remind the settlers and land speculators that they had been 
 excluded from purchasing their lands and settling among them 
 by the prohibition of slavery. Of course these land-owners 
 envied the good fortune of Missouri. Feeling that the pros 
 pects of Illinois had been blasted by freedom, they nursed the 
 desire to make it a slave State. This purpose was carried into 
 the election of 1822. The legislature was carried by the friends 
 of slavery, though, on account of dividing their votes between 
 two candidates, they failed to carry either of their candidates 
 for governor, and Edward Coles was elected to the guberna 
 torial chair by the friends of freedom. Mr. Coles was a native 
 of Virginia, a gentleman of culture and character, had eman 
 cipated his slaves, moved with them to Illinois in 1818, and 
 settled them upon lands which he had given them. He had 
 been private secretary of Mr. Madison, was the personal friend 
 of Mr. Jefferson, and an uncompromising emancipationist. 
 
 There were in Illinois a few French settlers holding slaves, 
 to whom, by common consent, neither the constitution of the 
 State nor the principle of the ordinance of 1787 had been 
 applied. When the legislature met, Governor Coles recom 
 mended the emancipation of these slaves. This recommen 
 dation incensed the advocates of slavery, and they sought to 
 amend the constitution. To call a convention for that purpose 
 required a two-thirds vote of both branches of the legislature, 
 ratified by a vote of the people. They had the requisite vote 
 in the Senate, but lacked one vote in the House. They had two 
 purposes, to carry the convention, and to elect a proslavery 
 
164 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 candidate for the United States Senate. There were two con 
 testants for one of the counties, one of them would vote for 
 their candidate for the Senate, but would not vote for the con 
 vention ; the other would vote for the convention, but not for the 
 candidate. They admitted the contesting member that was 
 willing to vote for their candidate for the Senate, and after 
 using his vote for that purpose expelled him from the House 
 and admitted the other. By this audacious trick and reckless 
 profligacy of principle the advocates of slavery, true to its in 
 stincts of fraud and violence, carried their point, and the call for 
 the convention was submitted to the people. Having accom 
 plished this purpose, with low-bred and indecent effrontery 
 they formed a disorderly procession, under the lead of the lieu 
 tenant-governor, several judges and a majority of the legisla 
 ture, of the rowdy elements of the capital, and " with blowing of 
 horns and beating of drums and tin pans," they marched to the 
 residence of the governor and to those of the other members in 
 sympathy with him, to insult, by their riotous demonstrations, 
 those opposed to making Illinois a slave State. But Governor 
 Coles and his friends were not to be intimidated. They were 
 rather strengthened than shaken in their purpose to exclude 
 from Illinois a system that inspired such displays of its fero 
 cious and brutalizing influence upon every one enlisted in its 
 advocacy and support. They appealed to the people not to 
 ratify the action of the legislature. Papers were established, 
 and Governor Coles, David Blackwell, Thomas Lippincott, 
 George Churchill, Morris Birkbeck, Judge Lockwood, and 
 other leading men made public addresses and prepared arti 
 cles for the press and pamphlets for circulation against the 
 suicidal policy of giving that great commonwealth to slavery. 
 The Methodist and Baptist clergy, many of whom had been 
 Southern men who had seen and experienced the evils of the 
 system, labored zealously and effectively for the same good 
 purpose. After an excited and bitter contest, of more than 
 fifteen months, the proposed convention was voted down by a 
 majority of more than two thousand. The victory was com 
 plete and final. The friends of liberty throughout the country, 
 dejected by the result of the Missouri struggle, found some com 
 pensation in the thought that Illinois had been saved to freedom. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 EAELY ANTISLAVERY MOVEMENTS. BENJAMIN LUNDY. WILLIAM 
 LLOYD GARRISON. 
 
 Aggressive and Dominating Spirit of Slavery. Elias Hicks. Antislavery in 
 Kentucky and Tennessee. Benjamin Lundy. He organizes an Antislavery 
 Society in Ohio. "Genius of Emancipation." Removed to Tennessee. 
 Established Abolition Societies in North Carolina. Meeting of the American 
 Abolition Convention. Political Action recommended. Establishes his 
 Paper in Baltimore. Visits the Eastern States. Joined by Mr. Garrison. 
 Imprisonment of Mr. Garrison, Paper removed to Washington. Establishes 
 the " National Inquirer." Removal to the West. Death. Character. 
 Mr. Garrison. Joins Mr. Lundy. Adopts the Doctrine of Immediate 
 Emancipation. Denunciation of the Slave-trade. Imprisoned in Baltimore. 
 Release through Intervention of Arthur Tappan. Denounces the Coloniza 
 tion Society. Establishes " The Liberator." Public Sentiment. Rewards 
 offered for his Arrest. His Fearlessness, Inflexibility, and Persistency. 
 
 IN the Missouri struggle freedom and slavery grappled for 
 the mastery. Freedom lost, and slavery won. Freedom be 
 came timid, hesitating, yielding ; slavery became bolder, more 
 aggressive, and more dominating. Freedom retreated from 
 one lost position to another ; slavery advanced from conquest 
 to conquest. Several years of unresisted despotism of the 
 Slave Power followed this consummation of the Missouri com 
 promise. The dark spirit of slavery swayed the policy of the 
 republic. Southern legislatures repealed the more humane 
 acts of their slave codes, revived the more severe laws of colo 
 nial legislation, and enacted statutes still more inhuman. 
 Northern States, too, were guilty of enacting similar statutory 
 provisions in the interest of oppression. The conscience of 
 the people was lulled into quiet by the new scheme of African 
 colonization. Institutions of learning, benevolence, and relig 
 ion, political organizations and public men bent in unresist 
 ing submission before this all-conquering despotism, whose 
 
166 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 aggressive advances became more resistless, as its successive 
 victories became more complete. But amid this general defec 
 tion and complete surrender there were a few who kept the 
 faith of the fathers, and firmly and bravely adhered to the 
 doctrines of human rights. Even in that dark night there 
 were Christian men who not only believed, but faithfully enun 
 ciated the creed of human fraternity, equality, and liberty ; 
 though their movements were individual and local, and their 
 appeals were unheeded by the great body of .the people. In 
 deed, there have always been witnesses for the truth ; and it has 
 been a sad aggravation of the national apostasy that it was 
 effected in spite of the earnest protests of these faithful men. 
 
 Among these witnesses were the Quakers, especially the fol 
 lowers of Elias Hicks. As early as the year 1814 he published 
 a work on African slavery. In it he maintained that the slave 
 holder had no moral right whatever to the man he styled his 
 slave, or to the products of his labor. He also enunciated the 
 incontrovertible principles that the slaveholder had no other 
 than a criminal possession of the bondman ; that he could 
 convey no right to a second person ; that the purchaser had 
 no more right than the original possessor, whose right was 
 founded on violence ; and that each holder of a slave, no 
 matter how many hands that slave may have passed through, 
 is guilty of the crime of the first perpetrator. As with the 
 leader, so with most of his followers, their opposition to 
 slavery was always earnest and unequivocal. 
 
 There was, also, a large infusion of antislavery feeling, 
 especially among the churches of Kentucky and Tennessee, 
 many of whose ministers proclaimed with great clearness and 
 force the distinctive doctrines of modern abolition. It was, 
 however, their misfortune and grief to dwell in communities 
 where the proslavery spirit was becoming increasingly in 
 tolerant and controlling in its influence on the public mind, 
 rendering their residence uncomfortable and unsafe. Ac 
 cordingly, such men as Rev. John Rankin, a native of Ten 
 nessee, with their flocks, removed to the free States across 
 the Ohio River, and there retained and insisted on the same 
 sentiments for which they were ostracized in their former 
 
BENJAMIN LUNDY. 167 
 
 homes. In New England the proportion of antislavery men 
 was much smaller, though there were some. Among them was 
 William Goodell, who in 1820 published in the Providence 
 Gazette a series of papers on the Missouri struggle, in which 
 he enunciated very clearly the primary principles of human 
 rights. He was for more than forty years connected with an 
 antislavery press. 
 
 But far the most devoted, effective, and prominent anti- 
 slavery worker of those days was Benjamin Lundy. From 
 1815 to 1830 his labors were immense, involving great per 
 sonal hardship and sacrifice, and placing him far in advance 
 of all contemporaneous or earlier Abolitionists. He was a 
 native of New Jersey, and of Quaker origin. At the age of 
 nineteen he went to Wheeling, in Western Virginia, where he 
 served an apprenticeship and worked at the trade of saddler. 
 He was evidently from the outset an earnest and thoughtful 
 man. While his companions were prone to dissipation, he 
 devoted his leisure hours to reading ; and he was also a regu 
 lar attendant on the meetings of his denomination. Wheel 
 ing being a great thoroughfare for the slave-trade, through 
 which often passed the coffles of that nefarious traffic, his 
 sympathies were largely enlisted in behalf of its helpless and 
 hopeless victims. " My heart," he said, " was deeply grieved 
 at the gross abomination. I heard the wail of the captive, I 
 felt his pang of distress, and the iron entered my soul." 
 Though he did not then and there enter upon what soon 
 became his life work, yet he unquestionably received his bap^ 
 tisin into the spirit of the great reform of which he was an 
 honored pioneer, while largely instrumental in persuading 
 others to enter upon it. 
 
 Even Mr. Garrison thus gratefully and gracefully refers to 
 his obligations to Mr. Lundy : " Now, if I have in any way, 
 however humble, done anything toward calling attention to 
 slavery, or bringing about the glorious prospect of a complete 
 jubilee in our country at no distant day, I feel that I owe 
 everything in this matter, instrumentally and under God, to 
 
 Benjamin Lundy I feel it due to the memory of one 
 
 who devoted so many years of his life so faithfully to the 
 
168 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 cause of the oppressed that I should state this reminis 
 cence." 
 
 Having married, he settled in Ohio, a few miles west of 
 Wheeling. He was prosperous in business, and happy in his 
 domestic relations ; " having," he said, " a loving wife and two 
 beautiful little daughters, that it was a real happiness to pos 
 sess and cherish." But, notwithstanding his success in busi 
 ness and the attractions of his home, he felt and yielded to the 
 higher claims of humanity. His heart was troubled at the sad 
 condition of the slaves, whose wrongs and sufferings he well 
 knew. He enjoyed, he said, no peace of mind, and came to 
 the conclusion that he must not only feel, but act for the suffer 
 ing bondmen. Calling a few friends together at his house, he 
 unbosomed his feelings. An antislavery organization, called 
 " The Union Humane Society," was formed ; which within a 
 few months contained nearly five hundred members, residing 
 in several counties in that section of the State. This society 
 was formed in 1815. He soon issued an appeal to the phi 
 lanthropists of the United States, in which he proposed that 
 societies should be formed wherever a sufficient number of 
 persons could be found to join them, with a uniform title 
 and constitution. It was also suggested that these societies 
 should correspond with each other, and co-operate in the gen 
 eral measures of their organization. 
 
 Not long afterward Mr. Charles Osborn commenced the pub 
 lication of a journal at Mt. Pleasant, Ohio, called " The Phi 
 lanthropist." For it Mr. Lundy furnished articles, and he was 
 soon invited to take an interest in the paper and superintend 
 the office. That he might be able to accept the invitation, he 
 must disencumber himself of his business, which he unsuc 
 cessfully attempted to do by taking his stock in trade to St. 
 Louis. Reaching that city in the midst of the Missouri strug 
 gle, and comprehending at a glance the nature of the question 
 at issue, he entered into the conflict with great earnestness and 
 vigor. Through the newspapers of Missouri and Illinois he 
 portrayed the evils of slavery and the wickedness of its need 
 less expansion. 
 
 Returning to Ohio, he commenced the publication of a paper 
 
BENJAMIN LUNDY. 169 
 
 whose spirit and purpose were well expressed by its name, 
 the "Genius of Universal Emancipation," a journal that 
 was destined from the start to a marked and stormy career. 
 After several months it was removed to Tennessee, where it 
 obtained quite a wide circulation, and was at that time the only 
 distinctive antislavery paper in the country. During his resi 
 dence there he visited Philadelphia for the purpose of attend 
 ing the American Convention for the Abolition of Slavery, 
 " travelling," he says, " six hundred miles on horseback in 
 midwinter, and at his own expense," a cost of time, labor, 
 and money not often, if ever, equalled by the most devoted an 
 tislavery men of later years. During this time he made the 
 acquaintance of other Abolitionists ; and, though without much 
 encouragement, concluded to remove his paper to Baltimore. 
 " Having arranged," he said, " my business in Tennessee, 
 I shouldered my knapsack, and set out for Baltimore on foot 
 in the summer of 1824." At Deep Creek, North Carolina, he 
 gave his first public lecture on slavery. He delivered fifteen 
 or twenty antislavery addresses in different parts of the State, 
 and assisted in the organization of a dozen antislavery socie 
 ties, which largely and rapidly increased, until in three years 
 they embraced some three thousand members, comprising many 
 persons of position and eminence. 
 
 Pursuing his journey through the middle of Virginia, he 
 held meetings, and effected the organization of several anti- 
 slavery societies in that State. Arriving at Baltimore, where 
 he proposed to establish his paper, he was received, he tells 
 us, even by the antislavery men, " civilly, but coolly enough." 
 They expressed strong doubts of his success, and gave him 
 very little encouragement. Still he determined to persevere, 
 and in 1824 commenced its publication. The next year he 
 visited Hayti ; but found, on his return, that his wife had died 
 during his absence, that his home was broken up, and his 
 children scattered. Collecting them, and placing them with 
 friends in whom he confided, he says : " I renewed my vows 
 to devote my energies to the cause of the slave, until the nation 
 shall be effectually roused in his behalf." With the aid of 
 a few warm friends, whose sympathy and counsel were freely 
 
170 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 given, he not only continued the publication of his paper, but 
 was successful in the organization of several societies. 
 
 Believing the question of emancipation to be a political one, 
 he took a deep interest in the presidential election of 1824, and 
 rendered effective service to the victorious party. He also 
 avowed his readiness to support the Colonization Society, " if it 
 united with its policy that great work of justice and righteous 
 ness, the total extirpation of slavery from the soil of America." 
 Avowing emancipation to be the primary object with him, he 
 could not for a moment think of joining in any colonization 
 scheme which had not that object in view. In the summer of 
 1825 he commenced a series of articles on the domestic slave- 
 trade, which greatly excited the slave-dealers of Baltimore, 
 and unquestionably was the provoking cause of the brutal as 
 sault made upon him in the streets of that city, occasioning, in 
 the end, his removal. 
 
 In the year 1826 the American Convention for the Aboli 
 tion of Slavery was holden in Baltimore, through his in 
 fluence ; in which were represented, directly and indirectly, 
 eighty-one societies, seventy-three being located in slaveh old- 
 ing States. There were at that time about one hundred and 
 forty antislavery societies in the country, of which one hun 
 dred and six were in the Southern States. About the same 
 time Mr. Lundy issued an address to the Abolitionists, main 
 taining that the most expedient course to be pursued was to 
 " go straight forward with firmness and resolution in the road 
 we have already begun to travel, neither turning to the right 
 hand nor to the left, until we reach the glorious mansion where 
 justice sits crowned with mercy, and where men esteem their 
 fellow-men as brethren. For my own part," he said, " I never 
 calculate how soon the cause of rational liberty will triumph 
 over that of cruelty and despotism in the country." Though 
 these were his sentiments of uncalculating devotion, and he 
 was regardless of personal consequences and secondary con 
 siderations, it is evident, from some recorded remarks of his, a 
 few months later, on the rapid growth of antislavery sentiment 
 and societies during the twenty preceding years, that, like most 
 of the early Abolitionists, he calculated on a far easier and ear- 
 
BENJAMIN LUNDY. 171 
 
 lier triumph than the nation was destined to witness. They 
 saw and felt the wickedness of slavery ; but they did not, as 
 they could not, comprehend how firmly it was embedded in the 
 very foundation of the civil, industrial, social, and ecclesias 
 tical institutions of the country, or estimate aright the tenacity 
 of its hold on life. 
 
 Mr. Lundy, however, clearly comprehended and fully ac 
 knowledged the necessity and the duty of political action. In 
 commenting, in the summer of 1827, on the resolution of a 
 county antislavery society in Ohio, that its members would 
 support no persons for office who were not opposed to slavery, 
 and who would not use all lawful means to remedy the evil by 
 the most speedy and efficient measures, he declared that, if the 
 friends of genuine republicanism would act upon that princi 
 ple, a change for the better would soon be witnessed. He held 
 it to be a grand mistake that the people of the free States had 
 nothing to do with slaves. " They guarantee," he said, " the 
 oppression of the colored man in this country. Let them wash 
 their hands of the crime ; there is blood on every finger." 
 Later he said : " I now fearlessly and boldly assert that the 
 subject of slavery is no State-rights matter, but that all the 
 citizens in this republic are interested in its extinction, and, if 
 ever we abolish it, the influence and government of the United 
 States must effect it." Still later, in 1837, he said : " The 
 question of abolishing slavery, when it shall be acted on, must 
 be settled at the ballot." Thus clearly defined and lucidly ex 
 pressed were his views of the evil and its remedy. The dis 
 cussions of thirty years did not materially enlarge or improve 
 the argument. 
 
 In May, 1828, Mr. Lundy made a journey to the Eastern 
 States. At New York he formed the acquaintance of Arthur 
 Tappan. At Providence he met William Goodell, of whom, 
 considering the latter's subsequent career, he has left the sin 
 gular record : " I endeavored to arouse him, but he was at that 
 time slow of speech on that subject." At Boston he said he 
 could hear of no Abolitionists resident in the place. In the 
 house where he boarded he met Mr. Garrison, whom he wished 
 to find, but who had not then turned his attention particularly 
 
172 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 to the subject, though he had noticed favorably his paper in 
 " The National Philanthropist," a temperance journal he was 
 then editing. He found in him a congenial spirit, most wel 
 come in the surrounding apathy. Honestly inquiring and 
 receptive, he not only responded favorably to his appeals, but 
 rendered present aid in procuring subscribers and getting up 
 meetings. Mr. Lundy also visited the clergy and called a 
 meeting, at which eight were present, to whom he unfolded his 
 plans. Most assented, at least, did not oppose, except 
 ing one, whom he challenged to public debate. His chal 
 lenge, however, was not accepted. He also visited New Hamp 
 shire, Maine, Connecticut, and New York. During this tour 
 of five months he travelled hundreds of miles, often on foot, 
 and delivered forty-three public addresses ; " scattering," he 
 said, " the seed of antislavery in strong and luxuriant soil," 
 although it " was then the very winter of philanthropy." 
 
 Returning to Baltimore, he attended, as delegate from 
 Maryland, the American Convention for the Abolition of Slav 
 ery. At this meeting it was resolved that the Convention 
 should thereafter be permanently held in the city of Wash 
 ington. One was held in the winter of 1829. But that was 
 the last, notwithstanding this resolution, of a series of con 
 ventions inaugurated in 1794 ; so little did the antislavery men 
 of those days understand the strength of the foe or their 
 own weakness. But while others faltered, Mr. Lundy did 
 not, though he felt the need of help. He remembered his 
 visit to Boston, and his interview with Mr. Garrison ; and he 
 longed to have him for a coadjutor in this unequal strife. 
 Accordingly, in the autumn of 1828, he visited New England, 
 to persuade him, if possible, to join him in the editorial man 
 agement of the " Genius." Mr. Garrison was then editing a 
 paper in Vermont, and he thus describes Mr. Lundy' s visit : 
 " He had taken his staff in hand and travelled all the way to 
 the Green Mountains. He came to lay it on my conscience 
 and my soul that I should join him in this work of seeking the 
 abolition of slavery. And he so presented the case, with the 
 growing disposition I had to take up the cause, that I said to 
 him : ' I will join you as soon as my engagement ends here ; 
 and then we will see what can be done.' " 
 
BENJAMIN LUNDY. 173 
 
 In the summer of the following year Mr. Garrison, on Mr. 
 Lundy's return from Hayti, fulfilled his promise, and became 
 one of the editors of the paper, though the two were not in 
 full accord in all their sentiments. But they were both honest 
 and earnest, and their aims were one. Elizabeth Margaret 
 Chandler was also engaged as an assistant, and the paper was 
 changed from a monthly to a weekly journal, and was vigor 
 ously conducted in the interests of temperance, emancipation, 
 and peace. Miss Chandler saon issued an appeal to the ladies 
 of the United States, urging them to enlist in the cause of 
 emancipation, and to form female antislavery societies, like 
 those in Great Britain. 
 
 At about the same time Mr. Lundy announced through his 
 columns, that the American government was attempting a 
 negotiation with Mexico for the purchase of Texas. With 
 his usual practical sagacity, assuming that all such attempted 
 negotiations were made for the support of slavery, he sounded 
 the alarm and began an opposition which he never remitted. 
 Nor was he content with this general protest; he soon pro 
 ceeded, at the cost of much personal sacrifice, exposure, and 
 danger, to visit and travel once and again over large portions 
 of that country and of Mexico, often in disguise. By this 
 personal inspection, made in the general behalf of the slave 
 and escaped fugitives, he became familiar with the whole 
 Texan plot, so that the information gained was of great ser 
 vice to John Quincy Adams and others during the annexation 
 struggle, even then casting its baleful shadows before. 
 
 The connection between Mr. Lundy and Mr. Garrison was 
 not, however, productive of all the good the former had fondly 
 anticipated. The growing exasperation of the slaveholding 
 portion of the city at any interference with the system was 
 greatly intensified and brought to a crisis by the severe attacks 
 of Mr. Garrison upon the domestic slave-traffic in general, and 
 upon the conduct of a New England master of a vessel, in 
 particular, in taking a cargo of slaves to the New Orleans 
 market. A prosecution, trial, conviction, and imprisonment 
 were the result, rendering a dissolution of their partnership 
 inevitable. Another circumstance had unquestionably added 
 
174 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 fuel to the flame already burning fiercely. A colored man, in 
 Boston, by the name of Walker, had published a pamphlet, 
 which was freely condemned by Mr. Lundy, in which, arraign 
 ing with terrible and merciless severity the slave-masters for 
 their wrongs inflicted on the poor bondmen, and breathing a 
 most vindictive spirit, he counselled the colored race to take 
 vengeance into their own hands. 
 
 Consequently, when Mr. Garrison had been driven from the 
 city, the same spirit of persecution followed Mr. Lundy. The 
 governor required him to give bail, libel suits and threatened 
 imprisonment lowered, and personal outrage and violence in 
 the streets rendered longer residence unsafe. He was finally 
 compelled to succumb and remove his paper to Washington. 
 Through his influence, while in that city, an antislavery society 
 was formed ; and a memorial, signed by more than a thousand 
 citizens of the District of Columbia, was presented to Congress 
 for the abolition of slavery and the slave-trade. 
 
 His paper failing for want of patronage, he started another 
 in 1886, in Philadelphia, called the " National Inquirer." Re 
 tiring from this in 1838, and being succeeded by John G. Whit- 
 tier, who changed the name to " The Pennsylvania Freeman," 
 he proposed to go West, and resume the publication of the 
 " Genius" in some town in the great valley. Having gathered 
 up his little store of earthly possessions, he deposited them 
 in the new Pennsylvania Hall, which, with his deposit, was 
 burned by the mob in the spring of 1838. Nothing daunted 
 or disheartened by what lie termed this " total sacrifice on 
 the altar of universal emancipation," saying, " they have not 
 yet got my conscience, they have not taken my heart," he still 
 persisted in his purpose of going West. After many disap 
 pointments, he succeeded in getting out a few numbers ; but, 
 for lack of funds and help, it could not be said to have been 
 established. But the good man's work was finished. He was 
 attacked with the fever of the country, and, after a brief illness, 
 died on the 23d of August, 1839, in the fifty-first year of his 
 age. 
 
 Thus passed away in the prime of his manhood and in the 
 full maturity of his powers one of the most humane, unselfish, 
 
BENJAMIN LUNDY. 175 
 
 laborious, and persistent of men. There have been abler men, 
 men rendering greater service ; but few have possessed more 
 largeness of heart, more uncalculating self-abnegation, or have 
 filled up the measure of their lives with more self-sacrificing 
 labors for the good of others. From the year 1820 to 1830 
 he states that he travelled twenty-five thousand miles, five 
 thousand on foot ; that he visited nineteen States, made two 
 voyages to Hayti, and delivered more than two hundred public 
 addresses. Nor were the last nine years of his life less replete 
 with like achievements. During those years, in addition to 
 his other abundant labors, he made several tours to Canada, 
 Texas, and Mexico, in the earnest, but vain search after shel 
 ter and relief for the lowly ones who could not find protection 
 in their native land. Indeed, as richly did he merit, as he on 
 whom it was bestowed, as his service was more laborious, 
 more protracted, and more widely extended, the splendid 
 eulogium of Burke on the philanthropist Howard : " His was 
 a voyage of discovery, a circumnavigation of charity." 
 
 And this service was rendered under circumstances well 
 calculated to try his temper and test his strength of principle ; 
 for not only did he perform those journeyings often on foot 
 and always without the modern appliances of travel, but most 
 of his multitudinous labors were performed without the stimu 
 lus of success or the cheering words of sympathy and encour 
 agement. His pilgrimage from Maryland to Vermont, " staff 
 in hand," for the simple chance of enlisting a co-laborer was 
 sadly significant. He was called to lead the " forlorn hope " 
 of a desperate cause against opposing foes increasing in num 
 bers and flushed with recent victories. And not only that, but 
 he was compelled to witness the manifest decadence of the 
 spirit of liberty in the government, and of resistance to the 
 demands of slavery among the masses of his countrymen. 
 
 Twenty-three years of such labor, under such circumstances, 
 are not often paralleled even in the annals of Christian mis 
 sions and reforms. Well does his biographer, Mr. Thomas 
 Earle, say of him : u Having resolved, twenty-three years 
 before his decease, to devote his energies to the relief of the 
 Buffering slave and the oppressed man of color, he persevered 
 
176 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 to the end, undeterred by difficulties and undismayed by dan 
 gers, undiscouraged by disappointments and unsubdued by 
 sacrifices. Alone, often on foot, he encountered fatigue, hun 
 ger, and exposure, the frosts and snows of winter, the rains and 
 scorching sun of summer, the contagion of pestilence and the 
 miasmatic effluvia of insalubrious regions, ever pressing on 
 ward toward the attainment of the great object to which he 
 had dedicated his existence." 
 
 In the great conflict between freedom and slavery in America 
 many names became historic, a few illustrious. No person is 
 more inseparably associated with that struggle than William 
 Lloyd Garrison. Men have differed, do and will differ, in their 
 estimate of his distinctive doctrines and modes of action, and 
 of his influence on the final result ; but he will ever be asso 
 ciated in their memories with the conflict which emancipated 
 one race and broke the power of another. 
 
 Born at Newburyport, Massachusetts, December 12, 1804, 
 Mr. Garrison learned the art of printing, and commenced his 
 editorial career at twenty-one years of age. He was first con 
 nected with the " Free Press," in his native town ; next with 
 the " National Philanthropist," a temperance paper, published 
 in Boston ; then with the " Journal of the Times," at Benning- 
 ton, Yermont ; then with the " Genius of Universal Emanci 
 pation," at Baltimore ; and finally, with " The Liberator," 
 which he established in Boston, January 1, 1831, and of 
 which he was the editor during the thirty-five years of its ex 
 istence. During these forty years of continuous editorial ser 
 vice he evinced singular personal independence, rare moral 
 courage, and an uncompromising fidelity to his convictions and 
 to the claims of humanity. 
 
 While at Boston, in the spring of 1828, he became acquainted 
 with Benjamin Lundy, then on his first tour to the Eastern 
 States in the service of the slave. He there listened to the 
 cogent reasonings and was moved by the tender appeals of 
 that singularly disinterested and tireless champion, who had 
 consecrated his life to the cause of his oppressed countrymen, 
 and ever gratefully acknowledged these obligations. 
 
 When, in 1828, Mr. Garrison assumed the editorial control 
 
WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 177 
 
 of the " Journal of the Times," at Bennington, Vermont, he 
 announced in his editorial address that the paper would be in 
 dependent in the broadest and stoutest signification of the 
 term ; that it should be trammelled by no interest, biassed by no 
 sect, awed by no power. He distinctly avowed that he had 
 three objects in view, which he should pursue through life, 
 whether in that place or elsewhere ; and those three objects were 
 " the suppression of intemperance and its associate vices, the 
 gradual emancipation of every slave in the Republic, and the 
 perpetuity of national peace." He pledged himself that what 
 might be wanting in vigor should be made up in zeal. This 
 independence and this avowal elicited from Mr. Lundy, who 
 had sought to secure Mr. Garrison's services for his " Genius of 
 Universal Emancipation," the warmest commendations, because 
 he had shown " a laudable disposition to advocate the claims 
 of the poor, distressed African upon our sympathy and justice." 
 And he declared, if he continued to advocate the cause of the 
 unfortunate negro, that " his talents will render him a most 
 valuable coadjutor in this holy undertaking." 
 
 Mr. Garrison continued his connection with the " Journal of 
 the Times " for several months ; but in the latter part of the 
 summer of 1829 he became associated with Mr. Lundy in the 
 editorship of his paper, in Baltimore. In this new field he was 
 brought into more immediate contact with slavery ; and yet 
 his utterances were no less decided and strong, still proclaim 
 ing his unrelenting hostility to slavery, intemperance, and war. 
 Although at first he had looked with favor on the colonization 
 scheme, as " an auxiliary to abolition " deserving encourage 
 ment, yet utterly inadequate alone, a short residence at Balti 
 more, and a fuller acquaintance with the spirit and purposes 
 of its advocates, soon led him to discard and denounce it, and 
 from that time onward to become one of its most uncompro 
 mising foes. On the subject of slavery he claimed that slaves 
 were entitled to complete and immediate emancipation ; that 
 expediency had no place in the consideration of questions of 
 simple right ; that, even if the question of expediency were 
 admitted into the discussion, it remained true that the sooner 
 the chains were broken the wiser the act ; and that, if the idea 
 
 23 
 
178 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of removing the slaves from the country were not visionary, as 
 he contended it was, all colored people born on the soil had the 
 right to remain, and none had the right to compel their removal. 
 
 The sinfulness of slavery and the duty of immediate eman 
 cipation had been often proclaimed before, at least, in sub 
 stance, if not in the precise phraseology of the new formula. 
 Edwards, Hopkins, and Emmons, of the last century, as Wes 
 ley before them, who had condensed his estimate of the sys 
 tem into that burning and oft-repeated sentence, " Slavery is 
 the sum of all villanies," had stated, as strongly as language 
 could express the thought, the essential wrongfulness of the 
 system, and the duty of immediate repentance, with the conse 
 quent fruits meet for repentance. Rev. John Rankin, whose 
 name is honorably associated with the earlier antislavery efforts 
 of the present century, was a native of Tennessee ; and he tes 
 tifies that in his " boyhood " a majority of the people of East 
 ern Tennessee, though not of the State, were Abolitionists. In 
 Kentucky, where he was first settled in the ministry, he says : 
 " We had our abolition societies, auxiliary to a State society 
 then existing." He spoke openly against the " sin " of slav 
 ery, while the people of his church showed the sincerity of 
 their opposition by leaving the State almost as a body, because 
 of the increasing proslavery spirit of the people therein. At 
 an anniversary meeting of the American Antislavery Society 
 at New York, he declared that he himself and the antislavery 
 societies of the South believed and avowed the doctrine of im 
 mediate emancipation. 
 
 In Ohio the antislavery sentiment was not only decided, but 
 active. Indeed, several years before the formation of the 
 American Antislavery Society the Chilicothe Presbytery made 
 strenuous efforts to purge the Presbyterian Church of the sin 
 of slavery. The Cincinnati Synod, on motion of Dr. Samuel 
 Crothers, unanimously " resolved that the holding of slaves 
 for gain is heinous sin and scandal." In 1825 Elizabeth Hey- 
 rick, of England, a member of the Society of Friends, had pub 
 lished a pamphlet, entitled, " Immediate, not Gradual Emanci 
 pation," which was somewhat in advance of the general 
 sentiment of the British people, though they were not long in 
 
WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 179 
 
 arriving at the same conclusion. It is stated, however, by 
 Oliver Johnson, who had it on the highest authority, that Mr. 
 Garrison had not seen the work before he wrought out the 
 same sentiment in his own mind, basing his conclusion on 
 the two-fold grounds of " moral duty and logical necessity." 
 There can be no doubt that the new circumstances in which 
 Mr. Garrison found himself, with the sad and revolting scenes 
 which were daily enacted before his eyes in a slaveholding com 
 munity, and in a slave-mart like Baltimore, quickened both 
 mind and heart, and hastened convictions to which he soon ar 
 rived, and which, when reached, he was not slow to enunci 
 ate in language unequivocal and strong. For not only was 
 slavery there, with its ordinary incidents of " wrong and out 
 rage," but Baltimore was then, next to Richmond, the great 
 Northern slave-mart of the Border States. It was the slave- 
 trader's exchange, where was the slave-prison and where could 
 be witnessed the revolting atrocities of the auction-block and 
 the saddening exhibitions of the coffle and the slave-ship, with 
 their heart-breaking partings, their apprehensions, and their 
 despairing dread of impending evils. In a community where 
 such scenes were common, and among a people accustomed to 
 them and acquiescent in them, Mr. Garrison was not long in 
 tracing the logic of the system, and in detecting the real ten 
 dency of colonization, and the empty pretensions of those who 
 advocated it as a^ means of removing the evils of the system 
 of oppression. 
 
 The subject, however, which more 'particularly stirred his 
 soul and fired his indignation, and which called forth his fier 
 cest anathemas, was the interstate slave-trade. In the prose 
 cution of this general traffic an incident and illustration soon 
 occurred which especially excited his feelings, and called forth 
 his sternest rebukes and his most objurgatory language. The 
 captain of a vessel owned by Francis Todd, of his own native 
 town of Newburyport, took, with the owner's consent, a cargo 
 of slaves for the New Orleans market. In consequence of the 
 severity of his rebuke and his unmeasured words of condem 
 nation, both a civil and criminal suit were instituted against 
 Mr. Garrison. Tried by a proslavery court and jury, he was, 
 
180 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of course, convicted, and his sentence embraced both im 
 prisonment and fine. 
 
 The knowledge of this, and the great wrong done to an 
 American citizen simply for language employed only in be 
 half of freedom and against oppression, excited a good deal of 
 feeling, as it became known, among the philanthropists of the 
 time. The case was brought by Mr. Lundy to the notice of 
 that munificent as well as earnest friend of the slave, Arthur 
 Tappan of New York, who at once paid the fine ; so that, after 
 an incarceration of seven weeks, Mr. Garrison was set free. 
 It is said that Henry Clay was on the point of doing the same 
 thing, through the earnest solicitation of John G. Whittier, who 
 represented to him that Mr. Garrison had been an earnest and 
 effective advocate of the election of John Quincy Adams. 
 This action of the agents of slavery completed the work already 
 far advanced, and made Mr. Garrison ever afterward an un 
 compromising, if not a bitter foe, not only to slavery, but to 
 everything that interposed itself between hin^and the object 
 of his unconquerable aversion and determined hostility. Noth 
 ing was too high or too low, nothing was too strong or too sa 
 cred, to escape his fierce denunciations. No iconoclast ever 
 dashed down more remorselessly the idols of popular regard. 
 The oath of eternal hostility to Rome which the youthful Han 
 nibal was made to swear was not more sacredly kept than was 
 the vow of the young reformer, as he went forth from that Bal 
 timore prison, against that power which held millions of his 
 countrymen in chains,* and which would silence free speech 
 and destroy the liberty of the press. 
 
 Imprisonment neither intimidated nor silenced him. From 
 that Baltimore jail he sent forth a letter in which he ar 
 raigned the law and the arbitrary conduct of the court. " Is 
 it," he asked, " supposed by Judge Brice that his frowns can 
 intimidate me, or his sentence stifle my voice on the subject of 
 oppression ? He does not know me. So long as a good Provi 
 dence gives me strength and intellect, I will not cease to de 
 clare that the existence of slavery in this country is a foul 
 reproach to the American name ; nor will I hesitate to pro 
 claim the guilt of kidnappers, slavery abettors, or slave-owners, 
 
WILLIAM LLOYD GAERISON. 181 
 
 wherever they may reside, or however high they may be 
 exalted. I am only in the alphabet of my task ; time shall 
 perfect a useful work. It is my shame that I have done so 
 little for the people of color ; yea, before God, I feel humbled 
 that my feelings are so cold and my language so weak. A 
 free white victim must be sacrificed to open the eyes of the 
 nation, and to show the tyranny of our laws. I expect, and 
 am willing to be persecuted, imprisoned, and bound for ad 
 vocating the rights of my colored countrymen ; and I should 
 deserve to be a slave myself if I shrank from that danger." 
 
 This violent individual demonstration was, however, but 
 significant of the general feeling and policy toward this anti- 
 slavery sheet and its heroic conductors. Nor did the persecu 
 tions, slanders, and libel suits which they prompted fail of 
 their purpose. Former friends timidly shrunk from the fierce 
 conflict, and withheld both their moral and pecuniary support ; 
 and even these earnest and brave men were compelled so far 
 to succumb to the popular pressure as to dissolve their partner 
 ship, and the paper was changed from a weekly to a monthly 
 journal. But, though not agreed in all things, they parted 
 with " the kindliest feelings and mutual personal regard." 
 Mr. Lundy declared that Mr. Garrison " had proven himself a 
 faithful and able coadjutor in the great and holy cause"; and 
 the latter, in separating from his philanthropic friend, ex 
 pressed the hope that " we shall ever remain one in spirit 
 and purpose." 
 
 After his liberation from prison, in June, 1830, Mr. Garri 
 son proceeded North, delivering a course of antislavery lec 
 tures in Philadelphia, New York, New Haven, Hartford, Bos 
 ton, Charlestown, and other cities and towns of New England. 
 In these lectures he maintained the sinfulness of slavery, and 
 the duty of immediate and unconditional emancipation. The 
 colonization scheme, which had obtained a strong hold upon 
 the confidence and support of the churches and the benevolent 
 people of the North, was sternly arraigned, and the designs of 
 its originators were declared to be hostile to the free people of 
 color in the slaveholding States. Earnest appeals were made, 
 especially to members of Christian churches, to engage at 
 
182 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 once in the work of immediate and unconditional emancipa 
 tion, which was proclaimed to be the duty of the people and 
 the right of the slave. But these views were far in advance 
 of the prevailing sentiments of even most of the members of 
 the churches ; and although some gladly accepted them, the 
 many were either hostile or indifferent. It was often with dif 
 ficulty, therefore, that churches .were opened for his addresses, 
 and sometimes they were positively refused. 
 
 In the month of August he issued proposals for the publica 
 tion of a journal, to be called " The Liberator," in the city of 
 Washington. The proposition, though hailed with favor by a 
 few persons in different sections of the country, was " palsied 
 by public indifference." The persecutions against Mr. Lundy 
 had also been so great in Baltimore that he had been com 
 pelled to remove the " Genius of Universal Emancipation " to 
 the seat of the Federal government, thus rendering the estab 
 lishment of " The Liberator " there less necessary. 
 
 But there was another reason for changing the place of the 
 publication of the proposed journal. This reason is given by 
 Mr. Garrison in his first number, which was published in 
 Boston, in January, 1831 : 
 
 " During my recent tour," he says, " for the purpose of 
 exciting the minds of the people by a series of discourses on 
 the subject of slavery, every place that I visited gave fresh 
 evidence of the fact 'that a greater revolution in public senti 
 ment was to be effected in the free States, and particularly in 
 New England, than at the South. I found contempt more bit 
 ter, detraction more relentless, prejudice more stubborn, and 
 apathy more frozen than among slave- owners themselves. Of 
 course, there were individual exceptions to the contrary. 
 This state of things afflicted, but did not dishearten me. I 
 determined at every hazard to lift up the standard of emanci 
 pation in the eyes of the nation, within sight of Bunker Hill, 
 and in the birthplace of Liberty. That standard is now un 
 furled ; and long may it float, unhurt by the spoliations of 
 time or the missiles of a desperate foe, yea, till every chain 
 be broken and every bondman set free ! Let Southern op 
 pressors tremble, let their secret abettors tremble, let 
 
WILLIAM LLOYD GARKISON. 183 
 
 their Northern apologists tremble, let all the enemies of 
 the persecuted blacks tremble ! " 
 
 In establishing " The Liberator," Mr. Garrison announced 
 that he should not array himself as the political partisan of 
 any man, and that, in defending the great cause of human 
 rights, he wished " to derive the assistance of all religions and 
 of all parties." 
 
 Many persons, however, who had become deeply interested 
 in Mr. Garrison's addresses in the summer and autumn 
 deemed his language too vituperative, denunciatory, and se 
 vere. Some of his earliest and most intimate friends, who 
 earnestly desired the success of his cause, had often remon 
 strated with him. In his salutatory address, referring to 
 these remonstrances, he said : 
 
 " I am aware that many object to the severity of my lan 
 guage ; but is there not cause for severity ? I will be as harsh 
 as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. On this subject 
 I do not wish to think or speak or write with moderation. 
 No ! No ! Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a 
 moderate alarm ; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from 
 the hands of the ravisher ; tell the mother to gradually extri 
 cate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen ; but urge 
 me not to use moderation in a cause like the present. I 
 am in earnest, I will not equivocate, I will not excuse, 
 I will not retreat a single inch, AND I WILL BE HEARD. 
 The apathy of the people is enough to make every statue 
 leap from its pedestal, and to hasten the resurrection of the 
 dead ! " 
 
 To those who questioned the wisdom of his course, he 
 replied : 
 
 " It is pretended that I am retarding the cause of emanci 
 pation by the coarseness of my invective and the precipitancy 
 of my measures. The charge is not true. On this question 
 my influence, humble as it is, is felt at this moment to a con 
 siderable extent, and shall be felt in coming years, not perni 
 ciously, but beneficially, not as a curse, but as a blessing ; 
 and posterity will bear testimony that I was right. I desire 
 to thank God that he enables me to disregard ' the fear of man 
 
184 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 that bringeth a snare,' and to speak his truth in its simplicity 
 and power." 
 
 He closed with the vow to oppose and thwart the brutalizing 
 sway of oppression, 
 
 " till Afric's chains 
 Are burst, and freedom rules the rescued land." 
 
 Mr. Garrison's partner in the publication of " The Libera 
 tor " was Mr. Isaac Knapp, a printer, like himself, and also a 
 native of the same town. The paper was commenced without 
 funds and without a single subscriber. Bearing the compre 
 hensive and cosmopolitan motto, " My country is the world, 
 my countrymen are all mankind," it appealed to no party, sect, 
 or interest for recognition and support. Both editor and prin 
 ter labored hard and fared meagrely ; and it was only thus 
 and a marvel it was at that that their journal lived. 
 But Mr. Garrison had a mission to fulfil, and he bravely 
 met the conditions it imposed. For, whatever may be the 
 estimate of his policy, and whatever may have been his 
 mistakes, none can withhold the meed of admiration at the 
 moral courage and faith he exhibited as he entered upon his 
 life's work. Hardly grander were their exhibition when Kep 
 ler was working out his problem of the solar system, willing 
 to " wait a century for a reader " ; when Columbus was travel 
 ling through Europe, from court to court, from philosopher to 
 prince, in the vain search for a convert to his new theory of a 
 western passage to the Indies ; or even when Luther was nail 
 ing his theses to the door of the church, and thus braving the 
 thunders of the Vatican, than when that young man with 
 no advantages of birth or culture, with wounds still bleeding 
 from his recent encounter with the dark and bloody tyrant, in 
 his dingy room of sixteen feet square, at once his sanctum, 
 workshop, and home made assault upon a despotism which 
 not only trampled millions of slaves in the dust, but domi 
 nated the whole country, binding both church and state in 
 chains, and there forged his weapons of warfare from the 
 indestructible materials of God's Word and the Declaration 
 of Independence. It must have been something more than 
 " the grace of indignation " which urged him on, which 
 
WILLIAM LLOYD GAREISON. 185 
 
 crowned him with the honors of imprisonment, gave him the 
 garland of a rope, the escort of a mob of Boston's " respecta 
 bility and standing," and extorted such honorable mention by 
 Southern governors and legislatures as can now be gathered 
 from their records. 
 
 It was not that Mr. Garrison discovered any new^ truths, or 
 that he stood alone, which gave him his prominence from the 
 start. The sinfulness of slaveholding and the duty of its 
 immediate relinquishment had been as unequivocally pro 
 claimed by others, and there were those then in the field as 
 decided and pronounced as he. It must have arisen partly, 
 at least, from the peculiar state of public opinion at that time. 
 After the crowning triumph of the Slave Power in the Missouri 
 Compromise, and in the sectional victory of the South, by the 
 defeat of Mr. Adams and the election of General Jackson, 
 there seemed to be a general acquiescence on the part of the 
 people in these triumphs, and a growing disposition to remit 
 further antislavery effort. 
 
 The nation had reached its nadir ; for, though there were 
 subsequently other aggressions, more flagrant outrages, and 
 new concessions and compromises, yet never after that was 
 the nation so voiceless and timid. Cowed and silent before 
 the domineering Power, with the number of protestants grow 
 ing fewer and feebler, the very boldness and seeming audacity 
 of the young man in his attic, telling the nation that he was 
 in earnest and would be heard, aroused attention. The very 
 deliberation with which he heralded and began the assault, the 
 stern defiance he bade the foe at whose feet he threw the 
 gauntlet of mortal combat, made him the mark for criticism 
 and hostile demonstration, as well as the rallying point of 
 those who sympathized with him in spirit and in purpose. His 
 impartiality, too, between sects and parties, men and schools, 
 constitutions and laws, and whatever arrayed itself against the 
 slave or remained neutral, increased that attention and criti 
 cism. 
 
 His pen, if possible, was more severe, caustic, and exasper 
 ating than had been his speech. While friends generally 
 doubted and questioned, and the people condemned, the 
 
 24 
 
186 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 slaveholders were stung to madness. Before the close of the 
 first year, the Vigilance Association of Columbia, South Caro 
 lina, " composed of gentlemen of the first respectability," 
 offered a reward of fifteen hundred dollars for the apprehen 
 sion and conviction of any white person detected in circulat 
 ing in that State " the newspaper called 4 The Liberator.' " 
 The corporation of Georgetown, in the District of Columbia, 
 passed an ordinance rendering it penal for any free person of 
 color to take from the posi>ofnce " the paper published in 
 Boston called ' The Liberator,' " the punishment for each of 
 fence to be twenty dollars' fine or thirty days' imprisonment. 
 In case the offender was not able to pay the fine, or the fees 
 for imprisonment, he was to be sold into slavery for four 
 months. The grand jury of Raleigh, North Carolina, at the 
 instigation of the attorney-general, made an indictment 
 against the editor and publisher of " The Liberator " for its 
 circulation in that county. The legislature of Georgia pro 
 ceeded to pass an act, which was promptly signed by Gover 
 nor Lumpkin, offering a reward of five thousand dollars for 
 the arrest, prosecution, and trial to conviction, under the laws 
 of the State, of the editor or publisher "of a certain paper 
 called < The Liberator,' published in the town of Boston and 
 State of Massachusetts." 
 
 But neither the doubts of friends, the condemnation of the 
 North, nor the threats and offered rewards of the South, moved 
 Mr. Garrison from his purpose. He bade defiance to his per 
 secutors, and avowed his readiness to die, if need be. He 
 stood, he says, " like the oak, like the Alps, unshaken, 
 storm-proof. Opposition and abuse and slander and preju 
 dice and judicial tyranny add to the flame of my zeal. I am 
 not discouraged ; I am not dismayed ; but bolder and more 
 confident than ever." 
 
 Nor is there any doubt that .his voice and pen were among 
 the most potent influences that produced the antislavery revi 
 val of that day. Antislavery societies were formed, antislav 
 ery presses were established, and antislavery lectures abounded. 
 Nine years after the establishment of " The Liberator " there 
 were nearly two thousand antislavery societies, with a mem- 
 
WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 187 
 
 bership of some two hundred thousand. This result, however, 
 was not secured without agitation, controversy, and strife. 
 Nor were these all outside of the societies. Within them 
 were discords and dissensions, growing out of the nature 
 of their work and the character of their members. For 
 the latter were generally, and almost of necessity, persons of 
 positive convictions and self-assertion, engaged in a work of 
 appalling magnitude and beset with unanticipated difficulties. 
 Especially true was this of those who gathered around Mr. 
 Garrison, adopted and defended his views, and recognized him 
 as their leader. Embracing many men, and especially women, 
 of talent, culture, and eloquence, they were a small, compact, 
 aggressive, and somewhat destructive body, who, with marked 
 characteristics and occasional idiosnycrasies, yet seemed to be 
 swayed by a common impulse, and to be committed not only 
 to a common object, but to the pursuit of that object by modes 
 peculiarly their own. 
 
 In pursuance of their object, they avowed the purpose of 
 granting quarter to nothing which, in their apprehension, 
 interposed itself between them and that object. Not finding 
 that hearty co-operation and ready acquiescence in their utter 
 ances and modes of action in church or state which they 
 desired or hoped for, but oftener hostility and persecution, 
 they soon arrayed themselves in antagonism to the leading 
 influences of both. And so, singularly enough, they presented 
 what appeared to their countrymen the practical solecism of 
 endeavoring to reform the government by renouncing all con 
 nection with it ; of seeking to remove a political evil by refus 
 ing all association with political parties, by whose action alone 
 that evil could be reached ; of depending alone on moral sua 
 sion, and an appeal to the consciences of the people, and yet 
 coming out of all the religious associations and assemblies of 
 the land. This arraying themselves against the patriotism, 
 the partisanship, and the religious sentiment of the great body 
 of the people prevented harmonious co-operation, and rendered 
 inevitable, sooner or later, a disruption of the national society. 
 In that separation, which took place in 1840, but a small part 
 remained with Mr. Garrison, probably not more than one 
 
188 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 fifth of the members of the antislavery societies then exist 
 ing ; and these were confined mainly to New England, and 
 mostly to Eastern Massachusetts. Nor did their numbers 
 increase during the conflicts of the subsequent twenty years. 
 Indeed, it is doubtful whether, in 1860, when Mr. Lincoln was 
 elected by a vote of nearly two millions, on a clearly defined 
 and distinct issue with the Slave Power, there were more 
 Abolitionists of that school than there were twenty years 
 before, when the American Antislavery Society was rent in 
 twain. During all this period, however, they acted, as they 
 professed, " without concealment and without compromise." 
 Whatever may be the estimate of the weight of their influence 
 on public opinion, none will ever doubt the sincerity of their 
 convictions, the purity of their motives, the boldness of their 
 utterances, or the inflexibility of their purposes. 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE VIRGINIA CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION. SOUTHAMPTON IN 
 SURRECTION. SLAVERY DEBATE IN THE LEGISLATURE. 
 
 Constitutional Convention. Struggle between Eastern and Western Virginia. 
 Slaveholding Interest Successful. Southampton Insurrection. Nat 
 Turner. Message of Governor Floyd. Kesolution of Mr. Summers. De 
 bate on Slavery. Proposition of Thomas Jefferson Randolph. Mr. Goode's 
 Motion to discharge the Committee. Report of the Committee. Mr. Pres 
 ton's Amendment. Speeches of Mr. Moore, Mr. Boiling, Mr. Randolph, 
 Mr. Rives, Mr. Brodnax, Mr. Daniel, Mr. Faulkner, Mr. Knox, Mr. Sum 
 mers, Mr. McDowell. The " Richmond Inquirer." Reaction in the State. 
 
 THE utterances of slaveholders in the Virginia convention of 
 1829-30, and in her legislature of 1831-32, were suggestive 
 of far more than their immediate intent. They revealed, in 
 language as strong and unequivocal as any ever used by Aboli 
 tionists, so freely charged with extravagance arid exaggeration, 
 the evils and appalling dangers of slavery. They revealed, 
 too, both the sense of insecurity and alarm which pervaded 
 society, and the desperation of a growing class determined to 
 cling to the evil, however great, and to risk the consequences, 
 however serious. 
 
 The convention was called for the revision of its constitution. 
 Ex-Presidents Madison and Monroe, Chief Justice Marshall, 
 and several eminent statesmen, were members. For years 
 much dissatisfaction had existed in the western section of 
 the State, where there were comparatively few slaves, with 
 the basis of representation, which gave political power to a 
 minority of the white people in the tide-water and eastern por 
 tions of the State. This minority, largely composed of slave 
 holders, was strong in talent, in wealth, and in social position. 
 
 The members from Western and Middle Virginia proposed 
 to base representation on white population alone. The com- 
 
190 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 mittee on the legislative department of the constitution, by a 
 vote of thirteen to eleven, reported in favor of the white basis 
 for the House, but by an equally divided vote rejected the prop 
 osition to adopt it for the Senate. An earnest and excited 
 struggle commenced, and continued through several weeks. 
 A proposition to base the Senate on federal numbers and the 
 House on white population was also defeated by a similar vote. 
 An arbitrary apportionment was finally adopted, and the repre 
 sentatives of the " old families," who were the special guar 
 dians of the siaveholding section, triumphed over those who 
 had, at the opening of the convention, cherished high hopes of 
 wresting political power from them. And so here, as was gen 
 erally the case everywhere, in the conflicts between the sup 
 porters and opposers of the Slave Power, the latter were over 
 borne. 
 
 In the month of August, 1831, the people of Virginia were 
 startled by the Southampton insurrection. Its leader was Nat 
 Turner, then a slave about thirty-one years of age. From 
 childhood he seemed to have been the victim of superstition 
 and fanaticism, and to have grown up in the belief that he was 
 destined to accomplish some great purpose. Austere in life 
 and manners, he impressed upon his personal associates the 
 conviction that he was a prophet of the Lord, and that he was 
 guided by Divine inspiration. In his confession he said: "On 
 the 12th of May, 1828, I heard a loud noise in the heavens, 
 and the spirit instantly appeared to me and said, ' The ser 
 pent was loosened, and Christ had laid down the yoke he had 
 borne for tlie sins of men, and that I should take it on and 
 fight against the serpent, for the time was fast approaching 
 when the first should be last and the last should be first, and 
 by signs in the heavens that it would make known to me when 
 I should commence the great work, and until the first sign 
 should appear I should conceal it from the knowledge of men.' ' 
 On the appearance of the sign, which was to be the eclipse of 
 the sun in February, 1831, he was to arise and slay his enemies. 
 He states that immediately on the appearance of that sign the 
 seal was removed from his lips, and he communicated the great 
 work he had to do to his associates. The 4th of July was fixed 
 
THE SOUTHAMPTON INSURRECTION. 191 
 
 upon as the day for rising, but his mind was so affected by the 
 magnitude of the undertaking that he fell sick, and that time 
 passed. " The sign appeared again," he said, and he then de 
 termined to wait no longer. The insurrection commenced on 
 the night of the 21st of August by the massacre of his master, 
 Mr. Joseph Travis, and his family. He and his associates had 
 agreed that until they could arm and equip themselves and 
 could raise a sufficient force, neither age nor sex should be 
 spared ; and this policy was invariably pursued. They pro 
 ceeded from house to house, massacring the whites, until their 
 numbers were increased to more than fifty, all mounted and 
 armed with guns and swords, axes and clubs. But the country 
 was soon aroused, and they were met, fired upon, and dis 
 persed. Deserted by his associates, Turner, after concealing 
 himself for several weeks, was discovered, tried, and executed 
 in November of that year. In this insurrection sixty-one white 
 persons and more than a hundred slaves were killed or exe 
 cuted. The excitement in Virginia and throughout the South 
 was intense. The " Richmond Whig " declared that another 
 such insurrection would be followed by putting the whole black 
 race to the sword. Portions of the community were thrown 
 into panic, and the thrilling cry of the affrighted people, in 
 peril of their lives and imploring protection, day after day filled 
 the ears of the governor of that great commonwealth. 
 
 The legislature met early in December. In his message 
 Governor Floyd called its attention to the Southampton insur 
 rection. He stated that a " banditti of slaves," not exceeding 
 at any time seventy in number, rose upon the defenceless in 
 habitants, and, under circumstances of the most " shocking 
 and horrid barbarity," put to death sixty-one persons. He 
 commended the promptitude and despatch with which the offi 
 cers and militia had performed their duty, as also the cheerful 
 alacrity of the people. He commended, too, the officers, sol 
 diers, and sailors of the United States army and navy for their 
 prompt and efficient action. Asserting that there was reason 
 to believe that the spirit of insurrection was not confined to 
 the slaves, he declared that there was too much cause for the 
 suspicion that the plans of " treason, insurrection, and mur- 
 
192 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 der " had been " designed and matured by unrestrained 
 fanatics in some of the neighboring States." Asserting, too, 
 that the most active among themselves in stirring up " the spirit 
 of revolt " were the negro preachers, he expressed the con 
 viction that the public good required that they should be 
 silenced. He urged a revision of the laws intended to pre 
 serve " in due subordination " the slave population, and sug 
 gested the idea that it would be indispensably necessary to re 
 move the free people of color from the State. 
 
 So much of the governor's message as related to the insur 
 rection was referred to a committee. Mr. Summers of Western 
 Virginia submitted a resolution, calling on the governor to lay 
 before the legislature a copy of the correspondence between 
 Governor Monroe and President Jefferson, in 1801, upon the 
 subject of obtaining lands beyond the limits of the State, to 
 which free persons of color might be removed. Petitions were 
 presented, signed by slaveholders, praying the, legislature for 
 the removal of free negroes. Among these petitions was one 
 from the Society of Friends, suggesting that legislative meas 
 ures might be taken for the emancipation of slaves, and for 
 their removal from the State. On the question of the refer 
 ence of this petition to a special committee, a debate of great ear 
 nestness and significance arose. Mr. Roane, who had presented 
 it, made a temperate argument in favor of its reception and 
 reference. Mr. Moore said that the free negro population was 
 a nuisance which the interests of the people required to be re 
 moved. But there was, he said, " another and greater nuisance, 
 slavery itself." He avowed that he was not one of those 
 fanatics, always crying out against the horrors of slavery, but 
 he thought it should now be considered by the legislature 
 and by the people themselves. The reference of the petition 
 to the committee was advocated by Mr. Brodnax, its chairman. 
 The hearing of the petition, he said, did not imply that any legis 
 lation would be recommended for the emancipation of slaves ; 
 but he was opposed to allowing the nations to believe that " the 
 State of Virginia was not willing even to think of an ultimate 
 delivery from the greatest curse that God in his wrath ever 
 inflicted upon a people." He emphatically declared that when 
 
SLAVERY DEBATE IN THE VIRGINIA LEGISLATURE. 193 
 
 men were forced to lock their doors at night, and open them in 
 the morning to receive their servants to light their fires, with 
 pistols in their hands, surely some measures to restore confi 
 dence and security were necessary. Under such circumstances 
 " life became a burden, and it were better to seek a home in 
 some distant realm, and leave the graves of their fathers, than 
 endure so precarious a condition." " Is there a man," he 
 asked, " in Virginia who does not lament that there ever was 
 a slave in the State ? And is there a man who considers the 
 decay of our prosperity, and the retrograde movement of this 
 once flourishing commonwealth, who does not attribute this 
 to the pregnant cause of slavery ? " 
 
 Mr. Boiling avowed himself in favor of considering the peti 
 tion. " We talk of freedom," he said, " while slavery exists 
 in the land, and speak with horror of the tyranny of the Turk ; 
 but we foster an evil which the best interests of the commun 
 ity require should be removed, which was deemed the bane of 
 our happiness by the fathers of the commonwealth, and to 
 which we trace the cause of the depression of Eastern Virginia. 
 Every intelligent individual admits that slavery is the most 
 pernicious of all the evils with which the body politic can be 
 afflicted. By none is this position denied, if we except the 
 erratic John Randolph, who goes about like a troubled spirit, 
 malignantly assaulting every individual against whom his 
 spleen is excited." 
 
 Mr. Chandler expressed his desire for the removal of the 
 free blacks, and for a plan that might remove, at some future 
 time, " the greatest curse that has ever been inflicted upon 
 this State." He declared that he should look upon the day on 
 which " the deliverance of the Commonwealth from the bur 
 dens of slavery should be consummated as the most glorious 
 in the annals of Virginia." William C. Rives was opposed 
 to any plan of emancipation, because its agitation at that 
 time would be " injudicious, if not perilous." The rejection 
 of this petition of the Quakers was moved by Mr. Goode ; 
 but his motion was rejected by a vote of more than three to 
 one, and its reference to the special committee was carried. 
 
 A day or two afterwards Mr. Goode, who assumed the 
 
 25 
 
194 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 championship of the slaveholders, rose and asked the select 
 committee what progress had been made, and when it intended 
 to report. To this question the chairman replied that it was 
 vigorously pursuing its investigation, and he hoped to report 
 in a few days. Mr. Goode then said that he believed the 
 course that had been taken would be productive of danger 
 ous consequences ; and he gave notice that he should, the next 
 day, submit a resolution that would save the committee from 
 further investigation. In accordance with this notice he in 
 troduced a resolution to discharge the committee, declaring 
 that it was not expedient to legislate further on the subject 
 of emancipation. 
 
 Thomas Jefferson Randolph, a grandson of Mr. Jefferson, 
 moved to amend the resolution so as to instruct the committee 
 to inquire into the expediency of submitting to a vote of the 
 qualified electors the proposition of providing by law that the 
 children of female slaves, born after the 4th of July, 1840, 
 should become the property of the commonwealth, the males 
 at the age of twenty-one, the females at the age of eighteen ; 
 then to be hired out until a sufficient sum be realized to defray 
 the expense of their removal beyond the limits of the United 
 States. But even this moderate proposition was resisted by 
 Mr. Goode, who declared that the continuance of the discus 
 sion would prolong the anxieties of the citizens, and excite 
 hopes in the colored population which must be disappointed. 
 While Mr. Goode's resolution to discharge the committee was 
 under consideration, the committee reported that it was inexpe 
 dient for the legislature to make any enactments for the aboli 
 tion of slavery, and the question of its disposition was at once 
 made the subject of discussion. Mr. Newton was in favor of 
 laying the report of the committee on the table, and of taking 
 up Mr. Randolph's amendment, which he denounced as a mon 
 strous proposition that struck at the foundation of republican 
 government. The motion to lay upon the table was then re 
 jected, and Mr. Preston, afterward Secretary of the Navy 
 under President Taylor, moved, as an amendment to the 
 report, to strike out the word " inexpedient " and insert the 
 word " expedient." 
 
SLAVERY DEBATE IN THE VIRGINIA LEGISLATURE. 195 
 
 Then commenced an elaborate and exhaustive debate, which 
 continued without limitation or restriction for several weeks. 
 It was one of the ablest, most eloquent, and brilliant de 
 bates that ever took place in the legislature of any of the 
 States. Most of those who participated in it were young and 
 rising men, who afterward achieved high positions and com 
 manding influence. Many of them then clearly saw and vivid 
 ly set forth the terrible evils which slavery had wrought, and 
 the appalling difficulties and dangers that beset them. Yet, 
 clearly as they saw them and vividly as they portrayed them, 
 they not only failed to comprehend their full import, but they 
 entirely failed in marking out the way of escape, and in devis 
 ing the means for their extrication. 
 
 Mr. Moore said that the apostle might as well have closed 
 his eyes upon the light which shone from heaven, or have 
 turned a deaf ear to the voice from on high, as for the legis 
 lature to stifle the spirit of inquiry as to the best means of 
 freeing Yirginia from the curse of slavery, " the severest 
 calamity that has ever befallen any portion of the human race." 
 Among the many evils he pointed out and forcibly portrayed 
 was " its irresistible tendency to undermine and destroy every 
 thing like virtue and morality in the community." Assert 
 ing that ignorance was the inseparable companion of slavery, 
 he declared it to be the purpose of the master to see that 
 " the ignorance of his slaves shall be as profound as pos 
 sible." Maintaining that this ignorance rendered the slave 
 incapable of deciding between right and wrong, he affirmed 
 that he was never actuated by those inspiring and enno 
 bling motives that prompt the free to praiseworthy deeds ; 
 and that he was habituated from his infancy to sacrifice 
 truth without remorse, to escape the punishment too apt to 
 be inflicted. He averred that the impulses of passion were 
 never restrained in him by the dread of infamy and dis 
 grace. Referring to the declining prosperity of Yirginia, he 
 said that the State below tide-water wore " an appearance of 
 almost utter desolation, distressing to the beholder" ; that " tall 
 and thick forests of pine, everywhere to be seen encroaching 
 upon the once cultivated fields, cast a deep gloom over the 
 
196 K18E AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 land, which looked as if nature mourned over the misfortunes 
 of man." Maintaining that it was due to their character as a 
 magnanimous people not to withhold from their negroes rights 
 they had declared to be the common property of the human 
 race, he would make a determined effort to free their Common 
 wealth of this element of disgrace and danger. He declared 
 that it mattered not whether oppression was exercised over 
 few individuals or over millions ; that " the autocrat of Russia 
 was no more deserving of the name of tyrant for having sent 
 his hordes to plant the blood-stained banner of despotism upon 
 the walls of Warsaw, amid the ruins of all that was dear 
 to freemen, than was the petty tyrant in any other quarter 
 of the globe, who is equally regardless of the acknowledged 
 rights of man." 
 
 Mr. Boiling declared that the advocates of slavery, while 
 " drunk with prejudice," claimed to be sober, and sought to 
 crown all its opponents with opprobrious epithets. He averred 
 that slavery was " a great and appalling evil, a blighting and 
 withering curse upon this land." " Many a brave man," he 
 said, " who would face without shrinking the terrible array of 
 battle, and with a fearless heart spur upon the cannon's 
 mouth, has felt his blood in icy currents flow back upon its 
 source, from the chilling, the fearful thought, that when he 
 should return to the home he had left he should be greeted, 
 not with the smile of joy and of welcome, but by the mangled 
 corses of his butchered family." He described the desolation 
 that " met and fatigued the eye " in portions of Virginia lying 
 below the mountains, and affirmed that there was no point to 
 which they could turn where the great evil did not stare them 
 in the face ; and that it was a bone of contention between East 
 ern and Western Virginia, between the slaveholding and non- 
 slaveholding States. 
 
 Briefly supporting his amendment, Mr. Randolph maintained 
 that it was the dark, the appalling, and the despairing future 
 that had awakened the public mind, rather than the South 
 ampton insurrection. He asked whether silence would restore 
 the death-like apathy of the negro's mind. It might be wise 
 to let it sleep in its torpor ; but " has not," he asked, " its dark 
 
SLAVERY DEBATE IN THE VIRGINIA LEGISLATURE. 197 
 
 chaos been illumined ? Does it not move and feel and think ? 
 The hour of the eradication of the evil is advancing, it must 
 come. Whether it is effected by the energy of our own minds, 
 or by the bloody scenes of Southampton and San Domingo, is 
 a tale for future history." 
 
 Speaking for slavery, Mr. Gholson deprecated discussion, 
 deeming it fraught with incalculable mischief. " We," he said, 
 " debate it, the press debates it, everybody debates it ; and all 
 this is done as if the slaves around us had neither eyes nor ears." 
 Maintaining, however, that discussion could now no longer be 
 avoided, he called upon gentlemen who regarded Mr. Ran 
 dolph's proposition as " monstrous and unconstitutional " to 
 " meet it publicly, publicly to discuss it, publicly to expose 
 it, and publicly to reject it." He thought his constituents 
 would be filled with wonder at the light which illumined the 
 present age, and with mortification at their present ignorance. 
 They really believe, he said, that slaves are property, and that 
 they belong to their masters. This opinion had been im 
 pressed upon their minds at quite a tender age ; and in spite 
 of the new lights, they believed that " by the Constitution of 
 the United States and the laws of Virginia slaves were prop 
 erty, which dying men might bequeath, and living men might 
 convey by deeds." His constituents had always considered 
 that " the owner of land had a reasonable right to its annual 
 profits, the owner of orchards to their annual fruits, the 
 owner of brood mares to their products, and the owner of 
 female slaves to their increase." 
 
 He said that the wretched and misguided fanatic who led 
 the Southampton massacre thought he saw the light of the 
 age, but all his light and all his inspiration were shrouded in 
 the darkness of the grave. He said that northern lights had 
 appeared, and incendiary publications had cast their illuminat 
 ing rays among them, to conduct the slave to massacre and 
 bloodshed. He thought gentlemen who had drawn gloomy 
 pictures of the poverty and thriftless agriculture of Virginia 
 were better poets than planters, and that there was more happi 
 ness and less misery among the slaves of Virginia than among 
 the laboring poor of Europe or the servants of the North. He 
 
198 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 thought other Southern States would not applaud the rash and 
 precipitate conduct of Virginia. They were engaged, he said, 
 in a rash and intemperate debate. " With the indiscretion of 
 children we are playing with torches and firebrands, either 
 regardless or forgetful that magazines are under and around 
 
 us Should it be the pleasure of this body in an evil 
 
 hour to connect with its history the adoption of this unjust, 
 partial, tyrannical, and monstrous measure, permit me in the 
 presence of my country to offer a prayer to Heaven, that the 
 recording angel, as he writes it down, may drop a tear upon it 
 and blot it out forever." 
 
 Mr. Rives said that he saw no occasion for excitement, and 
 trusted as the debate progressed there would be found nothing 
 to arouse or alarm. He thought the Southampton insurrection 
 had brought nothing new to the minds of the people of Virginia, 
 as it was but an earlier and more melancholy realization of 
 their apprehensions. While he was not filled with apprehen 
 sions and alarms, he thought it was the part of wisdom to look 
 ahead, and the duty of public men to scent out and ward off 
 danger, however remote. 
 
 Mr. Brodnax addressed the House at great length. He 
 thought the spirit of the age would not tolerate suppression, 
 that slavery was the subject of grave consideration in all parts 
 of the country, and that " the people all over the world are 
 thinking about it, speaking about it, and writing about it." 
 Although he maintained that slavery was " a mildew which 
 has blighted every region it has touched, from the foundation 
 of the world," he made the strange and preposterous affirma 
 tion that he was opposed to any system of emancipation 
 which interfered with private property, affected its value, or 
 took a single slave from his master without his consent. De 
 nouncing the moderate plan of emancipation proposed by Mr. 
 Randolph as monstrous in its features and principles, he de 
 clared that owners of that kind of property would not and 
 ought not to submit to such a law ; that they would hurl from 
 their stations their unfaithful representatives, who had con 
 tributed to bring such injustice upon them ; and if their suc 
 cessors could effect no repeal, the people would burst into 
 
SLAVERY DEBATE IN THE VIRGINIA LEGISLATURE. 199 
 
 atoms the bonds that united Virginia in one political com 
 munity. 
 
 " In listening," said Mr. Powell, "to an unrestrained dis 
 cussion upon a subject on which we are accustomed to breathe 
 our opinions with the lowest whisper, I feel that I am in a 
 dream. But a short time ago the bare utterance of senti 
 ments now listened to with the most profound attention 
 would have been responded to by a simultaneous murmur of 
 disapprobation." He warned the House that when the slaves 
 should have become more enlightened and the love of freedom 
 should have sprung up in their bosoms, that the tragic scenes 
 of Southampton might become a common occurrence, and in 
 those convulsions and struggles their history might be written 
 in characters of blood. Mr. Daniel remarked that it was an 
 age of change and revolution, the fruitful period of conven 
 tions and speeches, but he had never expected to see the legis 
 lature of Virginia gravely debating the question whether or 
 not the slaves they had inherited from their fathers were 
 property. 
 
 Mr. Faulkner, Minister to France at the opening of the 
 rebellion, addressed the House in favor of the gradual extinc 
 tion of slavery. He said he was no enthusiast, no fanatic ; he 
 went for no agrarian laws, no confiscation of property, no wild 
 and chimerical schemes of abolition. But he went for such 
 practical measures, sanctioned by the most illustrious names 
 that adorned the annals of Virginia, as would rescue the 
 State from the appalling catastrophe which in time must 
 befall it. 
 
 He referred to the statements made by those opposed to 
 emancipation, calculated to prejudice the public mind. " Our 
 propositions," he said, " have been denounced as monstrous, 
 novel, violent, and extraordinary. We have been represented 
 as sounding a war-cry of insurrection, and as endangering the 
 tranquillity of this State by rash and violent schemes of legisla 
 tion." He gloried in the privilege of participating in proceed 
 ings tending to help forward a revolution so grand and patri 
 otic in its results. " If slavery," he said, " can be eradicated, 
 in God's name let us get rid of it. If it cannot, let that melan- 
 
200 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 choly fact be distinctly ascertained, and let those who, we have 
 been told, are now awaiting with painful solicitude the result 
 of your determinations, pack up their household goods and 
 find among the luxuriant forests and prairies of the West that 
 security and repose which their native land does not afford." 
 
 He referred to a remark of a sagacious politician on the 
 evening when the first debate sprung up on the presentation of 
 the Quaker petition. " Why do you gentlemen from the West," 
 he asked, " suffer yourselves to be fanned into such a tempest 
 of passion when the subject of slavery is introduced into the 
 House ? The time will come, and before long, when there will 
 be no diversity of feeling or interest among us on that point, 
 when we shall all equally represent a slaveholding inter 
 est." " It is," said Mr. Faulkner, " to arrest any such possi 
 ble consequences to my country that I one of the humblest, 
 but not the least determined, of the Western delegation have 
 raised my voice for emancipation. Tax our lands, vilify our 
 country, carry the sword of extermination through our now 
 defenceless villages, but spare us, I implore you, spare us 
 the curse of slavery, that bitterest drop from the chalice of 
 the destroying angel." 
 
 " Slavery," he said, " it is admitted, is an evil ; it is an 
 institution which presses heavily against the best interests of 
 the State. It banishes free white labor ; it exterminates the 
 mechanic, the artisan, the manufacturer. It deprives them 
 of occupation ; it converts the energy of a community into 
 indolence, its power into imbecility, its efficiency into weak 
 ness. Sir, being thus injurious, have we not a right to demand 
 its extermination ? Shall society suffer that the landholder 
 may continue to gather his virgintial crop of human flesh ? 
 What is his mere pecuniary claim compared with the great 
 interests of the common weal ? Must the country languish, 
 droop, die, that the slaveholder may flourish ? Shall all 
 interests be subservient to one, all rights subordinate to 
 slaveholding ? Has not the mechanic, have not the middle 
 classes their rights, rights incompatible with the existence 
 of slavery ? " 
 
 He expressed his gratification that no gentleman had arisen 
 
SLAVERY DEBATE IN THE VIRGINIA LEGISLATURE. 201 
 
 in that hall as the avowed advocate of slavery, and declared 
 that the day had gone by when such a voice could be listened 
 to with patience, or even forbearance. He regretted, too, that 
 any had entered the lists of discussion as its apologists, except 
 on the ground of uncontrollable necessity. If there was any 
 one who believed in the harmless character of slavery, he 
 requested him to compare the condition of that commonwealth, 
 barren, desolate, and seared as it were by the avenging hand 
 of Heaven, with the descriptions of the same country by 
 those who first broke its virgin soil. To what is this ascrib- 
 able ? Alone to the withering and blasting effects of slav 
 ery. He avowed himself opposed to any plan of emancipa 
 tion which was not mild, gradual, and prospective in its opera 
 tion. Delicate and difficult as was the subject, he would 
 still preach it. " Our security," he added, " requires it. In 
 the language of the wise and prophetic Jefferson, you must 
 approach it, you must hear it, you must adopt some plan of 
 emancipation, or worse will follow." 
 
 Mr. Marshall proposed such an amendment to the Constitu 
 tion of the United States as would give the power to Congress 
 to appropriate money to aid the States. He would, by timely 
 precautions, endeavor to " avert that portentous cloud which 
 Iready blackens the horizon, and which threatens at some 
 iture day to pour its fury on our heads." He thought the 
 abolition of slavery was not desirable on account of the condi- 
 ion of the slave ; " but it is ruinous to the whites, retards 
 improvement, roots out an industrious population, banishes the 
 yeomanry of the country, deprives the spinner, the weaver, 
 the smith, the shoemaker, the carpenter, of employment and 
 support. This evil admits of no remedy. It is increasing, 
 and will continue to increase, until the whole State will be 
 inundated with one black wave covering her whole extent, 
 with a few white faces here and there floating on the sur 
 face." 
 
 Mr. Roane owned slaves, and valued them as highly as Mr, 
 Gholson valued his women and children, which he had asserted 
 were as much his property as his brood mares. ' He declared 
 that he would never interfere with the just rights of property, 
 
202 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 but lie was in favor of action, because delay brought danger, 
 and he would not " halt and boggle and falter " while the 
 country was " groaning and travailing and suffocating under 
 the heaviest and blackest curse that ever afflicted freemen." 
 
 Mr. Wood was opposed to touching the question of abolition, 
 and he saw nothing in the Southampton insurrection calculated 
 to inspire alarm or create distrust. He said if Virginia had 
 been settled by the Puritans her condition might have been 
 better without slavery, but the early settlers of Virginia were 
 English gentlemen, who came there not to devote themselves 
 to lives of labor and self-denial, but for the purpose of enjoy 
 ing the luxuries of the table, furnished alike by the forests and 
 the waters. " The people of Virginia," he said, " did not vex 
 themselves with the harassing cares of commerce, nor were 
 they reduced to the necessity of labor. They devoted them 
 selves to social intercourse, to the cultivation of elegant litera 
 ture and fine oratory. In these they excelled, not only any 
 race in this Union, but perhaps in the world." 
 
 These words of the boastful Virginian breathe a spirit and 
 convey a sentiment which were not only common at the South, 
 but more or less admitted and acquiesced in at the North. The 
 chivalry, generosity, refinement, and culture of Southerners 
 were always claimed and often urged as at least some compen 
 sation for their servile system, and for their other less worthy 
 qualities. But the facts never justified such pretensions. In 
 literature their authors were few, and at best of inferior rank ; 
 while the meagreness of their contributions to science, letters, 
 and the arts has been generally conceded. From their pre 
 tensions to superior generosity and refinement the war tore off 
 the mask, and revealed the fact that all such assumptions were 
 shams, or, at best, most glaringly superficial. 
 
 Mr. Preston, who had moved to amend the resolution of the 
 committee so that it would declare that it was " expedient " to 
 act, spoke eloquently in support of the position he had as 
 sumed. He admitted that for two hundred years the thoughts, 
 words, and acts of Virginia had been suppressed, that their 
 mouths had been closed, and that all investigations in relation 
 to slavery had been stifled. He thanked God that the spell 
 
SLAVEKY DEBATE IN THE VIRGINIA LEGISLATURE. 203 
 
 was broken, that the scales had fallen from their eyes, and that 
 he was at liberty to speak every opinion he entertained. He 
 admitted that no emancipation could take place then, or in the 
 future, without an infringement upon the rights of property, 
 if those rights were, as was assumed, " superior to all law, and 
 above all necessity." He said unhesitatingly that if the 
 slaves were white men he should rejoice in a revolution, as it 
 was their color and difference of race which made such an idea 
 appalling. Referring to the declaration of Mr. Gholson that 
 much of the wealth of Eastern Virginia was in the increase of 
 their slaves, he exclaimed : " In the name of God, has it come 
 to this ? Does the wealth and the beauty and the chivalry 
 of Virginia derive its support and owe its existence to the in 
 crease of slaves ? " 
 
 The policy of emancipation was denounced by Mr. Knox, 
 and he declared that it was susceptible of demonstration, that 
 to slavery, as it existed in Virginia, they might " trace the high 
 and elevated character which she has heretofore sustained " ; 
 and he expressed the opinion that " its continued existence is 
 indispensably requisite, in order to preserve the forms of- a re 
 publican government." 
 
 Mr. Summers of Western Virginia made a very able speech 
 against slavery west of the Blue Ridge. He thought, if that 
 section of Virginia were a separate and independent State, she 
 would annihilate slavery at a blow. " We do not," he said, 
 " desire that the hardy and independent tenantry of our coun 
 try should be made to give way to those who have no other 
 rule than to work as little and waste as much as they can, 
 whose only impulse is fear, and whose only interest is to avoid 
 the punishment of their employers. We cannot desire to see 
 our mountains blackened with the slave, or that the fresh grass 
 of our valley should wither beneath his tread." He would not 
 advert to the great principles of eternal justice, that regarded 
 with equal beneficence all persons, without distinction of color 
 or condition ; but he wished to better their own condition, 
 " to arrest the desolating scourge of our country, to save from 
 after ages the accumulated ills of a then hopeless and reme 
 diless disease." He maintained that men, to remain slaves, 
 
204 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 must remain ignorant ; that necessity had placed on the stat 
 ute-books of Virginia " laws to close every avenue of knowl 
 edge to the wretched negro, to extinguish that little spark that 
 glimmers in his bosom, and which ages of degradation have 
 not wholly destroyed." The antiquary in his researches, he 
 feared, would not understand the necessity which justified them 
 " in attempting to annihilate the mind of a portion of our race, 
 and to withdraw from them the knowledge of their own im 
 mortality and destiny beyond the grave. The love of lib 
 erty could not be eradicated by oppression. It was a scintil 
 lation struck from the eternal rock of being, and could be ex 
 tinguished only in the tomb." He closed with expressing the 
 hope that by emancipation they should save their posterity from 
 the wretched inheritance and calamity of slavery, receive the 
 smile of Heaven and the blessing of their children's children, 
 and that after time would trace the origin of American abolition 
 to that debate. 
 
 Mr. Burr denied the sinfulness of slavery ; said that there 
 were more than forty millions of slaves at the beginning of 
 the Christian era, and that Christ saw them in their wretched 
 ness, and, although he came into the world to rebuke sin, he 
 did not condemn slaveholding. He reminded the representa 
 tives of Western Virginia that the dark wave of slavery which 
 haunted their imaginations had been rolling for centuries 
 against the mountains, and yet had " only cast a little spray 
 beyo'nd. The foot of the negro delights not in the dew of the 
 mountain grass. He is the child of the sandy desert. The 
 burning sun gives him life and vigor, and his step is most 
 joyous on the arid plains." 
 
 Of this system, thus declared not to be " sinful," Mr. Berry 
 said that it was a cancer on the body politic, as certain, steady, 
 and fatal in its progress as any cancer on the physical system, 
 Of the slaves he said that they had as far as possible closed 
 " every avenue by which light might enter their minds," and 
 that they had to go only one step farther " to extinguish the 
 capacity to see the light," to reduce them to the level of the 
 beasts of the field ; and, he added, " I am not certain that we 
 would not do it if we could find out the necessary process, and 
 

 SLAVEEY DEBATE IN THE VIKGINIA LEGISLATUEE. 205 
 
 that under the plea of necessity." He predicted that the 
 slaves would yet assert their liberty, and that " a death-strug 
 gle must come between the two classes, in which one or the 
 other will be extinguished forever." This " death-struggle," 
 of which the eloquent Virginian spoke, was his form of charac 
 terizing the " irrepressible conflict." It did come in less than 
 one generation, though not in the form here shadowed forth. 
 In it, however, the slave system, and not one of the contestant 
 classes, went down. 
 
 But the most eloquent and effective speech of this great de 
 bate was made by James McDowell, afterward governor of the 
 State and a representative in Congress. It was a masterly 
 portrayal of the ruin and demoralization wrought by slavery 
 in his native State. Its wonderful and almost magical effect 
 upon the convention is a matter of tradition in Virginia to this 
 day. In describing the panic and terror wrought by the South 
 ampton insurrection, and in reply to a member who had char 
 acterized it as a petty affair, he declared that it drove families 
 from their homes, assembled women and children in crowds, in 
 every condition of weakness and infirmity, and every suffering 
 that want and terror could inflict, to escape the terrible dread 
 of domestic assassination. " Was that," he asked, " a ' petty 
 affair,' which erected a peaceful and confiding portion of the 
 State into a military camp ; which outlawed from pity the un 
 fortunate beings whose brothers had offended ; which barred 
 every door, penetrated every bosom with fear or suspicion ; 
 which so banished every sense of security from every man's 
 dwelling, that, let but a hoof or horn break upon the silence 
 of the night, and an aching throb would be driven to the heart ? 
 The husband would look to his weapon, and the mother would 
 shudder, and weep upon her cradle ! Was it the fear of Nat 
 Turner and his deluded, drunken handful of followers, which 
 produced such effects ? Was it this that induced distant coun 
 ties, where the very name of Southampton was strange, to arm 
 and equip for a struggle ? No, sir, it was the suspicion eter 
 nally attached to the slave himself, a suspicion that a Nat 
 Turner might be in every family, that the same bloody deed 
 might be acted over at any time and in any place, that the 
 
206 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 materials for it were spread through the land, and were always 
 ready for a like explosion." 
 
 Not only is there the testimony of the great debate, but the 
 press of the State was equally pronounced in its assertion of 
 the evils and dangers of their system of slavery. The " Rich 
 mond Inquirer," the leading paper of the State and of the 
 whole South, said on the 7th of January, 1832 : " It is proba 
 ble, from what we hear, that the committee on the colored popu 
 lation will report some plan for getting rid of the free people 
 of color. But is that all that can be done? Are we to forever 
 suffer the greatest evil that can scourge our land, not only to 
 remain, but to increase in its dimensions ? ' We may shut our 
 eyes and avert our faces if we will,' writes an eloquent South- 
 Carolinian, returning from the North a few weeks ago, i but 
 then it is the dark and growing evil at our doors ; and meet 
 the question we must at no distant day. God only knows what 
 it is the part of wise men to do on this momentous and appall 
 ing subject. But something ought to be done. Means, sure 
 but gradual, systematic but discreet, ought to be adopted for 
 reducing this mass of evil which is pressing upon the South, 
 and which will press upon her the more heavily the longer it 
 is put off. We ought not to shut our eyes nor avert our faces. 
 And although we speak almost without hope that the commit 
 tee or the legislature will do anything at the present session to 
 meet the question, yet we say now, in the utmost sincerity of 
 our hearts, that our wisest men cannot give too much of their 
 attention to this subject, nor can they give it too soon.' ' 
 
 Seldom, if ever, have the evils of slavery been more graphi 
 cally, not to say terrifically, portrayed, than in this remark 
 able debate and discussion. These men spoke and wrote of 
 what they knew. They described dangers and difficulties not 
 at a distance, but at home, in which they were involved, and 
 before which they trembled. None can read their words, even 
 at this day, without feelings of sympathy and pity at their help 
 less and almost hopeless condition. For through the whole 
 debate, even in the remarks of the most earnest and advanced, 
 there was manifested an inability to grapple successfully with 
 a system, not only enshrined in their laws, but inwrought into 
 their whole social life. 
 
SLAVERY DEBATE IN THE VIRGINIA LEGISLATURE. 207 
 
 This movement, however, though begun under auspices so 
 favorable and betokening success, and though thus ably sus 
 tained in the halls of debate and by the press, came to nothing. 
 Looking to ultimate emancipation and expatriation, however 
 remote and gradual, it alarmed the slaveholding aristocracy 
 which had so long ruled Virginia, and which at once took the 
 alarm. Discussion, sternly frowned upon, ceased. Most of 
 the men, prominent in this debate, were either placed under 
 the ban of the Slave Power, or were compelled to placate it 
 by succumbing to its behests, disowning their own words, and 
 becoming the active agents in defending what they once so 
 severely condemned. 
 
 Where, it may be asked, in the fiercest invectives, in the 
 most impassioned appeals and warnings, or in the wildest 
 ravings of any class of Abolitionists, can there be found any 
 arraignment of the system of slavery more fearful, any con 
 fessions more damaging, or any condemnation more crushing, 
 than can be gathered from the words of this debate, carried 
 on by Southern men on Southern soil ? And where can be 
 found more mournful evidence, plentiful as it is, of the terri 
 ble power embodied in the slave system, which could convert, 
 as it soon did, such men, with talents and position so com 
 manding, and with such admissions and confessions on their 
 lips, into strenuous advocates and sturdy defenders of what 
 they knew to be so full of guilt and harm to the individual, 
 of detriment and danger to the State ? 
 
CHAPTER XY. 
 
 THE FORMATION AND PURPOSES OF THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION 
 
 SOCIETY. 
 
 Its Inconsistencies. Views of Dr. Hopkins. Mr. Jefferson's Proposition. 
 Kesolutions of the Virginia Legislature. Judge Tucker's Plans of Emancipa 
 tion. Mercer's Resolutions. Meetings of the Society. Its Constitution 
 and Officers. Its Purpose. Equivocal Position. Declarations of Mr. Clay. 
 Avowals of its Advocates. Views of the " African Repository." Black 
 Laws. Compulsory Colonization. Action of Maryland Legislature. Ac 
 tion of the Free People of Color. Views of the National Conventions of 
 Free Colored Men. Declaration of Mr. "Webster. Mr. Garrison's Mission 
 to England. Eliot Cresson. Protest of the British Abolitionists. Address 
 of Mr. Garrison. Hold of the Colonizationists upon the Country. Their 
 Prescriptive Course. Encouragement to Mobs. 
 
 THE American Colonization Society was organized in the 
 year 1816, in the city of Washington. Auxiliary societies 
 were soon formed in most of the States. This association, 
 with its affiliated organizations, contributed in no small degree 
 to influence the opinions and actions of men, and to intensify 
 the irrepressible conflict of the last half-century. In its origi 
 nal formation and subsequent progress, in its avowals, argu 
 ments, and acts, it was always singularly inconsistent and 
 illogical. It manifestly yielded and pandered to the wicked 
 prejudice against race and color ; and yet it called upon 
 churches and Christians to assist in sustaining it as an essen 
 tial part of the missionary enterprise. It cruelly aspersed and 
 defamed the free people of color ; and yet insisted that they 
 were the preordained instruments of Heaven for the civiliza 
 tion of Africa. It evinced the most undisguised hostility to 
 Abolition and Abolitionists ; and yet it persistently pressed its 
 claims on the friends of the slave. While it embraced many 
 wise and good men, actuated by philanthropic and Christian 
 principles, its history compels the conviction that, unwittingly 
 
THE AMEKICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY. 209 
 
 or from design, its influence was largely instrumental in pro 
 ducing that sad demoralization of the nation which rendered 
 possible the subsequent aggressions and triumphs of the Slave 
 Power. 
 
 How to suppress the slave-trade, how to abolish slavery, and 
 what disposition should be made of free people of color, were 
 questions that early occupied the minds of leading men both 
 North and South. Dr. Hopkins, the ablest champion of the 
 colored race in his day, was in favor of the extinction of the 
 slave-trade ; of " averting the Divine judgments," and obtain 
 ing " the smile of Heaven " by delivering the country from 
 " the sin and calamity of slavery " ; and also of providing for 
 the education of colored children in useful learning, that they 
 might be raised to an acknowledged equality with wh ; .te peo 
 ple. Deeply concerned for the highest welfare of the colored 
 race, and for the advancement of civilization and Christianity, 
 he conceived and suggested the idea, even before the Revo 
 lution, of African colonization. In his address on the slave- 
 trade and the slavery of the Africans before the Providence 
 Antislavery Society, in 1793, he more fully developed the idea 
 of a general movement for colonizing such colored persons in 
 Africa as might be desirous of going thither ; in order to 
 " maintain the practice of Christianity in the sight of their 
 now heathen brethren, endeavor to instruct and civilize them, 
 and spread the knowledge of the gospel among them." In an 
 appendix to this powerful address, he expressed his confidence 
 that if a well-digested plan could be laid before the public, it 
 might be carried into effect. He referred with commendation 
 to the previous action of Massachusetts in resolving that, 
 " when a place can be found in Africa where the blacks of that 
 State may settle to their advantage, they would furnish them 
 with shipping and provisions sufficient to transport them there, 
 and arms sufficient to defend them, and farming utensils suffi 
 cient to cultivate the land." 
 
 During the Revolution Mr. Jefferson proposed to incorpo 
 rate into the revised code of Virginia a plan for colonizing free 
 persons of color. At that time these were regarded as a 
 " lower caste," and, in the South at least, as " a disturbing 
 
 27 
 
210 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 element to the peace of society and dangerous to the interests 
 of slavery." Mr. Jefferson and other more advanced South 
 ern men were in favor of general emancipation with coloniza 
 tion. The idea of colonization, too, was entertained by an 
 entirely different class, by those who wished to be rid of 
 the presence and example of free negroes, but who were op 
 posed to emancipation. This feeling was greatly stimulated 
 and increased by the discovery, in 1800, of an alleged conspir 
 acy of the negroes, in the country around Richmond, to seize 
 the magazine, the mills, and bridge across the James River, 
 take possession of the city, and issue a proclamation inviting 
 the blacks to rally to their standard. But the scheme failed, 
 and several of the leaders were tried and executed. The feel 
 ings and fears, however, excited by it, were manifested at the 
 next meeting of the legislature. The governor was requested 
 to enter into correspondence with the President relative to the 
 purchase of land out of the limits of that State, " where per 
 sons obnoxious to the laws and dangerous to the peace of 
 society may be removed." At the following session the pro 
 ject of obtaining lands beyond the limits of the State was 
 distinctly declared to be for the purpose of securing a place to 
 which " free negroes and such as may be emancipated may be 
 sent." 
 
 As no action was taken by the general government, the 
 legislature of Virginia, in 1805, instructed members of Con 
 gress from that State to secure a cession of territory in 
 the new Louisiana purchase for the purposes of colonization. 
 This action of several successive legislatures of Virginia was 
 taken in secret session, revealing the sense of insecurity that 
 prompted it. As no territory for this purpose had been se 
 cured by the efforts of the legislature, a law was enacted in 
 1806, that slaves thereafter manumitted should leave the State 
 within one year, or be again reduced to slavery. This action 
 of four legislatures clearly revealed the feelings and views 
 that then pervaded that State. The same was indicated by 
 the plan of emancipation proposed by Judge Tucker, one of 
 her most learned and distinguished jurists. In his plan, by 
 which all females born after a fixed period should be free, he 
 
THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY. 211 
 
 provided that no free black should hold office, possess real 
 estate, keep arms, be a witness against white men, or maintain 
 a suit at law. He gave as a reason for these stern and inhu 
 man provisions, by which the ordinary privileges of freemen 
 would be withheld from them, that he wished " to render it 
 their inclination and their interest to seek those privileges in 
 some other climate." 
 
 In 1816 Charles Fenton Mercer introduced a resolution into 
 the legislature, which was nearly unanimously adopted, asking 
 the aid of Congress to procure in Africa, or elsewhere beyond 
 the limits of the United States, a territory " as an asylum for 
 such persons of color as are now free, or may desire the same, 
 and for those who may be hereafter emancipated within this 
 commonwealth." It was afterward stated by Mr. Mercer that 
 his resolution was introduced prior, but with a view, to the 
 formation of a colonization society. It was stated, too, in a 
 published account of the formation of the American Coloniza 
 tion Society, that the meeting for that purpose was called by 
 those who believed the Virginia legislature had entered upon 
 the work with a spirit and determination to prosecute it with 
 vigor, and who also desired to secure the " aid " of the general 
 government. These facts justify the claims vauntingly put 
 forth in the Virginia Colonization Society, in 1836, that " the 
 plan of colonizing the free blacks, and such as might be made 
 free, originated here. The principles of the society were Vir 
 ginia principles." While, however, it was the action of the 
 Virginia legislature of 1816 which inspired this movement for 
 the purposes avowed, there were many Northern advocates of 
 colonization who were actuated by other and higher motives. 
 
 In the autumn of that year a meeting was held in Princeton, 
 New Jersey, under the lead of Rev. Dr. Robert Finley, who 
 took a deep interest in the organization of such a society, and 
 who was long identified with its operations. Indeed, this gen 
 tleman seems to have been the active agent in the movement 
 which resulted in its formation. He visited Washington early 
 in December, and was chiefly instrumental in calling the 
 meeting which assembled on the 21st of that month, in that 
 city, to consider the propriety and practicability of colonizing 
 
212 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 free people of color, and of forming an association for that 
 purpose. Henry Clay presided, spoke of the condition of the 
 free people of color, and pronounced the cause a noble one, 
 which proposed to " rid our country of a useless and perni 
 cious, if not a dangerous, portion of its population " ; and con 
 templated, strangely enough, with such materials for factors 
 and agents, " the spreading of the arts of civilized life, and 
 the possible redemption from ignorance and barbarism of a 
 benighted quarter of the globe." 
 
 John Randolph distinctly declared that this meeting did not 
 in any wise affect the question of negro slavery ; but " must 
 materially tend to secure the property of every master in the 
 United States in his slaves." On the 28th another meeting 
 was held, and on the first day of the year 1817 the society 
 was fully organized by the choice of officers. Judge Bushrod 
 Washington, an associate justice of the Supreme Court, a 
 Virginia slaveholder, was chosen president ; twelve of its 
 seventeen vice-presidents were from the South, and all, or 
 nearly all, of its twelve managers were slaveholders. The spirit 
 of its first president, if not of the society itself, was soon 
 manifested. Learning, in 1821, that his slaves believed, inas 
 much as he was the nephew of Washington, and president of 
 the Colonization Society, that he intended to give them their 
 freedom, he called them together, stated what he had heard, 
 and coolly informed them that he had no such intention. 
 Shortly afterward he verified that cruel and wanton declara 
 tion by sending fifty-four of them from the very home of the 
 Father of his Country to the New Orleans slave-market. 
 
 The constitution had no preamble setting forth the motive 
 and objects of the organization. Nor was there anything in 
 the instrument itself indicating its purpose, excepting the 
 second article, in which it was stated that its attention was 
 "to be exclusively directed" to colonizing free people of color. 
 This omission of all assigned motives indicated its equivocal 
 and double-faced policy, which ever seemed to be to secure at 
 one and the same time the co-operation of both the friends 
 and foes of the colored race, of those who aided it because 
 they hoped thus to lessen the evils of slavery, and of those 
 

 
 THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY. 213 
 
 who hoped that the removal of the free would strengthen the 
 fetters of the bond, of those who saw in it a providential 
 means of sending the gospel to Africa, and of those who 
 thought of that gospel only to hate and oppose it. 
 
 The general position of the American Colonization Society 
 may be seen, too, in the avowed sentiments and feelings of its 
 leading members, advocates, and presses toward the free peo 
 ple of color. Not only were they wanting in expressions of 
 sympathy and words of encouragement and hope, but lan 
 guage highly depreciative, if not defamatory, was employed 
 concerning these victims of an unfeeling ostracism and tyran 
 nous oppression. Mr. Clay declared : " Of all classes of our 
 population, the most vicious is that of the free colored peo 
 ple. Contaminated themselves, they extend their vices to all 
 around them. They are the most corrupt, abandoned, and 
 depraved." 
 
 General Mercer, who more than any other public man was 
 e master spirit of the enterprise, styled them " a horde of 
 iserable people, the objects of universal suspicion, subsisting 
 y plunder." A memorial of the Kentucky Colonization So- 
 iety to Congress thus characterized them : " They are a mil- 
 ew on our fields, a scourge to our backs, and a stain on our 
 escutcheon." An editorial in the " African Repository," the 
 recognized organ of the society, represented them as " igno 
 rant, degraded, mentally diseased, broken-spirited, and scarcely 
 reached in their debasement by the heavenly light." And 
 again : " They must be forever debased, forever useless, for 
 ever a nuisance from which it were a blessing for society to 
 be rid." 
 
 This cold-blooded characterization, too, was only equalled by 
 the reiterated assertions, and claim even, that there was no 
 remedy, no help, at least in this country. It was proclaimed 
 that " these prejudices of society " against them were " inevi 
 table and incurable," which "neither refinement, ' nor argu 
 ment, nor education, nor religion itself can subdue." They 
 were considered as belonging to an " inferior caste," as occu 
 pying a " station" from which " they can never rise, be their 
 talents, their enterprise, their virtues what they may. They 
 
214 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 constitute a class by themselves, out of which no individual 
 can be elevated and below which none can be depressed." 
 
 To these views of the character of the free people of color 
 and their remediless condition should be added the avowed 
 reasons for seeking their expatriation. The real intent and 
 animus of the movement were never in the interest of freedom, 
 or but exceptionally in that of the free people of color. Its 
 real, its avowed aim was to render slavery and its supporters 
 more secure ; or, as Henry A. Wise honestly expressed it, " the 
 great original principle " was " friendship for the slavehold 
 ers," which, he said, it must continue to " maintain." The 
 same principle was clearly recognized and avowed by Mr. 
 Webster, in his 7th of March speech, in which, among his 
 other overtures for Southern confidence, he pledged his support 
 to any proposition " or scheme of colonization " the South 
 might see fit to propose, " to relieve themselves from the bur 
 den of their free colored population." Though many Northern 
 antislavery men and Christians were lending it their aid, for 
 the promised good to Africa and the Africans, its leading 
 members and supporters were characterizing property in man 
 as "sacred," " as inviolable as any other in the country." 
 They said to the slaveholders : " We know your rights, and 
 we respect them." They claimed Southern support on the 
 ground, as expressed by Randolph at its first meeting, that it 
 " would prove one of the greatest securities " to such property. 
 This idea even the " Repository " expressed, again and again, 
 in different forms and phrases. It declared that removing free 
 people of color " would contribute more effectually to the con 
 tinuance and strength " of slavery than anything else ; " Avould 
 augment instead of diminishing the value of the property left 
 behind " ; " would secure slaveholders and the whole Southern 
 country " ; would render the slave who remains in America 
 more obedient, more faithful, more honest, and, consequently, 
 more useful to his master ; and " would provide and keep open 
 a drain for the excess beyond the occasion of profitable employ 
 ment." 
 
 Corroborative of the same influence was the ill-disguised in 
 difference, not to say hostility, of its advocates to any plan for 
 
THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY. 215 
 
 the improvement and elevation of the very class whose wretched 
 condition they so vividly depicted. While protesting against 
 the manumission of slaves unless coupled with expatriation, 
 calling abolition mere " enthusiasm," an " unsubstantial theory 
 of the rights of man," and abolitionists " fanatics," they ex 
 pressed their sorrow at the "misguided piety" which some 
 times prompted " death-bed " manumissions, and asserted that 
 " it would be as humane to throw slaves from the decks in the 
 middle passage as to set them free in this country." Not only 
 had they no plans for the amelioration of the free people of 
 color themselves, but they heartlessly pronounced against any 
 which might be proposed by others. Thus the society, in an 
 elaborate address to the public, authoritatively defined its posi 
 tion : " The moral, intellectual, and political improvement of 
 free people of color within the United States are objects foreign 
 to the powers of the society." 
 
 Dr. Leonard Bacon, a distinguished clergyman of New 
 Haven, an officer of the society, thus gave his views concern 
 ing its mission : " It is not a missionary society, nor a society 
 for the suppression of the slave-trade, nor a society for the im 
 provement of the blacks, nor a society for the abolition of slav 
 ery ; it is simply a society for the establishment of a colony on 
 the coast of Africa." And these are but samples of the general 
 tone and tenor of its writers and speakers, of the documents 
 and addresses that once abounded for its advocacy and 
 defence. 
 
 Among them the religious press was largely represented. 
 Thus a Southern paper declares : " If free people of color were 
 generally taught to read, it might be an inducement for them to 
 remain in this country. We would offer them no such induce 
 ments." Nor were the Northern journals without sentiments 
 equally unfeeling. The New Haven " Religious Intelligencer " 
 condemned any measures calculated to bind the colored popu 
 lation to this country by " seeking to raise them to a level with 
 the whites, whether by founding colleges or in any other way," 
 because it would " divert attention and counteract and thwart 
 the whole plan of colonization." 
 
 Among the many short-comings of the Colonization Society 
 
216 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 was its admitted failure to secure the confidence of the colored 
 people. Though it was ostensibly formed in their interest, 
 and was really incapable of accomplishing the objects of its 
 organization without their voluntary co-operation and willing 
 acceptance of its assistance, it was never regarded with favor 
 by them. On the contrary, they always distrusted its preten 
 sions and dreaded its influence. Nor was it strange. For 
 the more intelligent could not have been unacquainted with 
 something of its history, and with the open and cruel avowals 
 of its founders and early advocates ; and all may have known 
 that the same men who were its members and defenders not 
 only oppressed their slaves, but demanded and indorsed those 
 most cruel laws against free colored people which not only dis 
 graced the statute-books of all slaveholding States, but sadly 
 disfigured Northern legislation. 
 
 The extreme aversion of slaveholders to the presence of free 
 people of color, and their desire to be rid of them, aided by 
 the general prejudice against color, provoked a vast amount of 
 hostile and wicked legislation, both North and South. The 
 " black laws " of many of the free States were second in dis 
 graceful cruelty and injustice only to the more summary and 
 sanguinary slave-codes of the South itself. The admitted in 
 tent of such legislation in both sections was to compel, in 
 reality if not in form, these unfortunate ones to leave their 
 country, where their comfort, success, and security were per 
 sistently and systematically disregarded, while they were made 
 the objects of provoking and painful social and legal oppres 
 sions. 
 
 This identity of interest and purpose, and at the South of 
 constituency even, between the party of slavery and the party 
 of colonization, not only prevented on the part of the latter 
 all sympathy with the victims of these laws, but also all dis 
 countenance of the policy that demanded their enactment and 
 enforcement. In point of fact, the Colonization Society seemed 
 rather to welcome such legislation as a means of furthering its 
 purposes and making the colored people willing to accept its 
 proffered aid. Thus a writer in the " African Repository " ex 
 claims : " How important that we hasten to clear our land of 
 
THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY. 217 
 
 our black population ! What right, I demand, have the chil 
 dren of Africa to a home in a white man's country ? Let 
 Africans rise to empire ; but let it be under the shade of their 
 native palms. Let the Atlantic billow heave its high and 
 everlasting barrier between their country and ours." Even 
 the Massachusetts Colonization Society could speak almost 
 approvingly of the fact that " the colored man's prospects of a 
 happy home here are continually growing darker. The un 
 willingness to have a large free colored population is steadily 
 increasing in all the States exposed to it " ; and it adds, 
 " such discouragements force them to think of Liberia." 
 
 In 1831 Maryland, in order that the State might be pro 
 tected from the alleged " evils " growing out of the " connec 
 tion " of her increasing free colored population with the slaves, 
 enacted some very stringent and barbarous laws, one for 
 bidding manumission unless the slaves were sent away, and 
 it appropriated two hundred thousand dollars to be expended 
 by the Colonization Society of that State. At the next an 
 nual meeting of the parent society a resolution was passed 
 expressing the " highest gratification " at the continued efforts 
 of Maryland, embracing, of course, those barbarous laws in 
 regard to her free colored population. " We do not ask," 
 said a memorial of the New York Colonization Society to the 
 legislature, in language it is hardly credible civilized and 
 Christian men could have used, " that the provisions of our 
 constitution and statute-book should be so modified as to 
 relieve and exalt the condition of the colored people whilst 
 they remain with us. Let those provisions stand IN ALL THEIR 
 RIGOR, to work out the ultimate and unbounded good of these 
 people." 
 
 A society with such an origin and object, constituency and 
 avowals, could not escape the notice and criticism of the free 
 colored people themselves. They seemed instinctively to di 
 vine its purpose and distrust its aims ; for, as early as 1817, 
 they held a meeting in the city of Richmond to express their 
 opposition to the scheme. In the same year a similar meeting 
 was held in Philadelphia, -in which they denounced as " cruel" 
 " any measure or system of measures having a tendency to 
 
 28 
 
218 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 banish " them ; expressed their deep abhorrence at the stig 
 ma cast upon them as " a dangerous and useless part of the 
 community " ; declared that they would never voluntarily 
 separate themselves from the slave population of the country ; 
 that, " without arts, without science, or a proper knowledge of 
 government, to cast into the savage wilds of Africa the free 
 people of color seems to us the circuitous route by which they 
 must return to perpetual bondage." Similar meetings were 
 held by the free people of color in Washington, Baltimore, 
 and in all the Northern cities and States. 
 
 A national convention of colored men was held in Phila 
 delphia in 1831. That convention embodied and expressed 
 the sentiments of the free people of color. To the Coloniza 
 tion Society it thus addressed itself : It would " respectfully 
 suggest to that august body of talent, learning, and worth 
 that, in our humble opinion, strengthened, too, by the opinions 
 of eminent men in this country as well as in Europe, they are 
 pursuing the direct road to perpetuate slavery, with all its 
 unchristian concomitants, in this boasted land of freedom; 
 and, as citizens and men whose best blood is sapped to gain 
 popularity for that institution, we would in the most feeling 
 manner beg of them to desist ; or, if we must be sacrificed to 
 their philanthropy, we would rather die at home. Many of 
 our fathers and some of us have fought and bled for the 
 liberty, independence, and peace which you now enjoy ; and 
 surely it would be ungenerous and unfeeling in you to deny 
 us a humble and quiet grave in that country which gave 
 us birth." This tender and touching appeal was the voice 
 of a quarter of a million of oppressed and suffering men 
 and women, who, though nominally free, were compelled 
 to bear many of the burdens of that terrible system which 
 then held more than two millions of their race in chains. 
 The next year they met again in convention, and again ap 
 pealed to the colonizationists " to cease their unhallowed per 
 secutions." They declared that it was unnecessary to repeat 
 their " protest against that institution." " Our views and 
 sentiments," they said, " have long 'since gone to the world, 
 the wings of the wind have borne our disapprobation to 
 
THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY. 
 
 219 
 
 that institution. Time itself cannot erase it. We have dated 
 our opposition from its beginning ; and our views are strength 
 ened by time and circumstances, and they hold the upper 
 most seat in our affections." 
 
 The free colored people have ever firmly and persistently 
 continued to avow their opposition to the society, and to enter 
 their solemn protest against its policy. An association, so 
 curiously conglomerate, could not continue harmonious. Men 
 with such conflicting sentiments could not long see in the 
 same agency a legitimate means of promoting purposes so 
 antagonistic. Though it had a Northern face and words for 
 freedom, and numbered among its advocates such men as the 
 Tappans and Gerrit Smith, yet its Southern proclivities and 
 purposes were so much more prominent and pronounced, that 
 men whose philanthropy was something more than a name, 
 one after another, detected the deception and disavowed it. 
 Even Mr. Webster, as early as 1825, retired from a meeting 
 held in Boston to organize an auxiliary society, of which he 
 was chairman, Lewis Tappan, its secretary, being authority 
 for the statement, with the remark : " Gentlemen, I will 
 have nothing more to do with the matter ; for I am satisfied 
 it is merely a plan of the slaveholders to get rid of the free 
 negroes." 
 
 The opposition of the free negroes, the manifest futility of 
 a scheme to effect emancipation, which had sent out in the 
 first dozen years of its history only a single thousand colo 
 nists, and the avowals of its Southern advocates and presses, 
 naturally excited the suspicions of the pious and philanthropic, 
 who had early and gladly welcomed it as an agency of prom 
 ised good, and led them to examine and finally discard its 
 pretensions. 
 
 Previous to 1828, Arthur Tappan, an eminent merchant of 
 the city of New York, had generously contributed to its funds. 
 But he was led to distrust its efficacy as an instrumentality of 
 Christian benevolence, because blacks were sent out without 
 any reference to their moral fitness to become pioneers in civil 
 izing Africa ; because slaves were liberated on the express con 
 dition that they should go to Liberia, thus forcing a consent 
 
220 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 that should have been free ; and because a part of the cargoes 
 of the vessels sent were New England rum, powder, and arms. 
 As late, too, as the 4th of July, 1829, William Lloyd Garrison 
 delivered an address in Boston, before the Massachusetts Colo 
 nization Society, in which, however, he dwelt with much force 
 on the woes and wrongs of the slave. In the autumn of that 
 year he became associated with Benjamin Lundy in the publi 
 cation of the " Genius of Universal Emancipation," in Balti 
 more. While in that city he saw more clearly the workings 
 of the colonization scheme, and came to the conclusion that, 
 if it were not the intention of its originators, it had neverthe 
 less become its practical result, " to rivet still closer the fetters 
 of the slaves and deepen the prejudices against the free people 
 of color," and he became an advocate of the doctrine of im 
 mediate emancipation. Returning to the North, he became its 
 champion, and the uncompromising opponent of the Coloniza 
 tion Society. He and others found it difficult, however, to 
 awaken in the minds of the people the same distrust which 
 had taken such full possession of their own. But through 
 their agency the public mind was largely disabused of the 
 idea that it was an antislavery instrumentality, or that it 
 tended, in any degree, to the elevation of the free people of 
 color. 
 
 The agents of the Colonization Society had visited England, 
 and appealed for support to the British people. The Abolition 
 ists of that country had generally received, welcomed, and ac 
 cepted their statements. Eliot Cresson went there in 1880, 
 and for more than three years pressed its claims upon the vet 
 eran Abolitionists, who were then engaged in the great work 
 of West India emancipation. After the organization of the 
 New England Antislavery Society, and several of its auxilia 
 ries, it was deemed important to disabuse the British mind of 
 some of these unfounded impressions ; and Mr. Garrison was 
 deputed to visit England in the spring of 1833 for that purpose. 
 But he went, in the words of Samuel J. May, his early friend 
 and coadjutor, " with the execrations of the leading coloniza- 
 tionists and all the proslavery partisans on his head." 
 
 Cordially welcomed, and burning with the zeal of profound 
 
THE AMERICAN COLONIZATION SOCIETY. 
 
 221 
 
 convictions, he was anxious to grapple without delay with the 
 advocates of colonization. He at once challenged Mr. Cresson 
 to meet him for public discussion. That champion, how 
 ever, whose course Mr. Garrison afterward characterized as 
 " marked with cunning, duplicity, and cowardice," prudently 
 declined the challenge. Mr. Garrison delivered several ad 
 dresses, in which he exposed the character of the society and 
 of its claims to antislavery support, in either England or 
 America. Having faithfully pointed out to the leading Aboli 
 tionists the purposes and tendencies of the society, he received, 
 a 'few days before his return, a protest, addressed to the British 
 public, signed by Wilberforce, Macaulay, Stephen, Lushing- 
 ton, Buxton, Cropper, O'Connell, and other distinguished anti- 
 slavery men. While acknowledging the colony of Liberia " to 
 be in itself a good thing," they utterly repudiated the princi 
 ples of the society, declared it to be an obstacle to the " de 
 struction of slavery throughout the world," and pronounced 
 " its pretexts to be delusion," and its " real effects dangerous." 
 These eminent men averred that the society took " its root 
 from a cruel prejudice and alienation in the whites of America 
 against the colored people, slave or free " ; that " it fosters and 
 increases a spirit of caste " ; " widens the breach between the 
 two races " ; " exposes the colored people to great practical 
 persecutions " ; and " is calculated to swallow up and divert 
 that feeling which America, as a Christian and free country, 
 cannot but entertain, that slavery is alike incompatible with 
 the law of God and the well-being of man." 
 
 In sending this important document to the press, the leading 
 signature to which had been given by the illustrious Wilber 
 force a few days before his death one of the closing acts of 
 his eventful life, Mr. Garrison said : " This protest will hang 
 a millstone about the neck of the American Colonization So 
 ciety sufficiently weighty to drown it in an ocean of public in 
 dignation." Nor did he miscalculate. Though a colonization 
 society was organized in England, it existed only in name and 
 exerted but little influence. This testimony, too, of those 
 distinguished philanthropists, as cheering to the Abolitionists 
 as it was exasperating to the Colonizationists, became a power- 
 
222 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ful agency in dispelling the illusion which the latter had cast 
 over the Northern mind. Having aided in accomplishing this 
 purpose, by which, perhaps, he rendered as great and essen 
 tial a service to the antislavery cause as by any act of his life, 
 lie returned to the United States, and issued an address to the 
 friends of the slave, in which he said : " The great object of 
 my mission namely, the exposure of the real character and 
 objects of the American Colonization Society has been ac 
 complished expeditiously, comprehensively, and effectually." 
 
 Imbittered by the success which had crowned the mission 
 of Mr. Garrison in England, and by its arraignment and aban 
 donment by many of its former supporters, the friends of the 
 Colonization Society more fiercely than ever denounced the doc 
 trine of immediate emancipation and its advocates. Though 
 many good men, distinguished for their philanthropy and piety, 
 were continually withdrawing from its support and giving their 
 adhesion to the doctrine of immediate emancipation, the society 
 was still strongly intrenched in the confidence and sympathy 
 of the influential classes. Many of the public men, like Mr. 
 Clay, were earnest and eloquent in its defence. Leaders, too, 
 in the churches and institutions of learning were active in its 
 advocacy and support. Occupying positions of commanding 
 influence, they were indignant at the bold and uncompromis 
 ing annunciation of unpalatable truths, and strove to put under 
 the ban of social and ecclesiastical proscription the humble and 
 devoted men who were placing the antislavery cause on the 
 enduring basis of the rights of human nature and the laws of 
 God. This intolerant and prescriptive action intensified the 
 public feeling, increased the popular excitement, and inspired 
 many of the lawless deeds of that day, which brought such 
 reproach upon free institutions and dishonor upon the country. 
 Prominent men in both church and state consented to these 
 demonstrations of popular violence. At least, if they did not 
 encourage and prompt them, they did not rebuke and oppose 
 them. 
 
CHAPTER XYI. 
 
 NEW ENGLAND AND NEW YORK CITY ANTISLAVERY SOCIETIES. 
 
 Conference at the Office of Samuel E. Sewall. Adjourned Meeting. Adoption 
 of the Preamble and Constitution of the New England Antislavery Society. 
 
 Officers of the Society. Principles enumerated. Address to the People. 
 
 First Annual Meeting. Kesolutions. First Annual Report. Mr. Garri 
 son's Resolution in Favor of a National Convention. "Emancipator." Great 
 Excitement. Public Meeting. Organization of the New York City Anti- 
 slavery Society. Arthur Tappan. Lewis Tappan. William Goodell. 
 Joshua Leavitt. Colonizationists. Denunciation of the Abolitionists. 
 Rapid Increase of the Abolitionists. Publications of John G. Whittier, Lydia 
 Maria Child, Amos A. Phelps. 
 
 WHILE the doctrine of immediate emancipation, proclaimed 
 with so much earnestness and boldness by " The Liberator," 
 startled and incensed the many, it was welcomed and gladly 
 accepted by a few. Adopting such sentiments, the latter nat 
 urally looked to association and co-operative action. Accord 
 ingly, on the 13th of November, 1831, fifteen persons met at 
 the office of Samuel E. Sewall, then a rising young lawyer of 
 Boston, to consider the expediency of forming an antislavery 
 society. It was the understanding that, if twelve persons 
 were found who would agree on the basis of immediate eman 
 cipation, such a society should be formed. As only nine of 
 that number would thus agree no action was taken. 
 
 On the 16th of December another conference was held at 
 Mr. Sewall's office. There were present Samuel E. Sewall, Ellis 
 Gray Loring, David Lee Child, lawyers of that city ; William 
 Lloyd Garrison, editor, and Isaac Knapp, publisher, of " The 
 Liberator " ; Oliver Johnson, Robert B. Hall, Isaac Child, 
 John Cutts Smith, and Joshua Coffin. Mr. Child, Mr. Sewall, 
 Mr. Garrison, Mr. Loring, and Mr. Johnson were appointed a 
 committee to prepare a constitution. The meeting was then 
 
224 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 adjourned till the first day of January, 1832, at which time 
 there was an additional attendance of Alonzo Lewis, known as 
 the Lynn Bard, William J. Snelling, Dr. Abner Phelps, Rev. 
 Elijah Blan chard, and Dr. Gamaliel Bradford. The commit 
 tee reported a preamble and constitution. After discussion, 
 the constitution was adopted, and the preamble referred to 
 another committee, to report at an adjourned meeting, to be 
 held on the 6th, in the school-room under the African Baptist 
 Church, in Belknap Street. 
 
 At that meeting the preamble, which was written by Mr. 
 Snelling, was reported ; and, after discussion and amendment, 
 was adopted. The constitution was then signed by William 
 Lloyd Garrison, Oliver Johnson, Robert B. Hall, Arnold Buf- 
 fum, William J. Snelling, John E. Fuller, Moses Thacher, 
 Joshua Coffin, Stillman B. Newcomb, Benjamin C. Bacon, 
 Isaac Knapp, and Henry K. Stockton. There were in the 
 conferences which preceded the formation of the society differ 
 ences of opinion in regard to its name, principles, and policy. 
 David Lee Child, Samuel E. Sewall, and Ellis Gray Loring, 
 members of the committee to prepare the preamble and con 
 stitution, at first declined to identify themselves with the 
 movement, as they did not fully concur in the expediency of 
 putting forth at that time and in that form all the sentiments 
 contained in the preamble. But after a brief period they 
 became members of the society, and gave to the antislavery 
 cause the earnest and life-long devotion of their large abilities 
 and influence. Among the earliest to join the new society 
 was the venerable John Kenrick, of Newton, who had been 
 for many years an earnest and active Abolitionist. He was 
 subsequently made president, and in his will left the society 
 the first legacy it received. Several colored men soon be 
 came members, but at that early period no women joined 
 its ranks. 
 
 Its officers consisted of a president, two vice-presidents, a 
 corresponding secretary, a recording secretary, treasurer, and 
 a board of counsellors consisting of six members. Arnold 
 Buffum, a member of the Society of Friends, was made presi 
 dent. His father was a member of the old Abolition Society 
 
THE NEW ENGLAND ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 
 
 225 
 
 of Rhode Island, and he was nurtured in the faith of immedi 
 ate emancipation. Seven years before, he had visited England 
 and made the acquaintance of Thomas Clarkson and other 
 eminent antislavery men and women of that kingdom. He 
 brought to its service faith, earnestness, and devotion. Wil 
 liam Lloyd Garrison, whose name is more prominently identi 
 fied with modern antislavery than that of any other individual, 
 was made corresponding secretary. On the board of coun 
 sellors were Moses Thacher, Oliver Johnson, and Robert B. 
 Hall. Mr. Thacher was a clergyman, and somewhat distin 
 guished for his earnest advocacy of the theology of Dr. Em- 
 mons, and also for his hostility to the institution of Free 
 Masonry. He was the author of the first address put forth 
 by the society, and continued till the close of the struggle an 
 effective laborer in the cause of emancipation. Mr. Johnson 
 was a young man, intending to enter the ministry. He, how 
 ever, early identified himself with the antislavery cause, and 
 became a practical and efficient worker, sometimes as a lec 
 turer, but more generally as an editor. When the society was 
 organized, he was the conductor of " The Christian Soldier," 
 which he made at once a champion of the cause. During Mr. 
 Garrison's visit to England, in 1833, he had charge of " The 
 Liberator," and was at times assistant editor. Afterward he 
 was connected for several years with the " New York Tribune," 
 and subsequently, at successive periods, editor of the " Anti- 
 slavery Bugle," the " Pennsylvania Freeman," and the " Anti- 
 slavery Standard," each of them a radical antislavery journal. 
 He labored in these different fields with tireless persistency for 
 the emancipation and enfranchisement of the negro race. Mr. 
 Hall entered upon the work with much activity, but his subse 
 quent career hardly came up to his early promise. He be 
 came a clergyman of the Episcopal Church, and from that or 
 some other cause he lost something of his early zeal ; though 
 as a member of the XXXIVth and XXXVth Congresses his 
 votes were steadily on the side of freedom. 
 
 In the preamble the declaration was made that every person 
 of full age and sane mind had a right to immediate freedom 
 from personal bondage ; that man could not, consistently with 
 
 29 
 
226 KISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 reason, religion, and the eternal and immutable principles of 
 justice, be the property of man ; that whoever retained his 
 fellow-man in bondage was guilty of a grievous wrong ; that 
 difference of complexion was no reason why man should be 
 deprived of his natural rights, or subjected to any political 
 disability. " While we advance these opinions," so read the 
 preamble, " as principles on which we intend to act, we de 
 clare that we will not operate on the existing relations of 
 society by other than peaceful and lawful means, and that we 
 will give no countenance to violence or insurrection." Its 
 second article declared " that the objects of the society shall 
 be to endeavor, by all means sanctioned by law, humanity, 
 and religion, to effect the abolition of slavery in the United 
 States, to- improve the character and condition of free people 
 of color, to inform and correct public opinion in relation to 
 their situation and rights, and to obtain for them equal politi 
 cal rights and privileges with the whites." 
 
 The New England Antislavery Society, beginning its career 
 with the promulgation of the doctrine that immediate emanci 
 pation was the duty of the master and the right of the slave, 
 held its first public meeting in Essex Street Church, in Boston, 
 on the 29th of January, when a very able address was deliv 
 ered by the Rev. Moses Thacher, then editor of the Boston 
 " Telegraph," a Hopkinsian journal of that city. Other pub 
 lic addresses were made. Arnold Buifum and Oliver Johnson 
 were appointed agents, and subsequently did much to arouse 
 public attention by their labors. Eminent philanthropists, in 
 the United States and England, were early chosen honorary 
 members, and the society entered at once upon its work. It 
 issued an address to the people, and voted that, with a copy 
 of the constitution, it be sent to all the editors and clergymen 
 of New England. This address from the pen of Mr. Thacher, 
 chairman of the board of counsellors, was very significant of 
 the spirit and purpose of the Abolitionists at that time, affirm 
 ing that instead of violent they counselled only moral means. 
 He declared the object of the society to be " neither war nor 
 sedition " ; that the only influence it could exert must be that 
 of " moral suasion," not " coercion " ; that " in the truth and 
 
THE NEW ENGLAND ANTISL AVERT SOCIETY. 227 
 
 the God of truth alone we trust for the success of our exer 
 tions ; and with the truth and in the name of the God of truth 
 we plead for the cause of humanity." The address asserted 
 that the " fundamental principle upon which our constitution 
 is based is our Saviour's Golden Rule : 4 All things whatsoever ye 
 would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them.'' Hence 
 the grand articles in our creed, that ' God hath made of one 
 blood all the nations of men, for to dwell on all the face of the 
 earth ' ; c that all men are created equal ' ; that i they are en 
 dowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, and 
 that among them are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happi 
 ness.' " 
 
 The address also declared that the whole American people 
 ought to be an antislavery society ; that the spirit of civil and 
 religious liberty, the Declaration of Independence, the spirit 
 and letter of the Constitution, required it ; and that the spirit 
 of the gospel of Christ and the voice of public, commutative, 
 and retributive justice imperiously demanded it. The duty of 
 immediate emancipation was unqualifiedly asserted and main 
 tained. " We believe," said the address, " that slavery is 
 an evil now ; and, of course, the slaves ought to be now eman 
 cipated. If the thief is found in possession of stolen property, 
 he is required immediately to relinquish it. The slaveholder 
 and the man-stealer are in unlawful possession of the stolen 
 sons and daughters of Africa ; they ought, therefore, immedi 
 ately to set them free. Every principle which proves slavery 
 unjust, an evil, and a curse, equally demonstrates the duty of 
 immediate emancipation." 
 
 The number of slaves was then estimated to be two and a 
 quarter millions. Without impugning the motives of persons 
 who had, from feelings of the purest benevolence, advocated the 
 policy of colonization, that scheme was declared to be radically 
 wrong, tending to involve the country in remediless evils. It 
 was contrary to justice, humanity, philanthropy, and the letter 
 and the spirit of the Golden Rule. The right of the emanci 
 pated black man to reside in the United States was an inheri 
 tance earned by the sweat of his brow. It was affirmed that 
 colored men had the right of protection in their native land, 
 
228 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 and a right to the constitutional franchises of free citizens. 
 The nation was earnestly called upon to be just, to avert the 
 scenes of San Domingo. There was declared to be but one 
 alternative : " The master must manumit his slave, or the 
 slave will manumit himself. We have no doubt that the God 
 of Heaven, who is a God of justice, is at this moment, in his 
 Word and providence, setting before the Southern planter this 
 very alternative ; and this alternative embraces life and death, 
 a blessing and a curse. To choose the first, and say to the 
 slave, BE FREE, is to shut the floodgates of human war and of 
 human blood. To choose the latter, and hold the colored man 
 in vassalage, must erelong break up the fountains of the great 
 deep, and have a direct tendency to unsheathe the sword of 
 vengeance, revolution, carnage, and death." 
 
 This address, so earnest, temperate, and firm, appealing not 
 to passion or prejudice, but to conscience and reason, invited 
 the co-operation of every philanthropist and Christian to " show 
 himself a friend to his country and a friend to the black man." 
 Based upon such principles, guided by such maxims, hold 
 ing such articles of faith, and inspired by a spirit thus pure, 
 humane, and just, the New England Antislavery Society made 
 its appeal and entered upon the work of immediate emancipa 
 tion. It is a sad commentary on the philanthropy, patriotism, 
 and piety of those days that an association avowing such prin 
 ciples and proposing such measures should have encountered 
 so fierce a storm of obloquy and reproach, and been so long 
 and so persistently opposed by the leading influences in church 
 and state. That simple historical fact utters a language of 
 sterner condemnation than pages of invective and indignant 
 characterization. Still, amid all this opposition, many re 
 sponded to the appeal, and the members rapidly increased. 
 
 On the 9th of January, 1833, its first annual meeting was 
 holden in Boston. At this meeting Samuel E. Sewall intro 
 duced a resolution in favor of the abolition of slavery and the 
 slave-trade in the District of Columbia, and earnestly exhorted 
 the society to exert itself to put an end to that atrocious sys 
 tem tolerated at the seat of government. David Lee Child 
 submitted a resolution declaring that free people of color and 
 
THE NEW ENGLAND ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 229 
 
 slaves had less liberty and were less protected by law in the 
 United States than in any part of the world. In support of 
 his resolution, Mr. Child demonstrated, in an elaborate and 
 exhaustive speech and by references to the CIVIL LAW, that the 
 slaves were far better protected in their rights in the French, 
 Spanish, and Portuguese colonies than in the United States. 
 Amasa Walker, then a merchant of Boston, submitted and 
 ably supported a resolution proclaiming the objects of the New 
 England Antislavery Society to be in strict accordance with 
 the plainest principles of religion, philanthropy, and patriot 
 ism. 
 
 An elaborate report of the board of managers was read by 
 Mr. Garrison. It fully explained the objects and vindicated 
 the principles of the society. It pronounced immediate aboli 
 tion a necessity. It sharply criticised the Colonization So 
 ciety, because " it neither calls for any change of conduct 
 toward people of color on the part of the nation, nor has in 
 itself any principle of reform." It asserted that immediate 
 abolition would remove the cause of bloodshed and insurrec 
 tion ; give protection to millions who are now at the mercy of 
 irresponsible masters and drivers ; annihilate a system of licen 
 tiousness, incest, blood, and cruelty; open an immense market 
 to mechanics and manufacturers, and afford facilities for edu 
 cating the slaves in morals, science, and literature ; extinguish 
 the fires of division between the North and the South, and 
 make the bonds of union stronger than chains of iron ; permit 
 every slave to be supplied with a Bible, and place a hundred 
 thousand infants annually born of slave parents in primary 
 and sabbath schools. It conjured Abolitionists to maintain 
 their ground firmly and confidently. It closed by proclaiming 
 that the blood of millions who have perished unredressed in 
 this guilty land, the sufferings and lamentations of the millions 
 who yet remain in cruel servitude, the groans and supplications 
 of bleeding Africa, the cries of the suffering victims in the 
 holds of slave-ships now wafted on the ocean, and the threat- 
 enings and the judgments of the God of all flesh, all demand 
 the utter and immediate annihilation of slavery. At this an 
 nual meeting John Kenrick of Newton was chosen president, 
 
230 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Samuel E. Sewall and Oliver Johnson were made correspond 
 ing and recording secretaries. On motion of Mr. Garrison, the 
 board of managers were authorized to call a meeting of the 
 friends of abolition, for the purpose of forming a national anti- 
 slavery society, as being " essential to the complete regenera 
 tion of public sentiment on the subject of slavery and to the 
 speedy overthrow of that iniquitous system." 
 
 Organized on the basis of the common rights of human na 
 ture and the laws of God, the New England Antislavery So 
 ciety had proclaimed that the sin of slavery and the duty of 
 repentance belonged to that generation. Its outspoken, clear, 
 and distinct enunciation of the sin of oppression and the duty 
 of immediate repentance had, during the first year of its ex 
 istence, been welcomed with enthusiasm by thousands. During 
 no previous year in the history of the country had the ques 
 tions pertaining to the existence of slavery been so lifted up 
 to the domain of reason and conscience. Never had the cause 
 of the slave been so uncompromisingly held before the Ameri 
 can people. 
 
 The organization of the New England Antislavery Society 
 and its appeal to the conscience and reason of the country 
 evoked responses in several of the free States. Antislavery 
 societies were organized ; and many earnest, humane, and 
 just men and women entered upon the work of emancipation. 
 Nearly all who engaged in the formation of such societies 
 were members of Christian churches, and were taking, at the 
 same time, an active part in the religious, missionary, and 
 philanthropic enterprises of that day. Indeed, during the first 
 five years of the antislavery agitation, its promoters, regard 
 ing the effort as their religious work, looked with hope and 
 confident expectation to the churches and benevolent organiza 
 tions for hearty sympathy and co-operation. Unlike the great 
 contest on the Missouri Compromise, which had a few years 
 before so profoundly stirred the country, this was moral rather 
 than political. Consequently, they who became members of 
 these associations were accustomed to consider the questions 
 at issue in their moral rather than in their civil bearings, and 
 
THE NEW YORK ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 231 
 
 to look for aid to Christians, churches, and benevolent organ 
 izations, rather than to politicians, parties, and legislative 
 bodies. Unaccustomed to public affairs and sharing in the 
 general distrust of party politics, they seldom sought help 
 from political action, and usually failed when they did. 
 
 Although the churches generally failed to respond promptly 
 to these Christian appeals for immediate action on behalf of 
 the oppressed, the Abolitionists, though disappointed, were not 
 disheartened. The work went on. Many antislavery socie 
 ties were formed. Several antislavery newspapers were estab 
 lished, and a general system of antislavery agitation, having 
 been inaugurated, was continued. Among the papers estab 
 lished was the " Emancipator," commenced in New York in 
 March, 1833, by the pecuniary aid of Arthur Tappan, and 
 edited by Rev. Charles W. Denison. The establishment of 
 that journal in the commercial metropolis, in which the prin 
 ciples and policy of the friends of emancipation were clearly 
 and boldly set forth, together with other influences, caused 
 much excitement and aroused feelings of resentment and 
 hostility. This was signally manifested by the proceedings 
 on the evening of the 2d of October, 1833, and subsequently. 
 The friends of immediate abolition were summoned by the 
 call of a committee, of which Joshua Leavitt was chair 
 man, to meet at Clinton Hall to form a New York City Anti- 
 slavery Society. On the afternoon of that day large placards 
 were posted in the streets, calling upon all persons from 
 the South and all persons disposed to manifest the true feel 
 ings of the State to meet at the same time arid place. A 
 hostile demonstration was of course anticipated. 
 
 The trustees of Clinton Hall refusing to fulfil their contract, 
 and an unsuccessful application having been made for other 
 rooms, a few antislavery men met in the street near the City 
 Hall, and consulted upon the possibility of holding the proposed 
 meeting. At the suggestion of Lewis Tappan, a trustee of 
 Chatham Street Chapel, it was determined to hold the meet 
 ing in the lecture-room of that building. At the hour of meet 
 ing, about fifty determined Abolitionists, who had been person 
 ally notified, assembled. Arthur and Lewis Tappan passed 
 
232 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 unrecognized through an immense concourse of men assem 
 bled in front of Tammany Hall, preparatory to the premedi 
 tated attack upon the proposed meeting. The sexton of the 
 church, locking the iron gates in front of the building, placed 
 the keys in the hands of Lewis Tappan, who informed the 
 meeting that it would probably be assaulted, and that soon ; 
 and that they should promptly despatch the business for which 
 they were assembled. 
 
 John Rankin, a merchant of that city and a devoted Aboli 
 tionist, was made chairman. Amid those threatening demon 
 strations the blessing of God was invoked. A committee, 
 appointed at a previous meeting, reported a constitution, 
 which was quickly adopted. Arthur Tappan was chosen pres 
 ident ; Elizur Wright, Jr., and Charles W. Denison were 
 chosen corresponding and recording secretaries. The board 
 of managers consisted of Joshua Leavitt, Isaac T. Hopper, 
 Abraham L. Cox, Lewis Tappan, and William Goodell. The 
 meeting was adjourned, the keys were delivered to the sexton, 
 and the members retired through the main audience room of 
 the chapel into a rear street. They were followed by a man hav 
 ing a light in one hand and a dagger in the other. He was, 
 however, discovered by the sexton, his light extinguished, and 
 he was left to grope his way in the darkness as he best could. 
 Mr. Hopper, a sturdy Quaker, whose life had been consecrated 
 to works of beneficence and the cause of the oppressed, re 
 fused to retire, and boldly faced the mob, as with shouts and 
 threats they rushed into the chapel. In their disappointment 
 they seized a negro, called him Arthur Tappan, placed him in 
 the chair, and forced him to make a speech ; which he did 
 very creditably to himself, though not very satisfactorily to 
 his auditors. He said : " Gentlemen, I am not used to mak 
 ing speeches, and don't pretend to be qualified to do so. But 
 one or two things I do know : one is, God hath made of one 
 blood all nations ; and another is, all men are created equal, 
 and are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable 
 rights, among them life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. 
 " " That will do," exclaimed his impatient hearers. 
 
 Joshua Leavitt and Lewis Tappan devoted the night to pre- 
 
THE NEW YORK ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 233 
 
 paring an account of the proceedings, and furnishing copies 
 for the city press, whose readers the next morning were not a 
 little surprised to find in the same journals both the statement 
 that " the agitators had been put down," and an authorized 
 report of the doings of the meeting and the organization of 
 the society. This society soon issued an address to the people 
 of the city in explanation and defence of immediate emancipa 
 tion, and the principles and policy it proposed in its attempts 
 to secure it by the American people. Nor were their doctrines 
 and policy all that were calculated to attract attention ; the 
 personnel of the new organization was not unworthy of its 
 noble sentiments and benignant purposes. Arthur Tappan, 
 its president, was a native of Massachusetts. He early be 
 came a distinguished and successful merchant of New York. 
 An earnest Christian and philanthropist, his name was asso 
 ciated with nearly every missionary and reformatory enter 
 prise of his day. Modest, quiet, and unassuming, without 
 much facility in the use of tongue or pen, his life will be 
 remembered rather as one of deeds than words. Surrounded 
 by ledgers and invoices, clerks and customers, his ear and 
 hand were alike open to the appeals for personal charity, the 
 claims of an oppressed race or of a ruined world. Munificent 
 as unostentatious in his gifts, his range of benevolence was 
 wide and catholic. His brother, Lewis Tappan, though unlike 
 him in many particulars, was no less earnest and devoted to 
 the cause of reform and Christian benevolence. Like his 
 brother, with whom he was so long associated in trade and 
 beneficence, he was a man of remarkable business capacity, 
 great courage, and a large-hearted philanthropy. Unlike him, 
 he spoke and wrote with fluency, pungency, and vigor. Of 
 the many enterprises with which he has been connected his 
 rare versatility and energy have made him the life and soul. 
 " He would," says a fellow-laborer, " oversee their immense 
 mercantile business, go on 'Change, write two editorials, 
 attend a meeting of the American Antislavery Society's ex 
 ecutive committee, step into the noon prayer-meeting and pray 
 or deliver an exhortation, and wind up by sitting in the church 
 session, and addressing a temperance meeting composed of ne- 
 
 30 
 
234 RISE AND FALL QF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 groes in the evening, all in the same day ; all the time would 
 be in a hurry, but never flurried, and would seem perfectly at 
 home in each of these vocations." He infused much of his 
 own energy and system into the new society, besides contrib 
 uting largely to its funds. 
 
 Another member of that meeting and board was William 
 Goodell, a lifelong friend of the Tappans and of the slave. 
 Among the earliest in the field, fond of abstract reasoning, 
 speculation, and fundamental principles, he was, perhaps, too 
 prone to adopt extreme opinions and impracticable theories. 
 Though apt to be diffuse and prolix, he often condensed his 
 thoughts and gave them most clear, terse, and forcible expres 
 sion. Eminently conscientious and of undaunted courage and 
 untiring industry, he rendered invaluable service to an unpop 
 ular but righteous cause in the days of its feebleness. For 
 half a century he developed and brought to light by his inde 
 fatigable labors a mass of facts and reasonings on the subject, 
 which have afforded rich materials for the more effective use 
 by other men of more popular tact and talent. His " His 
 tory of Slavery and Antislavery " is a magazine from which 
 the speakers and writers of a generation drew their weapons 
 of attack and defence in the great conflict. 
 
 Another of the veterans who was present at that meeting was 
 Joshua Leavitt, a man of varied intelligence and of acknowl 
 edged ability, logical in his mode of thought, clear and forci 
 ble in his style of expression. From his long connection with 
 the press and frequent residence in Washington, where he was 
 on terms of intimacy with Adams, Giddings, Slade, and other 
 men of similar character, his information upon the political re 
 lations and bearings of slavery came to be comprehensive, 
 varied, and minute, and therefore of great practical service to 
 the antislavery cause. He was a fertile and voluminous writer, 
 and by his editorials, tracts, and other papers, did much to en 
 lighten the people and prepare them for political action. A 
 strong free-trader, his sympathies were more with the Demo 
 cratic party than with the Whigs, whom he manifestly dis 
 liked, and by whom his dislike was cordially reciprocated. 
 
 Such was the origin, material, and purpose of the New York 
 
THE NEW YORK ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 235 
 
 society. It was able in men and means, and did much in those 
 early days to bring and keep before the public eye the great 
 truths of human fraternity and man's political rights. And 
 yet, though it embraced so much of intellectual and moral 
 worth, with sentiments so humane and Christian, and purposes 
 so carefully and guardedly enunciated, it was at once de 
 nounced by mob and press, by truckling partisanship and re 
 ligious conservatism. The Colonizationists, deeming this organ 
 ization and its doctrines antagonistic to their own, joined in the 
 general denunciation. At a meeting held a few days after its 
 organization, immediate emancipation was bitterly denounced 
 and Abolitionists sternly rebuked. Chancellor Wai worth, whose 
 name was for many years associated with religious and benev 
 olent organizations, flippantly styled such generous, humane 
 and Christian men as had founded the new society " vision 
 ary enthusiasts " and " reckless demagogues." David B. Og- 
 den, one of the leaders of the New York bar, branded them 
 as " fanatics," and declared their doctrines " opposed to the 
 Constitution," and their organization " the poetry of philan 
 thropy." Even Theodore Frelinghuysen, eminent among 
 the men of his age for the purity of his public and private 
 character, and for his zeal and activity in the cause of religion 
 and benevolence, characterized the antislavery movement as 
 " the very wildness of fanaticism." Such language from such 
 men, in the then feverish condition of the public mind, clearly 
 tended to deepen the prejudices of those who had confidence 
 in their integrity, piety, and wisdom, and to arouse the brutal 
 passions of the rough and reckless. 
 
 How much such language, uttered at that time, contributed 
 to arouse the spirit of violence which was so fearfully developed 
 in that city during the next year will never be known. If such 
 men could so violate the sanctities of Christian character and 
 confidence, was it strange that the mob should invade the 
 sanctities, no more sacred, of private dwellings and the house 
 of God ? In the light of to-day, was it less censurable in 
 Chancellors Walworth and Frelinghuysen thus to arraign the 
 public character and conduct of such men, and that in regard 
 to purposes and plans so pure and benign, than for the un- 
 
236 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 named and lawless ruffianism of New York to rifle the houses 
 of Lewis Tappan and Dr. Cox, or break into and disperse the 
 meeting at Chatham Street Chapel ? 
 
 Notwithstanding, however, this violent and systematic op 
 position, the cause of immediate emancipation made rapid 
 progress during the year. No less than twenty-five periodicals 
 and newspapers gave it their support. One hundred and 
 twenty-four clergymen, mostly in New England, united in an 
 address to the public, setting forth similar sentiments. During 
 the year John G. Whittier published his " Justice and Expedi 
 ency," an earnest, tender, and eloquent appeal to his country 
 men in behalf of oppressed millions who were perishing as the 
 brute perished and whose blood was upon the nation. About 
 the same time, Mrs. Lydia Maria Child issued her " APPEAL IN 
 
 FAVOR OF THAT CLASS OF AMERICANS CALLED AFRICANS." This 
 
 volume, of more than two hundred pages, was a work of rare 
 merit, and exerted, perhaps more than any other, a powerful 
 influence upon thoughtful and cultivated minds. At the be 
 ginning of the same year, Rev. Amos A. Phelps published his 
 " Lectures upon Slavery and its Remedy," in a volume of 
 nearly three hundred pages. Of this work Mr. Garrison, many 
 years afterward, said " that it elucidated the nature of slavery, 
 the sin of making property in man, and the duty of immediate 
 emancipation, in a manner so masterly as never to have been 
 surpassed by any writer since that time. It was an encyclo 
 paedia of fact, argument, illustration, and logic." 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 HOSTILITY TO COLORED SCHOOLS. MISS CRANDALL'S SCHOOL 
 SUPPRESSED. 
 
 Slavery Hostile to Education. Proposed Collegiate School at New Haven. 
 Hostile Action of the Citizens of New Haven. Noyes Academy in New 
 Hampshire. Colored Students admitted. Institution broken up. Miss 
 Crandall's School in Connecticut. Admission of Colored Pupils. Hostility 
 of the People. Arbitrary Legislation. Imprisonment of Miss Crandall. 
 Samuel J. May. Arthur Tappan. Trial. Failure of the Prosecution. 
 Persecution of Miss Crandall. Incendiary Attempts. Abandonment of her 
 School. Her Opposers Triumphant. 
 
 AMONG the essential conditions of American slavery was the 
 necessary ignorance of its victims. By its own inexorable laws 
 they were doomed to moral and mental debasement. Conse 
 quently the slaveholder and his abettors looked with disfavor 
 upon any efforts which were designed or calculated to instruct 
 either the slave himself or any of his race. Free persons of 
 color, at the North as well as the South, had felt the full force 
 of this admitted necessity. Generous efforts to instruct their 
 darkened minds encountered opposition, as they themselves 
 were made to feel the repressive influences of this wicked and 
 abnormal system. Wherever such efforts had been made to 
 establish institutions for the higher culture of colored youth, 
 they had signally failed. The antislavery movement, how 
 ever, had excited higher hopes and aspirations. The more 
 advanced of the colored race, and their friends who were 
 pledged to the immediate emancipation of the slave and the 
 protection and elevation of free people of color, saw the ne 
 cessity and recognized the duty either of founding institutions 
 for their education or of opening for their admission those 
 already established. The well-known devotion of New Eng 
 land to popular education caused them to look to her for en- 
 
238 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 couragement, as that portion of the country where their hopes 
 might be realized. But they were speedily doomed to disap 
 pointment, and made to feel that, though the tree of slavery 
 was planted on Southern soil, its branches overshadowed, as 
 its roots penetrated, the whole land, shedding its blighting 
 influences on Northern as well as Southern hearts. 
 
 At the convention, held in Philadelphia in 1831, of the dele 
 gates of free people of color from the several States, it was 
 resolved to make an effort to establish a collegiate school on 
 the manual-labor plan. A committee was appointed to raise 
 the necessary funds and carry, if possible, the plan into execu 
 tion. In their appeal to the public, they stated with great 
 clearness the difficulties experienced by colored children in 
 gaining admission into seminaries of learning, as also into 
 manufacturing and mechanical establishments. They further 
 recommended that the proposed institution should be located 
 in the city of New Haven, and that there should be incorpo 
 rated into its plan the principle of self-support ; so that stu 
 dents might, with the attainment of that object, cultivate 
 habits of industry and obtain useful information and skill in 
 mechanical and agricultural pursuits while pursuing their 
 classical studies. Bishop White of Philadelphia and several 
 clergymen of distinction gave their prompt and cordial ap 
 proval to the project. 
 
 Connecticut was distinguished for its literary institutions, 
 its system of common schools, its mechanical pursuits and 
 diversified industries. This motion, however, to establish 
 within its borders a seminary of learning for the education 
 and higher culture of colored youth created the most profound 
 excitement and called forth the most determined resistance. 
 The mayor of New Haven at once summoned a meeting of its 
 citizens " to take into consideration a scheme said to be in 
 progress for the establishment in this city of a college for the 
 education of colored youth." At this meeting, held on the 
 8th of September, 1831, it was resolved by the mayor, common 
 council, and legal voters of the city that " we will resist the 
 establishment of the proposed college in this place by every 
 lawful means." In the preamble to these resolutions, the 
 
HOSTILITY TO COLORED SCHOOLS. 239 
 
 doctrine of immediate emancipation and the founding of col 
 leges for the education of colored people were pronounced an 
 unwarrantable and dangerous interference with the internal 
 concerns of the State, which ought to be discouraged. In that 
 crowded assembly, in a city distinguished for its educational 
 institutions and facilities, which had responded so generously 
 to the claims of the Colonization Society for the civilization of 
 Africa, and the appeals of the missionary enterprise for the 
 conversion of the world, only one voice was raised against 
 that unjust, unchristian, and inhuman resolution. That was 
 the voice of Rev. Simeon S. Jocelyn, who was among the ear 
 liest, not only to accept the doctrine of immediate emanci 
 pation, but to labor earnestly and persistently for the moral 
 and educational elevation of the free people of color. Thus, 
 by the cruel and wicked prejudices of the people of Connecti 
 cut, many of whom professed a personal interest in that gos 
 pel whose practical requirements and realization they then so 
 strangely ignored, was defeated this beneficent purpose for 
 promoting the improvement of the colored race. 
 
 This action of the citizens of New Haven, while it discour 
 aged, did not prevent still further efforts for the establishment 
 of such an academic institution in New England. Several 
 thousand dollars were subscribed, and several places were 
 recommended for its establishment. The trustees of the 
 Noyes Academy, in Canaan, New Hampshire, opened their 
 institution for the admission of colored students. Several 
 young men entered the academy, and for a time the friends 
 of the colored race were encouraged to believe that an insti 
 tution had been found where colored youth might enjoy the 
 means of acquiring an advanced education. That hope, how 
 ever, was soon dispelled. A legal town-meeting was called, 
 and held on the 3d of July, 1835, at which, after discussion, 
 a committee was chosen to remove the academy. From an 
 official account, published in the New Hampshire " Patriot," 
 the leading Democratic paper of the State, it appears that, 
 on the morning of the 10th of August, the committee, aided 
 by some three hundred persons with one hundred yoke of 
 oxen and the necessary apparatus, proceeded to the execu- 
 
240 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 tion of their discreditable task. It is stated that the most 
 respectable and wealthy farmers of that vicinity were engaged 
 in this lawless procedure. " The building," says this official 
 account, " was safely landed on the corner near the Baptist 
 meeting-house, where it stands, not like the monument on 
 Bunker's heights, erected in memory of those departed spirits 
 who fought and fell struggling for liberty, but as the monu 
 ment of those living spirits who are struggling to destroy 
 what our fathers have gained." 
 
 This was in the year of grace 1835. And what was the 
 offence ? A dozen colored youth were admitted into Noyes 
 Academy, an incorporated institution in the State of New 
 Hampshire, on equal terms with other youth, for moral and 
 intellectual culture. That was all, the very head and front 
 of their offending. For this offence the citizens, in formal 
 town-meeting assembled, voted to remove it from its foun 
 dations. The committee, with unseemly alacrity, hastened to 
 carry into effect this strange vote ; and, as if that were not 
 enough, as if servility must needs go further, all unconscious 
 of the disgrace involved in such a record, rushed into print, and 
 sent an official account to the leading paper of the State, 
 and all this, too, in the name of " liberty " ! Could there be a 
 greater or stranger confusion of ideas ? Could the fanaticism 
 of slavery go further ? How demoralized the community which 
 could furnish the actors in such a drama, and thus applaud 
 it when enacted ! 
 
 Miss Prudence Crandall, a member of the Society of Friends, 
 had established a good reputation as a teacher in Plainfield, 
 Connecticut. In the autumn of 1832, invited by several 
 prominent citizens, she purchased a large house in the village 
 of Canterbury, and established a school for young ladies in 
 the higher branches of education. A few months after com 
 mencing her school, she admitted Sarah Harris, a colored 
 girl, a member of the village church. She had attended 
 the district school, and desired, to use her own words, " to 
 get a little more learning, enough to teach colored chil 
 dren." Although she had been a classmate of some of 
 Miss Crandall's pupils in the district school, objection was 
 
HOSTILITY TO COLORED SCHOOLS. 241 
 
 soon raised to her remaining in this, institution, and remon 
 strances were made by several patrons of the new school 
 against her continuance, though some of them belonged to the 
 same church, and though they knew nothing to her discredit, 
 except that she belonged to the proscribed race. But their 
 prejudices against color and their pride of caste were aroused, 
 and they were resolved it should never be said that their 
 daughters "went to school with a nigger." Miss Crandall 
 had invested all her property in the building, and had incurred 
 something of a debt besides ; and the alternative presented to 
 her of dismissing that colored girl or losing her white pupils 
 was a sore trial. She, however, met the issue bravely, grandly, 
 and in the spirit of self-abnegation and devotion to principle, 
 leaving the event with God. 
 
 Having determined on her course, she advertised that at the 
 commencement of her next term, her school would be opened 
 for young ladies and little misses of color, and others who 
 might wish to attend. The people of Canterbury, on learning 
 the fact, were greatly enraged and thrown into intense excite 
 ment. A town meeting was called on the 9th of March, before 
 the term began, to adopt measures to avert or abate the threat 
 ened " nuisance." In the mean time Miss Crandall was grossly 
 insulted and slandered. Rev. Samuel J. May, then a pastor 
 in the neighboring town of Brooklyn, George W. Benson, 
 and Arnold Buffum, president and agent of the New England 
 Antislavery Society, were commissioned by her to represent 
 her cause at the town meeting. At the meeting resolutions 
 were introduced protesting against the opening of such a 
 school, and suggesting the appointment of the selectmen to 
 wait upon Miss Crandall and persuade her, if possible, to re 
 linquish the project. Andrew T. Judson, a Democratic poli 
 tician, afterward a member of Congress and judge of the 
 District Court of the United States, resided on Canterbury 
 Green, in a house adjoining the building of the school ; and 
 this Democrat was horrified that a school for negro girls was 
 to be opened near his mansion. Confessedly a leader in this 
 mean and cruel crusade against that noble woman and her 
 benevolent design, he addressed the meeting in a strain of 
 
 31 
 
242 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 bitter and relentless hostility, and avowed his determined pur 
 pose to defeat it. 
 
 When he closed, Mr. Buffum and Mr. May presented a letter 
 to the moderator from Miss Crandall, requesting that they 
 might be heard in her behalf. But Judson and others sprang 
 to their feet, and with clenched fists admonished them to be si 
 lent. They were not permitted to speak, and she was thus de 
 nied even the courtesy of a hearing. And yet these gentlemen 
 went to the meeting ready to agree with the people of the town, 
 if they would repay to Miss Crandall what they had advised 
 her to give for the house and allow her time to remove, that 
 she would transfer her school to some more retired part of the 
 town and vicinity. But the meeting would hear nothing, and 
 adjourned with the purpose to crush the enterprise with or 
 without law. 
 
 Notwithstanding, however, this opposition, the school was 
 opened with some fifteen or twenty pupils. Then commenced 
 the most disgraceful persecutions. Her pupils were insulted 
 whenever they appeared in the village, the stores were closed 
 against her and them, her well was filled with filth, and her 
 house was repeatedly assailed. An attempt was made under 
 the Vagrant Act to drive her young pupils from the town ; but, 
 on Mr. May and other Brooklyn citizens giving bonds to the 
 amount of ten thousand dollars, that scheme was abandoned. 
 Baffled in their attempts, Mr. Judson and the town authorities 
 repaired to the legislature and secured the passage of a law 
 providing that no person should establish in that State any 
 school or other literary institution for the education of colored 
 persons who were not inhabitants of the State, nor harbor or 
 board any colored person not an inhabitant of the State for that 
 purpose, without the consent in writing from the selectmen of 
 the town in which such school or institution might be insti 
 tuted. This act, disgraceful alike in its passage and pro 
 visions, was received by the inhabitants of Canterbury and 
 vicinity with firing of cannon, ringing of bells, and other 
 demonstrations of general rejoicing. 
 
 A few days after its passage, Mr. May and George W. Ben 
 son visited Miss Crandall, to advise with her in regard to that 
 
 
HOSTILITY TO COLORED SCHOOLS. 
 
 243 
 
 inhuman and wicked enactment by which a woman might be 
 fined and imprisoned for giving instruction to colored children. 
 After consultation, it was determined, should she be prosecuted, 
 that she should remain in the hands of those with whom the 
 hideous act originated. On the 27th of June Miss Crandall 
 was arrested, brought before two justices of the peace, and 
 committed to take her trial at the next term of the county 
 court, in the month of August. Mr. May and his friends 
 were informed that she was in the hands of the sheriff, and 
 would be committed to jail unless bonds were given for her ap 
 pearance. According to agreement, however, the bonds were 
 not given, and the responsibility was thrown upon the framers 
 >f that infamous statute of giving the required sureties them 
 selves, or of committing an unoffending woman to jail. A man 
 had recently been confined in the jail for the murder of his 
 
 fe. The jailer, at the request of Mr. May, had his cell put in 
 order for her comfortable reception, should she be sent there, 
 'he sheriff and jailer saw and felt that her incarceration would 
 bring dishonor upon the State and deep disgrace upon her per- 
 
 iutors, and they lingered, in the hope that something might 
 
 done to avert the disagreeable alternative. 
 
 But she and her friends remained firm. When night came, 
 that brave and devoted woman was delivered into the hands 
 of the jailer, and led into the cell from which a murderer had 
 just passed to execution. Her friends retired, and she re- 
 
 bined in the prison till the morning, when the required 
 bonds were given. The intelligence of these proceedings 
 went over the country, exciting no small amount of feeling 
 in all, and in the better portion of the community intense in 
 dignation at the inhuman law and the scandalous proceed 
 ings that preceded and led to its enactment. Arthur Tappan, 
 with characteristic promptness and generosity, wrote at once 
 to Mr. May, indorsing his conduct, authorizing him to spare 
 no reasonable cost in her defence, employ the ablest coun 
 sel, and consider him responsible for the expense. Accord 
 ingly, Hon. William W. Ellsworth, Hon. Calvin Goddard, and 
 Hon. Henry Strong, eminent members of the Connecticut bar, 
 were retained. These distinguished lawyers expressed the 
 
244 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 opinion that the law was clearly unconstitutional, and would 
 be so pronounced by a competent judicial tribunal. 
 
 But the persecution against Miss Crandall went on. Even 
 physicians refused to attend the sick of her family. The 
 trustees of the church forbade her to come with any of her 
 family into the house of the Lord. But her friends stood 
 by her with unfaltering devotion. Arthur Tappan left his 
 pressing business, visited her, and was deeply affected by her 
 heroism and the courage and trust with which she inspired 
 her pupils. To Mr. May he said : " The cause of the whole 
 oppressed race of our country is to be much affected by the 
 decision of this question. You are almost helpless without 
 the press. You must issue a paper, publish it largely, send it 
 to all persons whom you know in the county and State, and to 
 all the principal newspapers throughout the country. Many 
 will subscribe for it and contribute largely to its support, and 
 I will pay whatever it may cost." Thus encouraged and sup 
 ported by the deep sympathy, large-hearted benevolence, and 
 sagacious counsel of Mr. Tappan, Mr. May commenced the 
 publication of a paper called the " Unionist." Charles C. 
 Burleigh, then living with his parents in the neighboring town 
 of Plainfield, assisting them on their farm, and at the same 
 time pursuing his legal studies, was sought out and made its 
 editor. Mr.. Burleigh thus commenced his antislavery career, 
 which he pursued with earnest fidelity to the end of the sys 
 tem he helped to destroy. By common consent, his talents 
 and forensic abilities were acknowledged to be of a high order. 
 None ever doubted his conscientiousness ; though many re 
 gretted certain idiosyncrasies of mind and manner, which 
 unquestionably impaired somewhat his usefulness, as they 
 marred the general symmetry of his character. 
 
 On the 23d of August, 1833, the trial of Miss Crandall for 
 the crime of teaching a school for colored girls was com 
 menced in the court of Windham County, Judge Joseph Eaton 
 presiding. Mr. Judson, her persecutor and prosecutor, took 
 the lead. He denied that colored persons were citizens in the 
 States where they were not enfranchised, and he insolently 
 inquired why a man should be educated who could not be a 
 
HOSTILITY TO COLORED SCHOOLS. 245 
 
 freeman. She was defended with signal ability. Though 
 Judge Eaton charged that he regarded the law as constitu 
 tional, the jury failed to return a verdict for conviction. It 
 was understood that seven were for it, and five were for ac 
 quittal. 
 
 Foiled in this attempt to procure conviction, and impatient 
 of delay, the prosecutors of the suit, refusing to wait for the 
 December term of the same court, commenced a new trial 
 before Judge Daggett, of the Supreme Court. The judge, a 
 native of Massachusetts, had risen rapidly in his profession, 
 had served in the United States Senate, and was then Chief 
 Justice of the Supreme Court of Connecticut. He was known 
 to have little sympathy with the colored people, and to have 
 been an advocate of the new law. Of course, no great sur 
 prise was felt at his adverse decision. In an elaborate opinion, 
 he maintained the constitutionality of the law, and declared 
 that he was not aware that free blacks were styled citizens in 
 the laws of Congress, or of any of the States. The jury ren 
 dered a verdict against Miss Crandall, and her counsel at once 
 filed a bill of exceptions and appealed the case. Before the 
 highest tribunal her cause was argued in July, 1834. That 
 court, however, decided that the case ought to be quashed for 
 legal informality, and tamely evaded the constitutional ques 
 tion by declaring it " unnecessary for the court to come to 
 any decision on the question as to the constitutionality of the 
 law." 
 
 Soon after this failure an unsuccessful attempt was made to 
 burn Miss Crandall' s house. In spite, however, of persecu 
 tions, insults, imprisonments, and the attempt to destroy her 
 dwelling, this brave woman struggled on in her work of disin 
 terested benevolence. But her enemies were determined and 
 implacable. On the 9th of September, near the hour of mid 
 night, her house was assaulted with clubs, doors and windows 
 were broken in, and the building left nearly untenantable. 
 Her few friends, having been invited to look upon the scene 
 of desolation, and deeming further effort unavailing, if not 
 perilous to life and limb, advised the abandonment of the 
 enterprise. Acting upon this advice, the heroic lady, who had 
 
246 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 breasted and braved the violence of the mob and the undis 
 guised intolerance of the community for seventeen months, 
 disbanded her school, and sent twenty young girls to their 
 homes, whose only offence, their enemies being judges, was 
 the color of their skin and their strong desire to learn. Mr. 
 May states that when he gave that advice the words blistered 
 his lips and his bosom glowed with indignation. " I felt 
 ashamed," he said, " of Canterbury, ashamed of Connecticut, 
 ashamed of my country, ashamed of my color." 
 
 It is in the light of such facts that the deep degradation and 
 demoralization reached by even the New England of those 
 days appears, when not only the demands of humanity and 
 religion were resisted, but the peculiar claims of womanhood 
 and childhood were rudely and roughly ignored. A lonely and, 
 from all that appears, a lovely woman of culture and charac 
 ter, at the head of a seminary of learning, yields to the impor 
 tunity of a colored girl of seventeen to get a little more learn 
 ing, that she may teach the children of her race, encounters 
 the rough hostility of the whole community, with hardly a dis 
 senting voice in the church or out of it, and is compelled to 
 accept the cruel alternative of turning her back, or of relin 
 quishing the patronage of those on the faith in whom she em 
 barked her all and ventured on the enterprise. The scene 
 shifts. 
 
 A new act in the drama, a real tragedy, without its blood, 
 opens. The same brave woman, true to her convictions and 
 deaf to the claims of selfish fear and interest, appears upon 
 the stage with twenty young girls, coming up from as many 
 lonely homes of a proscribed people, anxious to learn. To 
 aid them, to educate twenty immortal minds for their high 
 mission on earth, she not only sacrifices position and popular 
 favor, but bows beneath the crushing weight of public obloquy, 
 and hazards, not to say sacrifices, her pecuniary means without 
 reserve. And what had the public of Canterbury and Connec 
 ticut for such sublime devotion to principle, for such heroic 
 self-sacrifice ? Social ostracism, personal insult, exclusion 
 from God's house, a criminal trial, conviction and incarcera 
 tion in a murderer's cell ! Nor was this the work of unprin- 
 
HOSTILITY TO COLORED SCHOOLS. 
 
 247 
 
 cipled politicians and fellows of the baser sort alone, The 
 town and its church, the county and its court, the State and 
 its legislature, all joined in this dark business and contributed 
 to this sad result. 
 
 Do questions rush to the lip ? How could such things hap 
 pen ? How could there be philanthropy, or piety, or even 
 common honesty and humanity, or anything but barbarism, 
 in a community which could enact or tolerate such scenes ? 
 And yet there may have been; for perfect consistency is a 
 "jewel" rarely found, an exotic which seldom blooms on earth. 
 
 And yet these facts are both a puzzle and a mortification, 
 antagonistic alike to the doctrines of the Decalogue and of the 
 Declaration of Independence. So intensely unchristian, bar 
 barous, and despotic, they provoke, if they do not entirely 
 justify, the severe criticisms against both the Christianity and 
 republicanism not only of those but of later days. For these 
 facts were but representative of much that was then taking 
 place throughout the country, and which afterward trans 
 pired. 
 
 These scenes of Canterbury were hardly more disgrace 
 ful than those which were witnessed twenty years later in 
 Boston, at the rendition of Anthony Burns. Andrew T. Jud- 
 son, commanding the silence of the committee appearing in 
 behalf of Miss Crandall, in that old meeting-house at Can 
 terbury, was no more an instrument of the Slave Power 
 than was Mr. Webster, years afterward, demanding from the 
 steps of the Revere House, in Boston, that the citizens of New 
 England should " learn to conquer their prejudices." The 
 trustees of that church, excluding Prudence Crandall and her 
 pupils from the house of God, were hardly more obnoxious 
 to just condemnation than were the Fugitive Slave Act dis 
 courses and " South Side Views " of subsequent years. They 
 all reveal the sad truth that the virus of slavery was coursing 
 through the veins of the body politic, destroying its healthy 
 action, weakening its powers of reason and conscience, so that 
 the language of the prophet seems not too strong : " The 
 whole head is sick, the whole heart is faint." 
 
CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 NATIONAL ANTISL AVERT CONVENTION AT PHILADELPHIA. ORGAN 
 IZATION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 
 
 National Antislavery Convention called. Excited Condition of the Public 
 Mind. Conference held at the House of Evan Lewis. Assembling of the 
 Convention. Its Officers. Committee on the Declaration of Sentiments. 
 Resolutions. Speeches of Lewis Tappan, Amos A. Phelps. Female Anti- 
 slavery Societies recommended. The Constitution. The Object of the Socie 
 ty the entire Abolition of Slavery. Conference on the Declaration of Senti 
 ments. Words of Elizur "Wright, Jr. Declaration of Sentiments prepared 
 by Mr. Garrison. Reported by Mr. Atlee. The Declaration adopted. Sig 
 natures to the Declaration. Its Doctrines. Officers of the Society, Elizur 
 Wright, Jr., John G. Whittier, Amos A. Phelps, Theodore D. Weld, Ellis Gray 
 Loring, Robert Purvis. Increase of Auxiliary Societies. 
 
 * THE New England Antislavery Society, at its first anniver 
 sary, adopted a resolution, introduced by Mr. Garrison, in 
 structing its board of managers to call a meeting of the friends 
 of abolition to form a national antislavery society. No defi 
 nite action, however, was taken. 
 
 In the autumn of 1833 Evan Lewis, a member of the Socie 
 ty of Friends, conductor of " The Friend," an antislavery jour 
 nal in Philadelphia, and a man of whom it was said " he was 
 afraid of nothing but being or doing wrong," visited the city 
 of New York to persuade leading Abolitionists to unite in call 
 ing a national convention. A small meeting was held, at 
 which, after considerable discussion, it was voted, by a mere 
 majority, to call such a convention at Philadelphia, on the 4th 
 of the following December. Many Abolitionists, however, en 
 tertained serious doubts whether the time had come for hold 
 ing a convention for that purpose. Nor is it a matter of 
 surprise that such should have been the fact. It required 
 principle, nerve, moral courage, and a martyr spirit thus 
 to lead the forlorn hope of a then most unpopular cause ; 
 
ORGANIZATION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 249 
 
 more even than when, under the cover of comparative ob 
 scurity, the New England society was organized. It was a 
 time, too, of feverish excitement, exasperation, and intense 
 bitterness of feeling, word, and act ; when the mob violence of 
 the street was but the counterpart of the similar though more 
 decorous demonstrations of the counting-room, the parlor, and 
 the church. The Colonizationists had always manifested hostil 
 ity to the antislavery cause. Their society had declared in 1828, 
 four years before the organization of the New England Anti- 
 slavery Society, that "it is in no wise allied to any abolition 
 society in America or elsewhere ; and is ready, when there is 
 need, to pass a censure upon such societies in America." The 
 organization of societies pledged to immediate emancipation, 
 the successful visit of Mr. Garrison to England, his unac 
 cepted challenge of their champion to public discussion, the 
 protest of Wilberforce and his compeers against their scheme, 
 had so incensed its friends that even professedly Christian 
 men were prepared to justify a resort to almost any measure 
 to oppose and put down what they deemed a pestilent heresy. 
 To go to Philadelphia at such a time and on such an errand 
 was anything but a holiday affair. 
 
 On the evening preceding the assembling of the convention, 
 a meeting* of some thirty or forty delegates was held at the 
 house of Evan Lewis, who had been chiefly instrumental in its 
 convocation at that time. Lewis Tappan of New York pre 
 sided. A committee was appointed to secure the services of 
 some well-known citizen and philanthropist of Philadelphia to 
 preside over the convention. Thomas Wister, a member of 
 the Society of Friends, declined the invitation. The commit 
 tee then invited Robert Yaux, of the same denomination ; but 
 he declined, though an Abolitionist. As the committee retired, 
 not a little mortified and irritated at their ill success, Mr. May, 
 one of their number, reports that Beriah Green sarcastically 
 remarked : " If there is not timber amongst ourselves big 
 enough to make a president of, let us get along without one, or 
 go home and stay there till we have grown up to be men." 
 
 The convention assembled at the Adelphi Buildings, on the 
 4th of December. Beriah Green of the Oneida Institute, in 
 
 32 
 
250 BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the State of New York, was elected president ; and Lewis Tap- 
 pan of the city of New York, and John G. Whittier of Mas 
 sachusetts, were made secretaries. These officers were thus 
 pleasantly characterized by Mr. J. Miller McKim, one of the 
 youngest members of the convention, and ever since an active 
 Abolitionist. 
 
 " A better man than Mr. Green could not have been se 
 lected. Though of plain exterior and unimposing presence, he 
 was a man of learning and superior ability ; in every way 
 above the average of so-called men of eminence. Mr. Tappan, 
 who sat at his right, was a jaunty, maii-of-the-world looking 
 person, well dressed and handsome, with a fine voice and tak 
 ing appearance. Whittier, who sat at his left, was quite as 
 fine-looking, though in a different way. He wore a dark frock- 
 coat with standing collar, which, with his thin hair, dark and 
 sometimes flashing eyes, and black whiskers, not large, but 
 noticeable in those unhirsute days, gave him, to my then 
 unpractised eye, quite as much of a military as a Quaker 
 aspect. His broad, square forehead and well-cut features, 
 aided by his incipient reputation as a poet, made him quite a 
 noticeable feature in the convention." 
 
 It was then voted that delegates from antislavery societies, 
 and all other persons in favor of emancipation without expa 
 triation, be entitled to seats in the convention. Its sessions 
 continued during three days. The members were admonished 
 by the police not to hold evening sessions, as they could not 
 be protected after dark. Committees were appointed to pre 
 pare a constitution, nominate a list of officers, and draft a 
 declaration of principles, to which the signatures of mem 
 bers should be affixed. That committee consisted of Dr. Ed 
 win P. Atlee of Philadelphia, Elizur Wright, Jr. of New York, 
 William Lloyd Garrison of Massachusetts, Simeon S. Jocelyn 
 of Connecticut, David Thurston of Maine, John M. Sterling 
 of Ohio, William Green, Jr. of New York City, John G. Whit 
 tier of Massachusetts, William Goodell of New York, and 
 Samuel J. May of Connecticut. 
 
 On the second day of its session the convention, on motion 
 of the Rev. Charles W. Denison, editor of the " Enaancipa- 
 
ORGANIZATION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 251 
 
 tor," voted to take measures to ascertain how many clergymen 
 in the United States were slaveholders ; and a committee of 
 three was chosen to carry the resolution into effect. It was 
 then moved by John Rankin of New York that the thanks 
 of the convention be extended to those editors who have em 
 barked in the cause of emancipation, and that to their support 
 in the good work the members pledge their individual and 
 collective influence. Upon this resolution the convention 
 resolved itself into a committee of the whole, and Mr. James 
 McCrummell, a colored delegate from Philadelphia, was called 
 to the chair. President Green spoke warmly for editors who 
 had stood erect and exposed their bosoms to the shafts which 
 calumny had thrown. " They have," he said, " stood out 
 amidst falling missiles and jarring notes of opposition ; and, 
 like trumpets, lifted up their voices for the poor and needy, 
 the suffering and the dumb." He expressed to them his grat 
 itude, and avowed his willingness to present his own " bare 
 bosom to the foe, and receive the shafts intended for them." 
 
 Lewis Tappan followed in warm and eloquent commenda 
 tion of the services of Benjamin Lundy and William Lloyd 
 Garrison. He wished the members of the convention by their 
 action to show to posterity that the men contemplated in the 
 resolution were held in high esteem. " Although they are," 
 he said, " held accursed by those who know them not, and 
 who seek to impeach their motives and destroy their lives ; 
 yet the coming generations shall hallow their memories and 
 rise up and call them blessed." 
 
 Rev. Amos A. Phelps of Massachusetts earnestly supported 
 the resolution. He referred in words of tender eulogy to the 
 Rev. Charles B. Storrs, late president of the Western Reserve 
 College, who had recently died at Braintree, Massachusetts. 
 He stated that Mr. Storrs, while lying on his death-bed, re 
 quested that a pen should be placed in his hands, that he might 
 affix his name to a declaration of antislavery principles about to 
 be issued. " He commenced," said Mr. Phelps, " tracing his 
 name, and had written the first word, ' Charles,' when he dis 
 covered that two of the letters had been transposed. Letting 
 the pen fall, and turning to his brother, standing by, he ex- 
 
252 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 claimed, with an energy peculiar to him : ' I can write no more. 
 Brother, do you finish my name. Those principles are eternal 
 truth. They cannot be shaken. I wish to give to them my 
 dying testimony.' ' Mr. Phelps expressed the opinion that the 
 death of President Storrs had been hastened by over-exertion 
 in delivering an address of great vigor and power of more than 
 two hours in length, in behalf of the slave. Mr. Storrs was a 
 gentleman of high promise and scholarship, of Christian prin 
 ciple and earnest philanthropy, in whose untimely death free 
 dom lost one of its earliest and ablest champions. The touch 
 ing scene at his death-bed is one among the evidences that 
 the antislavery struggle in this country was born of a zeal and 
 heroic devotion to principle which finds not many parallels in 
 the world's history. 
 
 The convention having unanimously adopted the resolu 
 tion, Mr. Denison introduced a proposition recommending the 
 youth of the country, without distinction of sex, to form aux 
 iliary antislavery societies, which was unanimously adopted. 
 A resolution, introduced by Robert B. Hall, recommending 
 that the Christian church throughout the land should observe 
 the last Monday evening of each month in seeking the Divine 
 aid in behalf of the slave and of the free people of color, was 
 then unanimously adopted ; as was also another resolution, 
 introduced by Samuel J. May, pledging the members of the 
 convention to an effort to secure from the several denomina 
 tions to which they belonged solemn and earnest addresses 
 in behalf of the oppressed to affiliated churches in the slave- 
 holding States. 
 
 Mr. Garrison introduced a resolution in which it was 
 declared that the cause of abolition eminently deserved the 
 countenance and support of American women ; and Horace 
 P. Wakefield of Massachusetts introduced another, hailing the 
 establishment of ladies' antislavery societies as the harbinger 
 of a brighter day. These resolutions were also unanimously 
 adopted, as were others, declaring that the fountains of knowl 
 edge, like those of salvation, should be opened to every crea 
 ture ; that the laws against teaching colored people were cruel 
 and impious ; that the statutes and customs which withhold 
 
ORGANIZATION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 253 
 
 the Bible from the slave were inconsistent with the first prin 
 ciples of religious liberty ; and that the teachers of religion 
 who failed to lift the warning voice against oppression did not 
 declare the whole counsel of God. Kindred resolutions, breath 
 ing the spirit of liberty, justice, humanity, and Christianity, 
 were adopted with great unanimity. 
 
 In the constitution adopted, the object of the society was 
 declared to be the entire abolition of slavery in the United 
 States. While admitting that each State had exclusive right 
 to legislate in regard to its abolition, it avowed as its aim to 
 convince the people of the slave States, by arguments addressed 
 to their understandings and consciences, that slaveholding was 
 a heinous crime against God, and that duty and safety re 
 quired its immediate abandonment, but without expatriation. 
 It favored the abolition of the domestic slave-trade and of slav 
 ery in the District of Columbia ; and urged the duty of elevat 
 ing the character and condition of the free people of color, and 
 of giving them equality with whites in civil and religious privi 
 leges, though it discountenanced any resort to physical force 
 for the vindication of these rights. 
 
 But the most important action of the convention was its 
 declaration of principles. A committee of ten had been ap 
 pointed on the first day of the session to prepare such a paper. 
 That committee, with several other members, assembled at the 
 rooms of the chairman. Those present were invited to state 
 their views concerning the document which all deemed so im 
 portant. The suggestions made revealed great unanimity of 
 opinion. The Rev. Samuel J. May states, in his " Recollections 
 of the Antislavery Conflict," that Elizur Wright, Jr., gave utter 
 ance to these pregnant words : " I wish that the difference be 
 tween our purpose and that of the Colonization Society should 
 be explicitly stated. We mean to exterminate slavery from 
 our country, with its accursed influences. The Colonization- 
 ists only wish to get rid of the slaves so soon as they be 
 come free. Their plan is unrighteous, cruel, and impracti 
 cable withal. Our plan needs but a good will and a right 
 spirit among the white people to accomplish it." 
 
 After some time spent in this conference, Mr. Garrison, Mr. 
 
254 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Whittier, and Mr. May were appointed a sub-committee to pre 
 pare a draft of a paper setting forth the principles, sentiments, 
 and purposes of the new society. The sub-committee immedi 
 ately repaired to Mr. Garrison's lodgings ; and, after a brief 
 consultation, he was requested to prepare it. The sub-com 
 mittee met early next morning, made a few slight altera 
 tions, and submitted the draft to the whole committee at 
 nine o'clock. Alluding to this circumstance, years after, Mr. 
 Whittier thus happily refers to this meeting : " I recall the 
 early gray morning when, with Samuel J. May, our colleague 
 on the committee to prepare a declaration of sentiments for 
 the convention , I climbed to the small t upper chamber ' of a 
 colored friend to hear thee read the first draft of a paper which 
 will live as long as our national history." 
 
 For hours this document was subjected to a careful and criti 
 cal examination ; yet but few alterations were found necessary. 
 Mr. Garrison had arraigned the Colonization Society with 
 characteristic severity. But his strictures were omitted, on 
 motion of Mr. May, for the reason that the Colonization So 
 ciety could not long survive the deadly blows already aimed 
 at it ; and it was not worth while to perpetuate its memory 
 in this declaration of the rights of man. This omission 
 was resisted by Mr. Garrison ; but, finding the committee 
 were favorable to it, he promptly yielded, with the remark, 
 " Brethren, it is your report, not mine." 
 
 Edwin P. Atlee, chairman of the committee, reported the 
 declaration to the convention. Its reading produced a pro 
 found impression. It was then moved by a member of the 
 Society of Friends that it be adopted, and that the members 
 proceed at once to append to it their signatures. " We have," 
 he said, " already given it our assent ; every heart here has 
 responded to it. There is a doctrine of the Friends which 
 impelled me to make the motion I have done. First impres 
 sions are from heaven. I fear, if we go about criticising and 
 amending this declaration, we shall qualify its truthfulness and 
 impair its strength." But the convention thought otherwise. 
 It was read paragraph by paragraph, and discussed for several 
 hours ; very few changes, however, were made. The venera- 
 
OKGANIZATION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 255 
 
 ble Thomas Shipley, a Quaker, and a long-tried friend of the 
 black man, objected to the word " manstealer," as applied to 
 the slaveholder ; but it was suggested by Lucretia Mott that the 
 term be retained, with an amendment inserting before it the 
 words " according to Scripture," and the suggestion was 
 adopted. The document, with this slight modification, was 
 then unanimously adopted. 
 
 Thus far the convention had been a success. Its numbers, 
 its character, its harmony, and its enthusiasm were animating 
 and auspicious. But its hours of deliberation and conference 
 were over. Agreeing among themselves, their great work 
 was now to convince others. Framing a platform on which 
 they could stand, they were to go forth, and, in a conservative 
 and captious community, make proselytes who would occupy it 
 with them. Happily blinded to the severity and the length of 
 the contest on which they were entering, they went forth con 
 fident in the power of truth and in the favor of the Almighty. 
 
 On the morning of the third day the declaration, which 
 had in the mean time been engrossed, was submitted for signa 
 tures ; and upon it sixty-two members, representing ten States, 
 enrolled their names. Lucretia Mott, Esther Moore, Lydia 
 White, Sydney Ann Lewis, and several other Quaker women 
 of Philadelphia, were, after the first day, in constant attend 
 ance on the convention, and were deeply interested in its 
 work. But their names were not enrolled as members, nor 
 appended to its declaration of principles. While that declara 
 tion, however, was under consideration, Mrs. Mott, a woman 
 of fine intellectual development, with a rare combination of 
 firmness, gentleness, and clear moral perceptions, rose and, 
 remarking that she was there by sufferance, said that, if per 
 mitted, she would make a suggestion. She paused for a mo 
 ment, as if unwilling to offend even the prejudices of any 
 of its members, when President Green promptly, and in a 
 voice at once cordial and encouraging, bade her go on, while 
 others seconded his words. She suggested several modifica 
 tions, and gave the reasons why they should be made with such 
 clearness and precision that they were readily assented to. 
 
 The declaration was a paper of great ability and power, 
 
256 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the power of timely truth and of appropriate and forcible 
 expression. Commencing with a reference to the time, fifty- 
 seven years before, when, in the same city of Philadelphia, 
 our fathers announced to the world their Declaration of Inde 
 pendence, based on the self-evident truths of human equality 
 and rights, and appealed to arms for its defence, it spoke of 
 the new enterprise as one " without which that of our fathers 
 is incomplete," and as transcending theirs in magnitude, so 
 lemnity, and probable results, as much " as moral truth does 
 physical force." It spoke of the difference of the two in the 
 means and ends proposed, and of the trifling grievances of 
 our fathers, compared with the wrongs and sufferings of the 
 slaves, which it forcibly characterized as unequalled by any 
 others on the face of the earth. It claimed that the nation 
 was bound to repent at once, to let the oppressed go free, and 
 to admit them to all the rights and privileges of others ; be 
 cause, it asserted, no man has a right to enslave or imbrute 
 his brother ; because liberty is inalienable ; because there is 
 no difference, in principle, between slaveholding and mansteal- 
 ing, which the law brands as piracy ; and because no length 
 of bondage can invalidate man's claim to himself, or render 
 slave laws anything but " an audacious usurpation." 
 
 It maintained that no compensation should be given to 
 planters emancipating slaves, because that would be a surren 
 der of fundamental principles ; because " slavery is a crime, 
 and is, therefore, not an article to be sold " ; because slave 
 holders are not just proprietors of what they claim ; because 
 emancipation would destroy only nominal, not real property ; 
 and because compensation, if given at all, should be given to 
 the slaves. 
 
 It declared " any scheme of expatriation " to be " delusive, 
 cruel, and dangerous." It fully recognized the right of each 
 State to legislate exclusively on the subject of slavery within 
 its limits, and conceded that Congress, under the present na 
 tional compact, had no right to interfere ; though still con 
 tending that it had the power, and should exercise it, " to 
 suppress the domestic slave-trade between the several States," 
 and " to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia and in 
 
ORGANIZATION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISL AVERT SOCIETY. 257 
 
 those portions of our territory which the Constitution has 
 placed under its exclusive jurisdiction." Having thus clearly 
 and cogently announced the principles of the enterprise thus 
 solemnly undertaken and avowed ; having guarded with scru 
 pulous care against all infringement of the personal or consti 
 tutional rights of any person or State, it closed with the fol 
 lowing eloquent portrayal of the obligations still admitted, the 
 agencies to be employed, with a pledge of unswerving fidelity 
 to the work undertaken, and an unwavering trust in the guid 
 ing hand and final blessing of God : 
 
 " We also maintain that there are, at the present time, the 
 highest obligations resting upon the people of the free States 
 to remove slavery by moral and political action, as prescribed 
 in the Constitution of the United States. They are now liv 
 ing under a pledge of their tremendous physical force to fasten 
 the galling fetters of tyranny upon the limbs of millions in 
 the Southern States ; they are liable to be called at any mo 
 ment to suppress a general insurrection of the slaves ; they 
 authorize the slave-owner to vote on three-fifths of his slaves 
 as property, and thus enable him to perpetuate his oppression ; 
 they support a standing army at the South for its protection; 
 and they seize the slave who has escaped into their territories, 
 and send him back to be tortured by an enraged master or a 
 brutal driver. This relation to slavery is criminal, and full of 
 danger ; IT MUST BE BROKEN UP. 
 
 " These are our views and principles, these our designs 
 and measures. With entire confidence in the overruling jus 
 tice of God, we plant ourselves upon the Declaration of Inde 
 pendence and the truths of Divine revelation as upon the ever 
 lasting rock. 
 
 " We shall organize antislavery societies, if possible, in every 
 city, town, and village in our land. 
 
 " We shall send forth agents to lift up the voice of remon 
 strance, of warning, of entreaty and rebuke. 
 
 " We shall circulate unsparingly and extensively antislav 
 ery tracts and periodicals. 
 
 " We shall enlist the pulpit and the press in the cause of the 
 suffering and the dumb. 
 
 33 
 
258 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 " We shall aim at a purification of the churches from all 
 participation in the guilt of slavery. 
 
 " We shall encourage the labor of freemen, rather than that 
 of slaves, by giving a preference to their productions ; and 
 
 " We shall spare no exertions nor means to bring the whole 
 nation to speedy repentance. 
 
 " Our trust for victory is solely in God. We may be per 
 sonally defeated, but our principles never. TRUTH, JUSTICE, 
 REASON, HUMANITY, must and will gloriously triumph. Al 
 ready a host is coming up to the help of the Lord against the 
 mighty, and the prospect before us is full of encouragement. 
 
 " Submitting this DECLARATION to the candid examina 
 tion of the people of this country, and of the friends of Liberty 
 throughout the world, we hereby affix our signatures to it ; 
 pledging ourselves that, under the guidance and by the help 
 of Almighty God, we will do all that in us lies, consistently 
 with this declaration of our principles, to overthrow the most 
 execrable system of slavery that has ever been witnessed upon 
 earth, to deliver our land from its deadliest curse, to wipe out 
 the foulest stain which rests upon our national escutcheon, 
 and to secure to the colored population of the United States 
 all the rights and privileges which belong to them as men and 
 as Americans, come what may to our persons, our interests, or 
 our reputation ; whether we live to witness the triumph of 
 LIBERTY, JUSTICE, and HUMANITY, or perish untimely as mar 
 tyrs in this great, benevolent, and holy cause." 
 
 The president of the convention made a closing address. 
 Profound silence pervaded the hall as he rapidly glanced at 
 the great work which had been accomplished. He referred to 
 the constitution of the new society, to its list of officers, to the 
 signing and the sending forth to the world of its Declaration 
 of Sentiments, to the union and earnestness which had marked 
 the proceedings, and to the meeting of congenial minds, where 
 heart had beat responsive to heart in the holy work of seeking 
 to benefit the outraged and despised colored race. He closed 
 his speech which for eloquence and thrilling power will 
 never be forgotten by those who heard it with these words 
 of heroic self-sacrifice, faith, and trust : 
 
ORGANIZATION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 259 
 
 " But now we must retire from these balmy influences, and 
 breathe another atmosphere. The chill hoar-frost will be 
 upon us. The storm and tempest will rise, and the waves of 
 persecution will dash against our souls. Let us be prepared 
 for the worst. Let us fasten ourselves to the throne of God 
 as with hooks of steel. If we cling not to Him, our names to 
 that document will be but as dust. 
 
 " Let us court no applause ; indulge in no spirit of vain 
 boasting. Let us be assured that our only hope in grappling 
 with the bony monster is in an Arm that is stronger than 
 ours. Let us fix our gaze on God, and walk in the light of 
 his countenance. If our cause be just, and we know it is, 
 his omnipotence is pledged to its triumph. Let this cause 
 be intwined around the very fibres of our hearts. Let our 
 hearts grow to it, so that nothing but death can sunder the 
 bond." 
 
 Having finished his address, he " immediately," to use the 
 words of one who heard him, " lifted up his voice to the 
 Throne of Heavenly Grace in a prayer full of fervor and zeal, 
 imploring the forgiveness and blessing of God to descend and 
 sanctify the convention." 
 
 Such were the origin and organization of the American Anti- 
 slavery Society. Its board of officers embraced many men of 
 marked ability, as well as of recognized position and influence. 
 Arthur Tappan was chosen president, and gave to the new as 
 sociation, not only the benefit of his warm devotion to the 
 cause, but his great practical sagacity and prestige as a lead 
 ing merchant of New York. 
 
 Elizur Wright, Jr., then of the same city, was made secre 
 tary of domestic correspondence, and continued in that posi 
 tion till 1838. He was also a member, ex qfficio, of the execu 
 tive committee. Its annual reports, with slight contributions 
 from others, were from his pen, and constitute an important 
 part of the antislavery literature of the five eventful years in 
 which he filled the office. Mr. Wright held a bold and incisive 
 pen, which he ever wielded in the interests of humanity. If 
 his words were sometimes curt and caustic, they were always 
 vigorous and effective ; and if he was sometimes impulsive and 
 
260 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 impracticable, there was always an air of refreshing boldness 
 and honesty in what he said and did. 
 
 Dr. Abraham L. Cox of New York was made recording sec 
 retary. He was earnest, industrious, impulsive, energetic ; but 
 not, like his compeers of that day, persistent and unflinching. 
 Mr. Garrison was selected as secretary of foreign correspond 
 ence. For this post he was eminently fitted by his knowledge 
 of antislavery leaders abroad, as also by their recognition of 
 him as the foremost among the Abolitionists of this country. 
 
 There were twenty-five vice-presidents. Among them were 
 the venerable Moses Brown of Rhode Island, an early Aboli 
 tionist and philanthropist, whose well-directed munificence 
 was largely bestowed upon and most honorably associated with 
 the University of that State ; General Samuel Fessenden of 
 Maine, a distinguished lawyer and a consistent Christian 
 statesman ; and Rev. Samuel J. May, who was among the 
 earliest to espouse the then hated cause of immediate eman 
 cipation, and who for forty years was indefatigable in his 
 labors for freedom, devoting without faltering his talents, 
 learning, social and ecclesiastical influence, to its advocacy 
 and defence. 
 
 There was also a large board of managers, embracing sev 
 eral gentlemen who had then and who have since taken an 
 important part in the great struggle. Perhaps none have been 
 more distinguished for their persistent and painstaking zeal 
 than were the brothers Arthur and Lewis Tappan, William 
 Goodell, and Joshua Leavitt, whose generous and effective 
 labors are more particularly referred to in another connection. 
 
 There, too, was John G. Whittier, the Quaker bard, who 
 early consecrated his genius to the cause of humanity, when 
 to be an Abolitionist was to lose caste in church and state, so 
 ciety and literature. How much he did, and how nobly and 
 beautifully he did it, will be among the most grateful recollec 
 tions of that stern strife. That he was the right man in the 
 right place may be well conjectured from his own testimony, 
 thirty years later, when, alluding to his signature of the " Dec 
 laration of Sentiments,' ' he could say, though wearing the 
 green chaplet of poetic fame, with which two hemispheres had 
 
ORGANIZATION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 26l 
 
 admiringly crowned him : " I love, perhaps too well, the praise 
 and good- will of my fellow-men ; but I set a higher value on 
 my name as appended to the Antislavery Declaration of 1833 
 than on the title-page of any book. Looking over a life marked 
 with many errors and shortcomings, I rejoice that I have been 
 able to maintain the pledge of that signature, and that in the 
 long intervening years 
 
 " ' My voice, though not the loudest, has been heard 
 Wherever Freedom raised her cry of pain.' " 
 
 Unlike most of his coadjutors of that day, he had clear con 
 ceptions of the political bearings of slavery. As editor of the 
 " Pennsylvania Freeman," associate editor of the " National 
 Era," and a contributor to other antislavery journals, he did 
 much to prepare the minds of the people for political action. 
 In counsel and action always sagacious and practical, he par 
 ticipated in those movements which finally resulted in the 
 organization of that powerful party which overthrew the sys 
 tem of human bondage and dethroned the Slave Power. In 
 those early days, " the clarion notes from his muse," in the 
 words of Henry B. Stanton, " were like the inspired appeals 
 of the Hebrew prophets, summoning the elect of God to do 
 battle with the powers of darkness." All along the struggle, 
 too, these lyrics of the meek-visaged but fiery-souled Quaker 
 rang out their notes of warning and appeal. And even after 
 rebellion had convulsed the land, and civil war had summoned 
 its legions to the field, his strains were heard amid the din of 
 strife, and the loyal soldier often felt their inspiration in the 
 camp, on the march, and in the hour of battle. 
 
 Rev. Amos A. Phelps was another member of the board, who 
 afterward evinced the sincerity and strength of his devotion 
 by leaving an eligible position as pastor of a city congregation, 
 to labor exclusively for the lowly and oppressed. A logical 
 speaker and vigorous writer, he rendered invaluable service to 
 the cause of emancipation in the earlier stages of its history. 
 A volume of lectures was published by him in the year 1834, 
 in which questions connected with slavery were elaborately 
 discussed, and an earnest appeal was made to the clergy of all 
 denominations. This work continued for a long time a text- 
 
262 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 book for antislavery speakers* and writers. From tins time 
 onward he labored assiduously and earnestly, till the time of 
 his premature death, which occurred in 1847. He, however, 
 not only died without being permitted to see the harvest of the 
 seed he had so faithfully sown, but he fell at his post in that 
 dark hour when the nation, under the inspiration and behests 
 of the Slave Power, was fighting ingloriously on a foreign soil 
 to extend and perpetuate the very system he had labored so 
 faithfully to limit and extirpate. 
 
 Theodore D. Weld, perhaps the youngest member of the 
 board, was a descendant of Jonathan Edwards and then a 
 member of Lane Seminary. He was one of the members who 
 were involved in the conflict with its Faculty which then and 
 afterward assumed so much of historic interest in the annals 
 of the antislavery struggle. A cogent reasoner and a glowing 
 rhetorician, he was esteemed one of the most powerful plat 
 form speakers of his day. He was the author of several re 
 markable productions. Among them were " The Bible Yiew 
 of Slavery," " Slavery as it is," and " The Power of Congress 
 over Slavery in the District of Columbia," which exerted a 
 marked influence over the thoughtful, pious, and humane. In 
 1838 and 1839 he was associated, at the office in New York, 
 with John G. Whittier and Henry B. Stan ton in securing and 
 forwarding to Congress antislavery petitions for the abolition 
 of slavery and the slave-trade in the District of Columbia, 
 which so excited the ire of its Southern members. 
 
 There, too, was Benjamin Lundy, the early and ever-vigilant 
 and faithful friend of the slave ; and Isaac Knapp, a silent but 
 efficient worker, the coadjutor of Mr. Garrison in the publica 
 tion of the " Liberator." There were also Ellis Gray Loring, 
 David Lee Child, and Samuel E. Sewall, learned and accom 
 plished lawyers of Boston, whose early consecration of personal 
 and professional service to the cause of abolition was followed 
 by a life-long and consistent devotion to the interests of the 
 slave. Mr. Loring died too early to see the glorious consum 
 mation which now gladdens the sight of many of his early 
 coadjutors. Upon that list, too, was the name of Dr. Jacob 
 Ide of Massachusetts, who, then in the prime of his powers 
 
ORGANIZATION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 263 
 
 and influence, made this public commitment, from which he 
 never afterward swerved. While too many of his clerical 
 brethren, at least, remained silent in the presence of this giant 
 iniquity, his voice and commanding influence were ever true 
 to the cause of the slave. Robert Purvis of Philadelphia, 
 a young colored gentleman of talents and culture, was also a 
 member. Feeling in his own person the wrongs of his breth 
 ren, he labored long and earnestly, with fiery zeal and fer 
 vid eloquence, to lift the heavy burden from his race. 
 
 The executive committee engaged an office in New York City, 
 and at once entered upon the vigorous prosecution of its work. 
 Arthur Tappan, president of the society, subscribed three thou 
 sand dollars ; John Rankin, likewise a merchant of. New York, 
 subscribed twelve hundred ; Lewis Tappan, one thousand ; and 
 other members and friends lesser sums, payable annually. 
 The " Emancipator " was put upon a firmer basis, under the 
 editorship of William Goodell, and publications in various 
 forms were circulated with unstinted liberality. The society 
 rapidly increased in numbers, strength, and influence. Its 
 lecturers and agents, newspapers and occasional publications, 
 instructed and aroused the country. Auxiliaries, adopting its 
 principles, were rapidly organized ; so that they numbered six 
 teen hundred and fifty, with a membership of nearly a quarter 
 of a million, at the time of its disruption. 
 
CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 LANE SEMINARY. ANTISLAVERY ACTION. 
 
 Antislavery Debate at Lane Seminary. Action of the Trustees. Antislavery 
 Students dissolve their Connection with the Institution. Offer of the Ameri 
 can Antislavery Society to give the Bible to Slaves. Conduct of Managers of 
 the Bible Society. Abolitionists mobbed in New York. Address issued by 
 the Abolitionists. Address of Massachusetts Antislavery Society. Doc 
 trines of the Abolitionists. Abolitionists arraigned in the Annual Message 
 of President Jackson. Reply of the American Antislavery Society. Activity 
 of the Abolitionists. Rapid Increase in Numbers. 
 
 THESE appeals of the new antislavery societies at once ar 
 rested public attention, though that attention oftener assumed 
 the form of opposition than of acquiescence. Among the first 
 to give this public recognition were the students of Lane 
 Seminary, of which Dr. Lyman Beecher was president and 
 Dr. Calvin E. Stowe a professor. Its students, several of 
 whom were the sons of Southern slaveholders, were of unusual 
 maturity of age and character. Soon after the formation of 
 the American Antislavery Society, an auxiliary was formed in 
 the seminary, embracing most of its members. Two of the 
 number, Henry B. Stanton, and James A. Thome of Kentucky, 
 attended the anniversary meeting of the parent society at New 
 York, in the spring of 1834, at which they made speeches ex 
 citing great interest and sanguine hopes, which were more 
 than redeemed by their subsequent career. 
 
 In the winter of 1834 - 35 a debate on the slavery question 
 took place, lasting more than a dozen evenings, of which Mr. 
 Stanton occupied two with remarkable eloquence and effect. 
 Several other students participated in the debate with signal 
 ability. But the great orator of that great debate, as conceded 
 by all, was Theodore D. Weld. Subsequently, nearly all the 
 students adopted antislavery views. Dr. Beecher promised to 
 
LANE SEMINARY. ANTISL AVERT ACTION. 265 
 
 attend the meetings, though he did not do so. It is said that 
 he was much affected when he found the main body of the 
 students adopting sentiments which he foresaw, or at least 
 apprehended, must bring them into collision with the board of 
 trustees, threatening the material injury if not the destruction 
 of the institution. The debate caused much excitement, not 
 only in Cincinnati, but throughout the country. The trustees 
 ordered the disbandment of the Antislavery Society, though 
 accompanying the order with a similar requirement of the 
 Colonization Society. Their real and avowed purpose was to 
 frown upon and check agitation concerning slavery in the 
 seminary. The antislavery students, feeling that they could 
 not, consistently with their self-respect and convictions, re 
 main in the institution, dissolved their connection with it. 
 Before, however, taking this step, they issued an elaborate and 
 eloquent protest against the policy adopted ; and then, as per 
 secution sent the apostles abroad to preach the gospel, so it 
 sent these young ministers of the gospel to proclaim the new 
 evangel of liberty. Several of them labored faithfully for longer 
 or shorter periods ; but none rendered services more brilliant 
 and effective than Theodore D. Weld and Henry B. Stanton. 
 
 The first anniversary of the American Antislavery Society 
 was held in New York on the 6th of May, 1834. It was largely 
 attended, and its proceedings were spirited and harmonious. 
 An overture made at this meeting to the American Bible So 
 ciety subsequently revealed not only the lack of sympathy with 
 their humane object on the part of the latter, but the opposi 
 tion and the rudeness of its exhibition, even by men standing 
 high in the church. The Bible Society, having been engaged 
 in carrying out the project of supplying every family in the 
 United States with a copy of the Scriptures, had on its comple 
 tion announced the fact to the British Bible Society ; though, 
 of course, no attempt had been made to supply the slaves. 
 The Antislavery Society, being in session in the city of New 
 York at the time of the annual meeting of the Bible Society, 
 made an offer of five thousand dollars if that society would 
 appropriate twenty thousand dollars for the supply of every 
 slave family in the country. 
 
 34 
 
266 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 A committee of seven was appointed to present this propo 
 sition to the board of managers. Lewis Tappan, chairman 
 of the committee, having presented it, and seeing that it 
 was about to be summarily disposed of, asked permission to 
 say a few words in explanation. But he received neither per 
 mission nor notice from the president. He then remarked 
 that, both as a member of the committee and as a life-director 
 of the Bible Society and ex qfficio one of the board of man 
 agers, he claimed the right of a hearing. But no notice what 
 ever was taken of this appeal. A motion that it be referred 
 to the committee of distribution was carried without debate, 
 and the board proceeded to other business. In the published 
 account of the proceedings, and in its monthly paper, the 
 organ of the society, no reference whatever was made either 
 to the proposition or to the mode of its disposition. The 
 refusal to entertain the generous offer, and its attending dis 
 courtesy, revealed the sad demoralization of even the religious 
 men of those days. But though Mr. Tappan, who had ever 
 been distinguished for his active and generous co-operation in 
 every form of Christian and philanthropic effort, was so sadly 
 repulsed by the managers, yet years afterward, at the World's 
 Antislavery Convention in London, when asked to state the 
 particulars of their conduct, he magnanimously refused to do 
 so; because, he says, "I felt unwilling before such an audi 
 ence to relate a circumstance so disgraceful to the managers 
 of the Bible Society and to my native country." 
 
 During that month a circular was issued by a committee of 
 the society, requesting its auxiliaries to hold meetings on the 
 4th of July ; and at the same time an appeal was made to its 
 friends to raise for its funds twenty thousand dollars. On 
 that day the society held a meeting in Chatham Street Chapel. 
 David Paul Brown, a distinguished lawyer of Philadelphia, 
 had been invited to deliver the oration. A meeting, respect 
 able in numbers, assembled ; but when the orator rose to 
 speak, his voice was drowned by the riotous demonstrations of 
 those who had gathered to disturb and break it up. Appeals 
 were made in vain to the rioters ; and the attempt to com 
 memorate the birthday of the nation in the name of liberty 
 was thus violently defeated by the despotism of the mob. 
 
ANTISLAVERY ACTION. 267 
 
 A few days afterward, another mob, unquestionably incited 
 by the violent language and appeals of some portions of the 
 city press, sacked and damaged the house of Lewis Tappan 
 and destroyed its furniture. Arthur Tappan and several mem 
 bers of the executive committee addressed a letter to the 
 mayor of the city in relation to the unfounded accusations 
 brought against them, disclaiming the charges freely made ; 
 and, though they could not recant any principles adopted, they 
 avowed their willingness to live and die by the constitution of 
 their society and its declaration of sentiments. 
 
 In that season of feverish excitement, trial, and danger, 
 Judge William Jay, inheriting not only the honored name, but 
 the principles and purity of the illustrious first chief-justice, 
 at first declined a proffered office in the new society, deeming 
 its organization premature, but afterward recalled his declina 
 tion, and sought to take his share of its labors and responsi 
 bilities. His name gave prestige ; his talents, learning, and 
 integrity afforded strength ; while his cautious and ready pen 
 laid precious gifts upon its altar. His " Inquiry " is a reposi 
 tory of valuable facts concerning the action of the national 
 government, and the principles and purposes of the Coloniza 
 tion and Antislavery Societies. It was read by scholars and 
 statesmen, and exerted a powerful influence by enlightening 
 an ignorant public sentiment upon the great truth that the na 
 tion was then and long had been the mere serf of the Slave 
 Power. All his writings were " characterized by the candor 
 of a philosopher, the accuracy of a statesman, the courtesy of 
 a gentleman, and the charity of a Christian." Having taken 
 his position, he became one of the executive committee, and 
 from 1834 to 1840 contributed largely to the wisdom as well 
 as vigor of its proceedings. 
 
 But the spirit of lawless violence continued not only in New 
 York, but throughout the North, repealing more and more 
 clearly the magnitude and inveteracy of the evil to be abated. 
 The purposes of the Abolitionists were persistently misrepre 
 sented. Even good and fair-minded men, who were generally 
 just and considerate in their opinions, were led to believe, not 
 withstanding the explicit avowals and disclaimers of the so- 
 
268 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWEK IN AMERICA. 
 
 ciety, through its constitution, Declaration of Sentiments, and 
 official organs, that its members " were pursuing measures at 
 variance not only with the constitutional rights of the South, 
 but with the precepts of humanity and religion." In the year 
 1835 the executive committee issued an address designed to 
 remove these false impressions. This address was signed by 
 Arthur Tappan, John Rankin, William Jay, Elizur Wright, Jr., 
 Abraham L. Cox, Lewis Tappan, Samuel E. Cornish, S. S. 
 Jocelyn, and Theodore S. Wright. It was written by Judge 
 Jay, and contained a very lucid exposition of the principles 
 and policy of the society, and attracted marked attention both 
 at home and abroad. 
 
 It declared that Congress has no more right to abolish slav 
 ery in the Southern States than in the French West India Isl 
 ands ; that the exercise of any other than moral influence to 
 induce abolition by the State legislatures would be unconstitu 
 tional ; that Congress had the right to abolish slavery in the 
 District of Columbia, and that it was their duty to efface so 
 foul a stain from the national escutcheon ; that American citi 
 zens have the right to express and publish their opinions of 
 the constitution, laws, and institutions of any and every State 
 and nation under heaven, asserting that " we never intend to 
 surrender the liberty of speech, of the press, or of conscience, 
 blessings we have inherited from our fathers, and which we 
 mean, so far as we are able, to transmit unimpaired to our 
 children." It also affirmed that they had uniformly depre 
 cated all forcible attempts on the part of the slaves to recover 
 their freedom ; that they would deplore any servile insurrec 
 tion, on account of the calamities that would attend it, and 
 the occasion it might give for increased severity ; that the 
 charge that they had sent publications to the South, designed 
 to incite the slaves to insurrection, was utterly and unequivo 
 cally false ; that the charge that they had sent any publica 
 tions to the slaves was false ; that they had employed no 
 agents in the slave States to distribute their publications. But 
 they reiterated their conviction that slavery was sinful and in 
 jurious to the country, and that immediate abolition would be 
 both safe and wise, and that they had no intention of refrain- 
 
ANTISLAVERY ACTION. 269 
 
 ing from the expression of such views in future. They also 
 gave unequivocal expression to their views in regard to the 
 elevation of the colored people. To the accusation, that their 
 acts tended to a dissolution of the Union, and that they wished 
 to destroy it, they replied with emphasis : " We have never 
 calculated the value of the Union, because we believe it to be 
 inestimable, and that the abolition of slavery will remove the 
 chief cause of its dissolution." 
 
 The Massachusetts Antislavery Society, too, issued an ad 
 dress to the public. A committee of thirty-one persons signed 
 the address. Among the number were Samuel J. May, Samuel 
 E. Sewall, William Lloyd Garrison, Francis Jackson, Henry C. 
 Wright, Ellis Gray Loring, and -David Lee Child. This ad 
 dress was issued because an attempt had been made to fix 
 upon Abolitionists sentiments and intentions they abhorred. 
 They categorically denied the charge made against them of a 
 wish to violate the Constitution of the United States, and 
 avowed their deep attachment to the Union. " No price," 
 they said, " can be paid too great for its preservation, but the 
 sacrifice of honor and principle." To intimations that they 
 were guilty of circulating incendiary publications among slaves, 
 they interposed a flat and peremptory denial and indignantly 
 denounced the charge as false. They solemnly pledged them 
 selves that if it could be shown that any person connected 
 with the antislavery cause had circulated inflammatory tracts 
 among slaves, or with a view to be read by them, " we will 
 publicly renounce him as a foe to the peace of society and to 
 the best interests of the oppressed." They denied that they 
 had ever advocated the right of physical resistance upon the 
 part of the oppressed. " We assure our assailants," they said, 
 " that we would not sacrifice the life of a single slaveholder to 
 emancipate any slave in the United States." 
 
 The charge of encouraging amalgamation between whites 
 and blacks they denied, and announced their object to be "to 
 prevent the amalgamation now going on, so far as it can be 
 done, by placing one million of the females of this country 
 under the protection of law." They denied, too, the accusa 
 tion of interfering with the domestic concerns of the South- 
 
270 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ern States, by any other force than the creation of a public 
 sentiment that shall " reach the conscience and blend with 
 the convictions of the slaveholder, and thus ultimately work 
 the complete extinction of slavery." Acknowledging that no 
 change in the slave laws of the Southern States could be made 
 unless by Southern legislatures, they distinctly declared that 
 " neither Congress nor the legislatures of the free States have 
 authority to change the condition of a single slave in the slave 
 States." They closed their address by avowing their intention 
 to discuss and promulgate their principles under the sacred 
 privileges guaranteed by the Constitution of the United States. 
 " We have violated," they said, " we mean to violate, no law. 
 We have acted, we shall continue to act, under the sanction 
 of the Constitution of the United States. Nothing that we 
 propose to do can be prevented by our opponents without vio 
 lating the charter of our rights. To the law and to the Con 
 stitution we appeal." 
 
 After referring to the unconstitutional usurpations of the 
 national government to protect slavery, and to the efforts made 
 to prevent free discussion and the free transmission of the 
 mails, they uttered these words of prophetic warning : " Surely 
 we need not remind you that if you submit to such an encroach 
 ment on your liberties the days of our Republic are numbered ; 
 and that, although Abolitionists may be the first, they will not 
 be the last, victims offered at the shrine of arbitrary power." 
 Having set forth their principles and purposes, so completely 
 in harmony with the theory of the government and the precepts 
 of Christianity, in language so concise, clear, and convincing, 
 they put the solemn and significant question to their country 
 men : " Are they unworthy of Republicans and of Chris 
 tians ? " 
 
 But notwithstanding the declarations of those Christian 
 men, the purity of whose lives was a guaranty of their sincer 
 ity and truthfulness, President Jackson, in his annual message 
 of the 7th of December of that year, invited the attention of 
 Congress to " the painful excitement produced in the South 
 by attempts to circulate through the mails inflammatory appeals 
 addressed to the passions of the slaves, in prints and in va- 
 
ANTISLAVERY ACTION. 271 
 
 rious sorts of publications, calculated to stimulate them to insur 
 rection and produce all the horrors of a servile war." He 
 expressed the opinion that no respectable portion of his country 
 men could be so far misled as to feel any other sentiment than 
 that of indignant regret at conduct " so destructive of the 
 harmony and peace of the country, and so repugnant to the 
 principles of our national compact and to the dictates of human 
 ity and religion." ', 
 
 This language was intended to be applied to the members 
 and officers of the American Antislavery Society and its aux 
 iliaries. On the 28th of December the executive committee 
 addressed to the President an elaborate and dignified protest 
 against his accusations. In this paper, from the polished and 
 pungent pen of Judge Jay, the propriety was suggested to the 
 President of ascertaining the real designs of the Abolitionists 
 before his apprehensions should lead him to sanction any more 
 trifling with the liberty of the press, or to denounce them as 
 misguided persons, engaged in unconstitutional and wicked at 
 tempts to effect the massacre of their Southern brethren. He 
 was reminded that there were then three hundred and fifty 
 abolition societies, numbering thousands of members ; and the 
 pertinent question was put to him, whether there was anything 
 in " the character and manner of the free States to warrant 
 the imputation on their citizens of such enormous wicked 
 ness ? " 
 
 " What, sir," they asked, " is the character of those you 
 have held up to the execration of a civilized world ? Their 
 enemies being judges, they are religious fanatics. And what 
 are the haunts of these plotters of murder ? The pulpit, the 
 bench, the bar, the professor's chair, the hall of legislation, the 
 meeting for prayer, the temple of the Most High. But, strange 
 and monstrous as is this conspiracy, still you believe in its ex 
 istence, and call on Congress to counteract it. Be persuaded, 
 sir, the moral sense of the community is abundantly sufficient 
 to render this conspiracy utterly impotent the moment its 
 machinations are exposed. Only prove the assertions and in 
 sinuations in your message, and you dissolve in an instant 
 every antislavery society in our land. Think not, sir, that we 
 
272 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 shall oppose any obstacles to an inquiry into our conduct. We 
 invite, nay, sir, we entreat, the appointment by Congress of a 
 committee of investigation to visit the antislavery office in 
 New York." They pledged themselves to put in possession 
 of such committee copies of their publications and their cor 
 respondence, and to answer, under oath, all interrogations. 
 ' The committee closed their communication to the President 
 with these words : " We have addressed you, sir, with republi 
 can plainness and Christian sincerity, but with no desire to 
 derogate from the respect that is due you, or wantonly to give 
 you pain. To repel your charges and to disabuse the public 
 was a duty we owed to ourselves, our children, and, above all, 
 to the great and holy cause in which we are engaged. That 
 cause, we believe, is approved by our Maker ; and while we re 
 tain this belief it is our intention, trusting to his direction and 
 protection, to persevere in our endeavors to impress upon the 
 minds and hearts of our countrymen the sinfulness of claim 
 ing property in human beings, and the duty and wisdom of im 
 mediately relinquishing it. When convinced that our endeav 
 ors are wrong, we shall abandon them ; but such conviction 
 must be produced by other arguments than vituperation, popu 
 lar violence, or penal enactments." 
 
 The executive committee of the society held weekly meet 
 ings from the time of its organization to the spring of 1840. 
 Important and weighty matters came before it, and were care 
 fully and conscientiously considered. Objects of contumely, 
 often standing in peril of life or limb, subjected to insult and 
 not unfrequently to actual violence, its members discharged 
 its high duties with firmness, dignity, and a calm trust in 
 God. None can fail to respect the men who thus toiled on for 
 the emancipation and elevation of a race scarcely one of whom 
 will know that they ever lived, the honors and rewards of 
 whose office were an ever-present obloquy and constant pecu 
 niary sacrifice. 
 
 The activity of those men was prodigious, their labors im 
 mense. Thus, during the year 1838 there were circulated 
 from the New York office more than 646,000 publications and 
 documents, some thousands of them being bound volumes ; and 
 
ANTISLAVERY ACTION. 273 
 
 during the year 1839 more than 724,000 of the like descrip 
 tion. In that office, too, a system of petitioning Congress and 
 State legislatures was carried forward on a most extensive 
 scale. During five months of one session of Congress and 
 that chiefly under the direction of John G. Whittier, Theodore 
 D. Weld, and Henry B. Stanton it was ascertained by actual 
 count that more than four hundred thousand signatures to peti 
 tions were sent to Congress ; and it was estimated by Mr. 
 Stanton that there were sent, under the auspices of the ex 
 ecutive committee at New York, during the years 1837-39, 
 more than two million signatures to Congress and to the State 
 legislatures. 
 
 Another evidence of the earnest purpose and wise forecast 
 of the executive committee was exhibited in their efforts to find 
 and fit suitable agents for the great work they had undertaken. 
 The country was canvassed, chiefly by Mr. Weld, for that pur 
 pose, and about seventy persons were brought together in the 
 city of New York for a kind of preparatory training for their 
 new vocation. For some two weeks they listened to the older 
 and more experienced orators and organizers on all the phases 
 of the great cause, and the varied demands and exigencies of 
 the rough and perilous service they had undertaken. It was, 
 in fact, an Institute of Humanity. After receiving their in 
 structions and suggestions, and after being subjected to such 
 drill and discipline as the time and place allowed, they went 
 forth, like the seventy of old, on their mission of liberty to the 
 slave and their errand of peace and good-will to the nation. 
 
 35 
 
CHAPTER XX. 
 
 MOBS. OUTRAGES IN CINCINNATI. WOMEN MOBBED IN BOSTON. 
 
 Proscription. Theodore D. Weld. James G. Birney. Establishment of the 
 " Philanthropist." Mobs. Meeting of the Citizens of Cincinnati. Reso 
 lution to suppress the "Philanthropist." Firmness of the Antislavery Com 
 mittee. Riotous Mob. Destruction of the Press. The " Philanthropist " 
 continued. Dr. Bailey. Mobs in Philadelphia. Continued Violence 
 against the Abolitionists. Orange Scott. George Storrs. Meeting of Citi 
 zens of Boston in Faneuil Hall. Boston Female Antislavery Society. Pub 
 lic Meeting of the Society. George Thompson. Mob Violence. Mayor 
 Lyman. Seizure of Mr. Garrison. Imprisoned. Francis Jackson. Meet 
 ing at his House. Remarks of Miss Martineau. 
 
 ALL who openly accepted the doctrine of immediate eman 
 cipation, or in any way countenanced and defended the meas 
 ures of the Abolitionists, were called to suffer. Too generally 
 some tie of personal friendship was weakened, if not severed, 
 the hostility of political organizations incurred, and the ban 
 of commercial circles was marked and inexorable. Even in 
 the associations of religion and benevolence, to be tainted with 
 the heresy of freedom involved too often loss of caste, reputa 
 tion, and influence. To believe in and defend the simple and 
 fundamental principles of the gospel and of the Declaration of 
 Independence generally subjected members to the supercilious 
 sneers of their leaders, if the opposition did not assume a 
 more active and offensive form. Even the sacred name of 
 " liberty " was held in disesteem, became a term of reproach, 
 a badge of disgrace, while fidelity to its claims was branded 
 as the wildest and most mischievous fanaticism. Antislavery 
 meetings were assailed by " gentlemen of property and stand 
 ing," hand in hand with the drunken and profane rabble. 
 Antislavery lecturers were pelted with eggs, stones, and brick 
 bats. The lowly homes of the proscribed race, the private 
 
OUTEAGES IN CINCINNATI. 275 
 
 dwellings of their heroic friends and defenders, and even the 
 churches of the living God, were roughly assaulted, and some 
 times sacked and burned. Printing presses and types were 
 broken and scattered, and antislavery papers and publications 
 were treated with undisguised neglect or scorn. Even woman 
 forgot the gentle amenities of her sex, no less than the claims 
 of humanity, and hesitated not to speak bitter and scornful 
 words of their cause who were aiming to rescue her sisters in 
 bondage from a doom more terrible than their fetters and 
 stripes. Indeed, it is difficult, without a shudder, to think of 
 those days of domestic estrangement and social ostracism, of 
 political intolerance and commercial exactions, those days 
 when even churches and missionary and benevolent organiza 
 tions were felt to be, if not " bulwarks of slavery," serious 
 obstacles in the way of its removal. 
 
 In the year 1832 Theodore D. Weld visited Tennessee, 
 Alabama, and other portions of the South. While at Hunts- 
 ville, he met at the table of an eminent slaveholding clergy 
 man James G. Birney, who afterward occupied so prominent a 
 place in the antislavery struggle. Mr. Birney was then en 
 gaged in raising cotton, and at the same time practising the 
 legal profession, in which he had gained considerable distinc 
 tion. At the table slavery and the right of the slaveholder to 
 his slaves were discussed. Mr. Weld put the question to his 
 host by what right he held his slaves one of whom was a 
 minister of the gospel in bondage. He endeavored to an 
 swer the question ; but, although a man of culture, he utterly 
 failed to meet the logic of Mr. Weld. Feeling that he had 
 failed, he asked the opinion of Mr. Birney ; but he declined to 
 give it, and continued to listen to the discussion with the 
 deepest interest. Inviting Mr. Weld to call at his office the 
 next day, he retired to his home, and gave the night, not to 
 sleep, but to a deep and anxious examination of this simple 
 but pregnant inquiry. When he called, Mr. Birney informed 
 him that he had deeply reflected through the night upon his 
 question, and had come to the conclusion that he could not 
 show the right of the slaveholder to his slaves. 
 
 Becoming deeply interested in and concerned for the rights 
 
276 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of the bondmen, he relinquished his legal practice, became an 
 active agent of the Colonization Society, and travelled exten 
 sively through the Southern States. He soon, however, lost 
 confidence in that society as an antislavery agency, and became 
 convinced that what he had fondly hoped would lead to eman 
 cipation tended rather to its prevention. At the close of the 
 year 1833 he returned to his home in Kentucky, dissolved his 
 connection with the Colonization Society, and emancipated his 
 slaves. For the purpose of disseminating the doctrines of 
 immediate emancipation, to which he had become a convert, 
 he purchased a press and types, with the view of establishing 
 a paper in his native State. Learning his purpose, his neigh 
 bors resolved at once to baffle his intentions. On the 12th 
 of July, 1835, the slaveholders of Danville assembled in mass 
 meeting, denounced the movement, and addressed to him a 
 letter remonstrating against the establishment of an abolition 
 journal, and avowing their purpose to prevent it. Mr. Bir- 
 ney, aware of his legal rights, firmly refused to yield to their 
 demands ; but his printer became alarmed and refused to en 
 gage in its publication. Finding he could not issue his paper 
 in Kentucky, he removed his press to Cincinnati, with a view 
 to its establishment there. 
 
 But he soon found that the same influences which rendered 
 it impracticable to establish his paper in Kentucky existed in 
 Cincinnati. Removing his press to New Richmond, some 
 twenty miles distant, he commenced the publication of the 
 " Philanthropist." His paper was highly commended for its 
 ability and moderation, and was so well received that he re 
 moved it to Cincinnati in April, 1836. All admitted its fair 
 ness and ability ; even its enemies conceded that its mode of 
 conducting discussions was unexceptionable. Nevertheless, 
 on the 12th of July, at midnight, his office was entered by 
 a band of conspirators, and the press arid types were much 
 damaged. Threats were thrown out that, unless the publica 
 tion of the paper was abandoned, the outrage would be re 
 peated in a more effective manner. The proslavery presses 
 of the city opened in full chorus upon the " Philanthropist," 
 its editor, and friends. Every means of abuse and annoyance 
 
OUTRAGES IN CINCINNATI. 277 
 
 was resorted to. Even handbills were posted in the streets, 
 offering rewards for Mr. Birney's arrest and delivery in Ken 
 tucky, as a fugitive from justice. But he remained firm and 
 stood undismayed amidst these fearful assaults. 
 
 On the 21st of July a meeting of the citizens of Cincinnati 
 was called at the Lower Market House, to see if they " will 
 permit the publication or distribution of abolition papers in 
 this city." This meeting, presided over by the postmaster of 
 the city, also a minister of the gospel, resolved that nothing 
 less than the complete relinquishment of the publication of 
 the paper could prevent a resort to violence. This tumult 
 uous assemblage proclaimed, too, that they would use all 
 lawful means to suppress any publication which advocated the 
 modern doctrine of abolitionism. A committee of thirteen 
 was appointed to wait upon Mr. Birney and his associates, and 
 request them to desist from the publication of their paper ; 
 and to warn them, if they did not do so, that the meeting 
 would not be responsible for the consequences. It was stated 
 by the " Cincinnati Gazette," a journal which then honored 
 itself by maintaining the right of free discussion, that eight 
 of the thirteen members of the committee were communicants 
 of Christian churches. They were certainly men of wealth, 
 social position, and large influence. At its head stood Jacob 
 Burnett, an old citizen of the Northwest, a lawyer of eminence, 
 who had been a judge of the Supreme Court of Ohio and a 
 senator in the Congress of the United States. 
 
 On the evening of the 28th this committee and the execu 
 tive committee of the Ohio Antislavery Society, under whose 
 auspices the " Philanthropist " was published, held a confer 
 ence. The executive committee proposed to discuss the sub 
 ject in public ; but the market-house committee would listen 
 to nothing but the immediate " discontinuance of the ' Phi 
 lanthropist ' and total silence on the subject of slavery." In 
 case of refusal to comply with their modest request, they pre 
 dicted " a mob unusual in its numbers, determined in its pur 
 pose, and desolating in its ravages." Judge Burnett expressed 
 the opinion that the mob would consist of five thousand per 
 sons, and that two thirds of the property-holders of the city 
 
278 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 would join in it. He thought it would be utterly vain for any 
 man, or set of men, to attempt to restrain it ; and he asserted 
 that it would destroy any man who should set himself in op 
 position to it, thus revealing both the policy and the power 
 of those riotous demonstrations. The members of this mar 
 ket-house committee were then asked, if the mob could be 
 averted, whether they would be willing that the publications 
 should be continued. 
 
 To this pertinent question the chairman and several of its 
 members promptly replied that they would not. The execu 
 tive committee were then graciously allowed till the noon of 
 the next day to give their final answer whether or not they 
 would discontinue the paper. When that hour arrived, the 
 eight men composing the executive committee of the Ohio 
 Antislavery Society unanimously and firmly declined to com 
 ply with the impertinent, insolent, and lawless demand. The 
 market-house committee were hardly prepared for such a re 
 ply. Its members found themselves in a predicament they 
 did not anticipate ; standing in the face of law and justice, 
 and also of men who firmly planted themselves on their con 
 stitutional and legal rights. They could only turn to the mob, 
 whose representatives they were, and hasten to resign their 
 office, so that its announcement could appear in the morning 
 papers of the next day. 
 
 On the evening of that day the rioters assembled, and 
 were regularly organized with a chairman and secretary. 
 They then resolved that the press and type of the " Philan 
 thropist " should be thrown into the streets, and that its editor 
 should be notified to leave the city within twenty-four hours. 
 When darkness had settled upon the city the work of destruc 
 tion commenced. The office of the obnoxious journal was en 
 tered and pillaged, the types scattered, and the press broken 
 and thrown into the Ohio. The mob then rushed to the 
 house of Mr. Birney ; but, not finding him, it wreaked its mean 
 vengeance, with cowardly brutality, upon the humble homes 
 of the poor colored people. About midnight, the mayor, who 
 dishonored his name and position by his pusillanimity and im 
 becility, addressed the mob as " friends," told them they had 
 
OUTRAGES IN CINCINNATI. 279 
 
 " done enough for one night," that the Abolitionists must be 
 convinced that they " could not set at naught the public senti 
 ment of Cincinnati," and advised them to go home, as they 
 could not punish the guilty without endangering the innocent. 
 And the mob, thus systematically organized by wealthy and dis 
 tinguished leaders, hastened to their homes, glorying in their 
 deed of infamy, to be to them ever afterward a reproach and 
 shame. By this act of lawless violence, however, the ranks of 
 the Abolitionists of Ohio received many accessions and the cir 
 culation of the " Philanthropist " was much increased. Its 
 publication was continued, and soon passed under the editorial 
 control of Dr. Gamaliel Bailey, a gentlemen of talent, expe 
 rience, and character. Although its types and presses were 
 three times broken and scattered, that journal was continued 
 for several years, ever an earnest and effective defender of the 
 rights of the oppressed and the advocate of their deliverance. 
 
 As already narrated, the New York City Antislavery Society, 
 organized in the autumn of 1833, was interrupted and driven 
 from its place of meeting ; the celebration of the 4th of July, 
 1834, by the American Antislavery Society, was broken up ; 
 the house of Lewis Tappan was sacked ; and churches and 
 school-houses, and the homes of colored men, were assaulted 
 and damaged by mob violence. In the city of Philadelphia, 
 also, a terrible riot commenced on the 13th of August, 1834, 
 which continued during three nights. Forty-four houses, in 
 habited by colored persons, were assaulted, damaged, and many 
 of them destroyed. Many blacks were brutally beaten and 
 seriously injured, one was killed outright, and another was 
 drowned in attempting to swim the Schuylkill to escape his 
 tormentors. Other riotous demonstrations, less serious and 
 fatal in their character, were made in other portions of the 
 country. 
 
 These outrages on person and property went on increas 
 ing, and the cruel and dastardly assaults upon the Aboli 
 tionists were renewed with redoubled fury. Deeds of law 
 less violence were countenanced and often excited by men of 
 wealth, of high social and political position, and sometimes 
 by members of Christian churches. The public presses were 
 
280 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 filled with the most scandalous and libellous accusations against 
 leading antislavery men. Their motives, purposes, and acts 
 were grossly misrepresented. Churches and public halls were 
 closed against them. They were everywhere made to feel that 
 they held property and liberty, if not life itself, at the mercy 
 of excited, exasperated, and lawless men. To be an Aboli 
 tionist then was to be buffeted, scorned, and outraged. It was, 
 indeed, a reign of terror. 
 
 Orange Scott, a clergyman of the Methodist church, an early, 
 consistent, and persistent opponent of slavery, while address 
 ing the citizens of Worcester, Massachusetts, on the 10th of 
 August, was assaulted and his notes seized and torn to pieces 
 by a mob led by a son of Ex-Governor Lincoln. In the same 
 year Rev. George Storrs, another Methodist clergyman, an 
 earnest and effective worker in the cause of emancipation, 
 while delivering a lecture in New Hampshire, was arrested by 
 a deputy sheriff, on the wicked charge of being " a common 
 rioter and brawler." A few months afterward he was arrested 
 at an antislavery meeting, and dragged from his knees while the 
 Rev. Mr. Curtis was at prayer, on a writ of the same character, 
 issued by Moses Norris, afterward a Democratic member of 
 Congress and senator of the United States. This good man, 
 universally known and recognized as such, was tried, con 
 victed, and sentenced by a justice of the peace to the House of 
 Correction for three months. From that unmerited and wicked 
 sentence he appealed to a higher tribunal, and was no more 
 molested. 
 
 One hundred and twenty-five of the citizens of Boston peti 
 tioned the city authorities for the use of Faneuil Hall for an 
 antislavery meeting. But their prayer was peremptorily de 
 nied. Shortly afterward fifteen hundred asked for it, not to 
 speak for liberty, but to apologize for slavery ; not to resist the 
 wicked demands of the Slave Power, but to censure and con 
 demn those whose only offence was fidelity to liberty and devo 
 tion to the claims of the down-trodden and oppressed. 
 
 On the 21st of August, Faneuil Hall was crowded by the ex 
 cited citizens of Boston. That assemblage was addressed by 
 the aged Harrison Gray Otis, whose presence and voice were 
 
WOMEN MOBBED IN BOSTON. 281 
 
 always welcome there ; and by Peleg Sprague and Richard 
 Fletcher, lawyers of great eminence, in whom the conservative 
 men of those times had unquestioning confidence. These ac 
 complished orators expatiated upon the compromises of the 
 Constitution and the obligations of citizenship, apologized for 
 slavery, and so presented and perverted the objects and pur 
 poses of the Abolitionists as to increase the prejudices already 
 existing, and to deepen and intensify passions already aroused 
 against them. 
 
 The legitimate effects of the meeting in Faneuil Hall, and 
 of similar meetings in New York, Philadelphia, and other 
 cities, were everywhere visible. Riotous demonstrations and 
 violence increased. Wherever the Abolitionists appeared to 
 proclaim their doctrines they were denounced by the press, 
 shunned and censured by the churches, and outraged by the 
 mob. 
 
 Several ladies in Boston and its vicinity, of culture and high 
 social position, were early led to take a deep interest in the 
 cause. They formed an antislavery society, and entered upon 
 the work with zeal, resolution, and tireless industry. With 
 different tastes and culture, opinions and beliefs, they found 
 here common ground of action, a common bond of union. 
 Of this society Mrs. Maria W. Chapman, a lady of rare exec 
 utive abilities and accomplishments, its secretary and one of 
 its leading members, says : " Our common cause appears in a 
 different vesture as presented by differing minds. One is striv 
 ing to unbind the slave's manacles, another to secure to all 
 human souls their inalienable rights ; one to secure the tem 
 poral well-being, and another the spiritual benefit, of the en 
 slaved of our land. Some labor that the benefits which they 
 feel they have derived from their own system of theology may 
 be shared by the bondman ; others that the bondman may have 
 light and liberty to form a system for himself. Some that he 
 may be enabled to hallow the Sabbath day by rest and religious 
 observances'; some, that he may receive wages for the other 
 six. Some are forcibly urged to the work of emancipation by 
 the sight of scourged and insulted manhood ; and others by 
 the spectacle of outraged womanhood and weeping infancy. 
 
 36 
 
282 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Some labor to preserve from torture the slave's body, and some 
 for the salvation of his soul. Here are differences ; neverthe 
 less our hopes and hearts are one." Deeply grateful that they 
 were among the early called, in those unquiet years, to such a 
 work of self-sacrifice, these gifted and excellent women went 
 forth cheerfully to their self-allotted task, praying " for the 
 sake of the oppressed that God will aid us to banish from our 
 hearts every vestige of selfishness ; for in proportion to our 
 disinterestedness will be our moral power for their deliver 
 ance." It hardly seems credible, it is certainly not creditable 
 to Boston and its citizens, that a company of its most refined 
 and cultivated ladies, animated by such a spirit and laboring for 
 such purposes could not meet in that city in safety, and that 
 the city government could not afford them protection ; and yet 
 such is the historical fact. 
 
 It was announced that the Boston Female Antislavery So 
 ciety would hold a public meeting at their hall in Washington 
 Street, on the 21st of October, 1835. On the morning of 
 that day inflammatory handbills were circulated and threats 
 were freely uttered. Appeals were made to the city authori 
 ties for protection. Instead of that these women were reminded 
 by the marshal that they gave the city officials a great deal of 
 trouble. It had been published and posted through the city that 
 " the infamous foreign scoundrel, Thompson," would speak at 
 the meeting, that it would be a fair opportunity for the friends 
 of the Union to " snake him out," and one hundred dollars 
 were offered to the individual who would first lay hands on 
 him " so that he could be brought to the tar-kettle." In the 
 autumn of the preceding year, George Thompson, one of the 
 most gifted and eloquent men of his age, came to the United 
 States, at the request of Mr. Garrison and other leading Aboli 
 tionists in England and America. He had so grandly distin 
 guished himself by his brilliant and successful advocacy of 
 West India emancipation, that when that great triumph had 
 been won, in 1833, Lord Brougham said : " I rise to take the 
 crown of this most glorious victory from every other head, 
 and place it upon George Thompson. He has done more than 
 any other man to achieve it." 
 
WOMEN MOBBED IN BOSTON. 283 
 
 He was an ardent admirer of republican institutions and a 
 sincere friend of the United States, and ever continued his 
 friendship, in spite of the rude buifetings he received, and the 
 unmeasured abuse which had been heaped upon him by pro- 
 slavery presses, politicians, and people. His coming was wel 
 comed by the Abolitionists ; and for more than a year, in New 
 England, the central States, and Ohio, he addressed public 
 meetings in speeches of surpassing eloquence and power. The 
 country was in a heated ferment, and his presence and speeches 
 intensified the excitement and added to the bitterness which 
 everywhere manifested itself. The press, with some honor 
 able exceptions, denounced him as a foreign intruder, inter- 
 meddler, British emissary, and " paid agent " of the enemies 
 of republican institutions. He was repeatedly hooted at, in 
 sulted, and mobbed ; but he never uttered an unfriendly word 
 toward the country, and he struggled on for the removal of 
 an evil which he pronounced " the nation's disgrace," and 
 what would prove its ruin, if continued. A few days before 
 this meeting he had been mobbed in Plymouth County ; 
 and so great was the excitement against him, he was then 
 secreted by his friends in Boston. Baffling his frenzied ene 
 mies, he shortly after left the country, and returned to his 
 native land. But when slavery, which, more than a quarter of 
 a century before, he sought so earnestly to destroy, plunged 
 the nation into civil war, though sorely enfeebled by his hercu 
 lean labors for humanity, he at once and boldly espoused the 
 cause of United America. When and where there were few 
 voices raised in its behalf, his rang out clear and strong for 
 the imperilled land. Welcomed again to the country during 
 its fearful conflict, it was his privilege to see the flag restored 
 over the dismantled walls of Sumter, to look into the glad 
 faces of emancipated thousands, and thrill their souls, as his 
 own must have been thrilled by the scenes before him, with 
 his words of counsel and of cheer. 
 
 The belief that he was to be at that meeting increased and 
 intensified the excitement. To " snake out " of a company 
 of Boston ladies that brilliant and eloquent Englishman 
 was unquestionably one of the leading motives which in- 
 
284 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 spired that mob of self-styled " gentlemen of property and 
 standing." 
 
 At the hour of meeting, about thirty members of the society 
 assembled in their room. Many others, who had striven to 
 enter the hall, were turned back by the rioters. The president 
 of the society, Miss Mary Parker, read a portion of the Bible, 
 and then, in tones heard above the yellings of the mob, offered 
 up a fervent prayer to God for his blessing upon the cause of 
 the bondman, his forgiveness of his and their enemies, and his 
 succor and protection in that hour of peril. While the secre 
 tary was reading the annual report, amid the noisy demon 
 strations of the mob, Mayor Lyman entered the room. He 
 requested and entreated the ladies to dissolve their meeting, 
 as he could not otherwise preserve the peace. Surrounded by 
 masses of excited and clamorous men, these ladies demanded 
 of the mayor protection and the dispersion of the mob. But, 
 though confessing it to be his duty to afford them protection, 
 he admitted that he could not do so. The meeting then ad 
 journed, and the rioters rushed into the room, fiercely de 
 manding Mr. Garrison. 
 
 At the earnest solicitation of the mayor, in order that he 
 might truthfully assure the mob that he was not in the build 
 ing, Mr. Garrison attempted to retire quietly to his residence 
 by a back passage. But he was quickly discovered, seized, a 
 rope put round him, his hat knocked from his head and cut in 
 pieces, and his clothes torn from his body. Dragged through 
 Wilson's Lane into State Street, he was rescued by the mayor, 
 his posse, and several respectable citizens, and taken into the 
 mayor's room in the old State House. From this place he 
 was conveyed to Leverett Street Jail, to save him from the 
 fury of the mob. 
 
 Upon the walls of that prison he inscribed these words : 
 " William Lloyd Garrison was put into this cell on Monday 
 afternoon, October 21st, 1835, to save him from the violence 
 of a respectable and influential mob, who sought to destroy 
 him for preaching the abominable and dangerous doctrine that 
 all men are created equal, and that all oppression is odious in 
 the sight of God." He was discharged the next day " as a 
 
WOMEN MOBBED IN BOSTON. 285 
 
 blameless citizen," and left the city for a few days, at the 
 earnest request of the authorities. 
 
 Thus a mob of thousands, in the city of Boston, assaulted 
 a meeting of Boston ladies, engaged in a work of self-denying 
 beneficence, tore down and dashed in pieces their office-sign, 
 roughly broke into their hall, dispersed their meeting, laid 
 violent hands upon an unoffending citizen, dragged him like a 
 culprit through the streets, and threatened him with further 
 indignities and injuries, from which he was only saved by the 
 friendly shelter of a prison. And this mob came not from the 
 purlieus of Fort Hill and Ann Street, but from the counting- 
 rooms of State Street and the parlors of Beacon Street. And 
 all these discreditable acts were done, in the language of one 
 of their leading organs, " to assure our brethren of the South 
 that we cherish rational and correct notions on the subject of 
 slavery. " 
 
 On the evening of that day Francis Jackson, a brother and 
 business partner of William Jackson, then in Congress, and a 
 gentleman of great firmness of purpose, addressed a letter to 
 the ladies of the Boston Female Antislavery Society, cordially 
 offering to them the use of his dwelling-house in Hollis Street 
 for their meetings. This generous offer was gratefully accept 
 ed, and on the 19th of November about one hundred and thirty 
 ladies and four gentlemen assembled at Mr. Jackson's house. 
 At that meeting Harriet Martineau, the eminent English author 
 ess, then on a visit to this country, was present. After the 
 transaction of business, she, at the request of Ellis Gray Lor- 
 ing, and much to the gratification of the meeting, gave them 
 these words of hearty indorsement : " I had supposed that my 
 presence here would be understood as showing my sympathy 
 with you. But, as I am requested to speak, I will say what I 
 have said through the whole South, in every family where I 
 have been, that I consider slavery inconsistent with the law 
 of God and incompatible with the course of his providence. 
 I should certainly say no less at the North than at the South 
 concerning this utter abomination ; and I now declare that in 
 your principles I fully agree." This eminent woman, distin 
 guished alike for her philanthropic and literary works, was 
 
286 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 soon given to understand that, in associating with the pro 
 scribed Abolitionists, and in avowing her assent to their doc 
 trines, she had given offence to the fashionable and leading 
 circles of American society. These facts and incidents con 
 vey their own moral, and indicate without commentary the 
 barbarism of slavery and the rigorous rule of the Slave 
 Power. 
 
CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 RIOTOUS DEMONSTRATIONS. 
 
 Convention at Utica. Mr. Beardsley. Joshua A. Spencer. Hall occupied by 
 Citizens. Meeting in the Church. Society formed. Mob. Convention 
 broken up. Members insulted. Gerrit Smith. Members invited to meet 
 at Peterboro'. Officers of the Society chosen. Resolution and Speech by Mr. 
 Smith. Antislavery Cause placed on High Principle. SamuelJ. May. 
 Mob in Vermont. Mr. Knapp. Colonel Miller. Years of Mobs. Dedi 
 cation of Pennsylvania Hall. Speeches by A Ivan Stewart. Mr. Garrison. 
 Miss Angelina Grimke. Miss Abby Kelley. Mob. Burning of Penn 
 sylvania Hall. Impotence of City Authorities. 
 
 THERE may have been nothing striking or peculiar in the fact 
 that similar demonstrations of this violence were exhibited and 
 were encountered by the active friends of freedom throughout 
 the North. Like an epidemic, as perhaps it was, there being 
 moral epidemics, the spirit of riot seemed to rule the hour ; 
 or, more probable, the disease being generally diffused, conse 
 quently, when the proper remedy was exhibited, the disturb 
 ance became as general as the malady. Hence, on the same 
 21st of October on which occurred the disgraceful scenes in 
 Boston, similar demonstrations were made in Central New York 
 and in the capital of Vermont. 
 
 On that day there assembled in the city of Utica a large and 
 imposing convention of six hundred delegates for the purpose 
 of forming a State antislavery society. The proposition for it 
 came from Alvan Stewart, a resident of that city and president 
 of a local association there. The court-house had been en 
 gaged for the purpose. When it became known that the con 
 vention was to be holden in the court-house, by the consent of 
 the city council, certain persons, styled respectable and promi 
 nent gentlemen, called a public meeting, and adopted measures 
 for the occupation of the same room on the day the convention 
 
288 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 was to meet. Samuel Beardsley, a lawyer of that city, a Demo 
 cratic member of Congress, declared in the most emphatic man 
 ner that " it would be better to have Utica razed to its founda 
 tions, to have it destroyed like Sodom and Gomorrah, than to 
 have the convention meet here." 
 
 This absurd declaration so like the man who, in the de 
 bate on the United States Bank, won the famous soubriquet of 
 "Perish credit, perish commerce " Beardsley received the 
 indorsement of the meeting ; and it forthwith resolved to pre 
 vent, if possible, the assembling of the convention. That most 
 eminent citizen of the place, Joshua A. Spencer, a lawyer of 
 commanding ability, though not an Abolitionist, strenuously 
 opposed the measure, and vindicated the right of free discus 
 sion. When the delegates assembled, they found the court 
 house occupied by a crowd of excited and maddened citizens. 
 Repairing to the Second Presbyterian church, they organized 
 the convention by the election of Judge Brewster of Genesee 
 County for president, and Rev. Mr. Wet-more of Utica, who 
 had been a soldier of the Revolution, as secretary. Alvan 
 Stewart reported the draft of a constitution, which was 
 adopted, and the State Antislavery Society was formed, while 
 the crowd without was clamoring for admission. Lewis Tap- 
 pan then commenced reading the Declaration of Sentiments. 
 While thus engaged, the mob broke into the church and en 
 deavored to prevent the reading ; but with his usual persist 
 ency, he continued until it was finished, when the paper was 
 adopted by a rising vote. 
 
 A committee of twenty-five from the meeting at the court 
 house then came forward, headed by Judge Chester Hayden, 
 and presented a series of condemnatory resolutions. When 
 the resolutions had been read, the rioters, drunk with passion 
 and poor liquor, belched forth their maledictions. The chair 
 man of the committee, addressing the rioters as his friends, 
 expressed the hope that they would permit the convention to 
 answer the accusations made against it. Mr. Beardsley, too, 
 would have his friends " exercise patience and long-suffering, 
 even toward such an assembly as this." He wished to know 
 what apology the convention could make. " They profess," 
 
RIOTOUS DEMONSTRATIONS IN NEW YORK. 289 
 
 he said, " to come here on an errand of religion ; while under 
 disguise they are hypocritically plotting the dissolution of the 
 Union. They have been warned beforehand, have been treated 
 with unexampled patience ; and, if they now refuse to yield to 
 our demands, and any unpleasant circumstance should follow, 
 we shall not be responsible." 
 
 His inflammatory and seditious harangue, whether so de 
 signed or not, had the effect to further exasperate the rioters. 
 Curses, imprecations, and blasphemies filled the air, and threats 
 of violence were freely made and reiterated. The convention 
 hurriedly adjourned, and members of the committee demanded 
 of the venerable secretary the record of its proceedings. Re 
 fusing to yield the record, he was seized by the collar and 
 threatened with violence. " A member of the committee of 
 twenty-five," says Samuel J. May, " a man holding an impor 
 tant public office, raised his cane over the head of that venera 
 ble minister of the gospel, and cried out ; ' Give the papers 
 up, or I will strike you on the head.' At this, another of the 
 committee, a young man, his son, sprang forward and begged 
 him : ' Do, father, give them up, and save your life. Give 
 them to me, and I will pledge myself to give them to you 
 again.' ' With this Mr. Wetmore complied, and he was let 
 off without further harm. 
 
 The mob triumphed ; but the society was formed. Amid 
 those scenes of lawlessness, brutality, and violence the consti 
 tution and Declaration of Sentiments were adopted, though no 
 officers were elected, nor could any more business be trans 
 acted. In the public houses, in the streets, wherever they were 
 seen, the members of the convention were insulted. It had 
 been announced in advance that Lewis Tappan would be 
 mobbed if he attended the convention. To a man like Lewis 
 Tappan such a menace acted rather as a provocation than a 
 dissuasive ; and, though it had been his purpose not to attend, 
 this threat made him feel that it was his duty to be there. His 
 presence, naturally enough, and that of a few other well-known 
 Abolitionists, exasperated the rioters and excited them to more 
 extreme violence. 
 
 Gerrit Smith was present, though not a delegate ; nor did 
 
 37 
 
290 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 he intend to take any part in its proceedings. His large- 
 hearted benevolence and antecedents, however, prevented in 
 difference and lack of interest in such a meeting, called 
 for such a purpose. His father had been a gentleman of 
 vast wealth, of great landed possessions, and a slaveholder. 
 Though he saw slavery in its mildest forms, he early realized 
 that it was unjust, and he had hailed the day when it was 
 utterly extinguished in his native State. He had welcomed 
 the Colonization Society, largely contributed to its funds, and, 
 though his views had been modified by the discussions which had 
 taken place, had, up to that time, continued to entertain some 
 degree of confidence in it. Becoming convinced, however, that 
 its tendency was proslavery rather than antislavery, he paid 
 into its treasury the balance of a subscription amounting to 
 three thousand dollars, and abandoned it forever. He came to 
 the Utica convention to see for himself. The scenes he there 
 witnessed aroused and alarmed him. He could hesitate no 
 longer. He felt that the time for him to act had come. He 
 invited the members of the convention to meet in his township 
 of Peterboro'. A portion accepted his invitation, and on their 
 arrival there were cordially received by Mr. Smith and his 
 neighbors. About three hundred members of the society were 
 present, officers were elected, and its organization completed. 
 
 At that meeting Mr. Smith introduced a resolution declaring 
 that the right of free discussion, given by God, and asserted 
 and guarded by the laws of the country, was one so vital to the 
 freedom, dignity, and usefulness of man that it could not be 
 surrendered without consenting to exchange liberty for slav 
 ery, and dignity and usefulness for debasement and worthless- 
 ness. He supported his resolution in a speech of rare and 
 convincing force. Placing free discussion on the basis of a 
 Divine right, he wanted men to defend it on the ground that 
 God gave it. " It is not to be disguised," he said, " that war 
 has broken out between the South and the North, not early to 
 be terminated. Political and commercial men, for their own 
 purposes, are industriously striving to restore peace ; but the 
 peace they accomplish will be superficial and hollow. True 
 and permanent peace can only be restored by removing the 
 
BIOTOUS DEMONSTRATIONS IN NEW YORK AND VERMONT. 291 
 
 cause of the war, that is, slavery. It cannot ever be estab 
 lished on any other terms. The sword, now drawn, will not 
 be sheathed until the deep and damning stain is washed out 
 from our nation. It is idle, criminal, to speak of peace on any 
 other terms." He declared that he did not wish to muster on 
 their side, in the great battle between liberty and slavery, those 
 who were willing to leave their countrymen to the tender mer 
 cies of slavery forever. But they wanted that class, be it ever 
 so small, who " will stand on the rock of Christian principle." 
 This language was discriminating and prophetic. Seldom, dur 
 ing the thirty years' struggle then commencing, was it ever 
 more correctly characterized. It placed the cause of emanci 
 pation on the high plane of conscience and religious obligation, 
 and foreshadowed a peaceful solution of the great problem be 
 fore them which only the fewness and lukewarmness of its 
 friends and the madness of its foes prevented. 
 
 In October of the same year, Samuel J. May gave several 
 lectures in Vermont, where he was five times mobbed. He 
 was invited to address the Vermont Antislavery Society at 
 Montpelier, during the session of the legislature. The hall of 
 the House of Representatives was obtained for his first meet 
 ing, which was held on the evening of the 20th of October. 
 The hall was filled, many members of the legislature being 
 present. Eggs and stones were thrown through the windows, 
 Mr. May only pausing to say, as they passed by : " Ah, we are 
 contending with greater evils than these ! " Chauncey L. 
 Knapp, then a publisher of the " State Journal," afterward a 
 member of Congress from Massachusetts, here arose and ap 
 pealed to the sheriff of the county, who was present, to arrest 
 those outside who were disturbing the meeting. But that 
 functionary shrank from the performance of his duty. 
 
 At the close of the meeting Mr. May was invited to address 
 the people in the largest church in the village, and accepted 
 the invitation. The next day placards were posted through 
 the town warning the people against attending the meeting, 
 as it would be broken up by violence. In the afternoon of 
 that day, while the gentlemen of Boston were assaulting the 
 Female Antislavery Society in that city and the mob in 
 
292 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Utica was dispersing the convention there, the president of the 
 bank, the postmaster, and five other leading citizens of the 
 capital of Vermont addressed a letter to Mr. May, requesting 
 him to leave the town " without any further attempt to hold 
 forth the absurd doctrines of antislavery, and save them the 
 trouble of using any other measures to that effect." Though 
 a gentleman of marked gentleness of manner and speech, 
 he was not the man to be deterred from the performance 
 of a high duty by such a request, nor by any menace, however 
 violent. 
 
 At the hour appointed, a prayer having been offered by Rev. 
 Mr. Hurlburt, Mr. May rose to address the meeting, which 
 thronged the house. Scarcely had he uttered a sentence 
 when the ringleader of the mob, Mr. Hubbard, president of 
 the bank, rose in the midst of a gang of rowdies, and peremp 
 torily demanded that he should refrain from speaking. To 
 this demand he replied : " Is this the respect paid to the 
 liberty of speech by the free people of Vermont ? Let any 
 one of your number step forward and give reasons why his 
 fellow-citizens, who wish, should not be permitted to hear 
 the lecture I have been invited here to deliver. If I cannot 
 show these reasons to be fallacious, I will yield to your de 
 mand. But, for the sake of our essential rights, I shall pro 
 ceed, if I can." 
 
 Commencing his lecture anew, he was again assailed by 
 boisterous outcries from Hubbard and his associates. Mr. 
 Knapp remonstrated against such proceedings, and implored 
 the people to desist from a proceeding so disgraceful. But his 
 words were unheeded by the mob, which, with noisy threats, 
 rushed toward the pulpit. At that moment Colonel Miller, a 
 brave coadjutor of Dr. Samuel G. Howe in the Greek Revolu 
 tion, a man of well-known courage and great physical power, 
 stepped forward in front of the advancing rioters, and said to 
 Mr. Hubbard, their leader, " If you do not stop this outrage 
 now, I '11 knock you down." The advancing mob was checked ; 
 but the people were alarmed and hurried from the house, the 
 meeting was broken up, and the purposes of the ruffians were 
 accomplished. 
 
EIOTOUS DEMONSTKATIONS IN PENNSYLVANIA. 293 
 
 An account of these disgraceful proceedings was published 
 by Mr. Knapp, and contributed not a little to the general 
 awakening of the people of the State. This exposure of the 
 rioters and of the disgraceful conduct of their ringleaders, 
 headed by a bank president, brought down upon him threats 
 of violence ; but they ended in nothing more serious than the 
 removal of his office-sign, which was flung into the river. 
 
 These high-handed outrages, perpetrated on the same day 
 in Boston, Montpelier, and Utica, were noised abroad ; and 
 though deprecated and condemned by the faithful few were 
 generally applauded, alike at the North and South, by those 
 who considered Abolitionists out of the pale of legal protec 
 tion, to be treated as the enemies of their country and race. 
 
 The riotous demonstrations which had marked the year 
 1834 seemed to culminate in the year 1835, in which a reign 
 of terror prevailed throughout the free States. Churches and 
 public halls were assaulted, life and limb were endangered, 
 antislavery speakers were rudely and roughly handled, and 
 often placed in circumstances of imminent peril. Rev. Jona 
 than Blanchard, afterward president of Wheaton College, spent 
 a portion of that year in delivering lectures in Pennsylvania. 
 Within the brief space of one month, twenty-five of thirty 
 meetings were interrupted, and many of them broken up. 
 
 Henry B. Stanton, on leaving Lane Seminary, was at once 
 employed as lecturer and agent of the American Antislavery 
 Society. Being earnest, enthusiastic, and eloquent, he took 
 his place at once among the most prominent and popular of 
 the antislavery orators of that day. Between that time and 
 the year 1840, when he was sent to England to attend the 
 World's Convention, he delivered in New England, New York, 
 and Pennsylvania more than one thousand addresses and lec 
 tures. Though he was resolute, adroit, and magnetic, and, of 
 course, had uncommon power over popular assemblies, more 
 than one hundred and fifty of those meetings were interrupted 
 and partially or completely broken up by violence. 
 
 Theodore D. Weld, leaving Lane Seminary at the same 
 time, engaged for two or three years in the same work, 
 mainly in the Central States and the West. He, too, 
 
294 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 possessed in an eminent degree those rare gifts of oratory 
 whose mission it generally is to soothe and subdue as well as 
 to thrill and convince. And yet the demoniac rage of those 
 proslavery times was too great for even his persuasive powers ; 
 and he, too, passed through a continual series of like outrages, 
 many of which, especially at the West, were of a most brutal 
 and violent character. And these are but illustrations of those 
 dark and troublous times in which the early pioneers of imme 
 diate emancipation were called to act, and in which they re 
 vealed the strength of their principles, the firmness of their 
 purposes, and the heroism of their characters. 
 
 Among the deeds of lawlessness which characterized those 
 days, the burning of Pennsylvania Hall stands out in disgrace 
 ful pre-eminence, in which the violence of the mob was only 
 equalled by the pusillanimity of the city government. Ex 
 cluded from churches and halls, the Abolitionists and other 
 friends of free discussion in Philadelphia erected in that city, at 
 the cost of about forty thousand dollars, Pennsylvania Hall. 
 It was dedicated on the 14th of May, 1838, and David Paul 
 Brown was selected as the orator of the occasion. LIBERTY 
 was the theme of his eloquent oration. A poetical address, 
 from the pen of John G. Whittier, was read by Charles C. Bur- 
 leigh. Letters were received and read from the most eminent 
 lawyers of the State. 
 
 Walter Forward, afterward Secretary of the Treasury, in 
 response to the invitation to be present, wrote that the right 
 to speak, to write, and to petition governments must not be 
 abridged, questioned, or surrendered. " They are to be," he 
 said, " fearlessly asserted at all times, in all places, and under 
 all circumstances." Thomas Morris, then senator from Ohio, 
 sent a long, earnest, and eloquent letter, in which the right of 
 " free discussion discussion without fear of the pistol of the 
 duellist, the knife of the assassin, the fagot of the incendiary, 
 or the still more dangerous fury of the unbridled mob " was 
 declared to be a right the people must and would have. The 
 Rev. Dr. S. S. Beman of the State of New York, who, twelve 
 years later, like too many of the early advocates of freedom 
 that faltered and yielded to the fearful pressure, gave in his ad- 
 
RIOTOUS DEMONSTRATIONS IN PENNSYLVANIA. 295 
 
 hesion to the Fugitive Slave Act, could not be present ; but he 
 sent an expression of his abhorrence of chains and stripes, and 
 the joy he felt that there was a spirit in existence and awake 
 in Philadelphia which " will not bow to the altar of slavery, nor 
 tamely submit to the dictation of those who declare in high 
 places that it is a wise and holy institution, and that it shall be 
 perpetual." 
 
 During three days meetings were held and speeches were 
 made to crowded assemblies for temperance, for the Indian, 
 and for the slave. Alvan Stewart spoke of the hall they were 
 then consecrating to free discussion, and which the mob was 
 so soon to give to the flames, as " Pity's home," the spot to 
 which " the pilgrim of humanity " would come, the u resting- 
 place of the fugitive," " the slave's audience-chamber," around 
 which " the sympathies of noble hearts and the prayers of the 
 poor would gather." Charles C. Burleigh, Alanson St. Clair, 
 Arnold Buffum, and others, joined in dedicating that hall to 
 the rights and interests of humanity. 
 
 At that time a national convention of antislavery women 
 was sitting in the same city, and it was announced that some 
 of its members would address the audience on the evening of 
 the third day. The room was thronged, and thousands went 
 away, unable to find entrance. A vast crowd gathered outside 
 of the building, volleys of stones were hurled against the win 
 dows, and the audience was interrupted with yells and other 
 riotous demonstrations of a determination to break up the 
 meeting. Many, too, within the hall, joined in this attempt. 
 
 Mr. Garrison, referring to the sneers of the slaveholders and 
 their allies against the labors of the women, maintained that 
 every good cause ultimately triumphed which received their 
 support ; and he averred that West India emancipation was 
 " mainly owing, under God, to the quenchless devotion, un 
 tiring zeal, and indomitable perseverance of the women of Eng 
 land." In the presence of the disorderly spirits within and 
 without the building, who sought to silence the voice of free 
 discussion, he proclaimed that there should be no silence until 
 the howlings of the bereaved slave-mother were turned into 
 shouts of joy. 
 
296 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 In the midst of these shoutings and the tumult of the riot 
 ers, Mrs. Maria W. Chapman of Boston arose, and calmly ex- 
 pressed her earnest desire that " the spirit of Divine truth 
 might so far penetrate the hearts of all present that they would 
 be prepared to listen to the wail now coming up to them from 
 the burning fields of the South." Miss Angelina Grimk 
 then addressed the stormy assemblage, pleading with earnest, 
 tender, and persuasive eloquence the cause of the slave. She 
 said she was brought up under the wing of slavery, had seen 
 its horrors and witnessed its demoralizing influences. She 
 had never seen " a happy slave," though she had seen him 
 " dance in his chains." Declaring that men who held the rod 
 over the slave ruled in the councils of the nation, she, as a 
 Southern woman, attached to the land of her birth, appealed 
 to the women of Philadelphia to imitate the zeal and love, faith 
 and works, of their English sisters for the deliverance of the 
 oppressed. 
 
 This eloquent Southern woman, self-exiled from her native 
 State because of her abhorrence of slavery, was followed by 
 Miss Abby Kelley of Massachusetts. Miss Kelley was a young 
 lady of superior abilities, personal attractions, and accomplish 
 ments. Early accepting the doctrine of immediate emancipa 
 tion, she zealously espoused the cause of freedom and conse 
 crated to its advocacy time, talent, property, and health. For 
 more than a generation she labored with tireless energy in that 
 self-denying service. If her stern and unsparing denunciations 
 against slaveholders and their allies were sometimes applied, 
 with too little discrimination, to those who did not fully accept 
 her views and adopt her modes of action in their opposition 
 to slavery and the Slave Power, none who knew her failed to 
 recognize the sincerity of her convictions and the integrity of 
 her purpose. 
 
 Rising on that occasion to address, as she said, for the first 
 time, a promiscuous assembly, she declared that it was not 
 " the maddening rush of those voices," nor " the crashing of 
 those windows " that called her before them ; but it was " the 
 still, small voice within " that bade her open her mouth for the 
 dumb, and plead the cause of God's perishing poor. 
 
RIOTOUS DEMONSTRATIONS IN PENNSYLVANIA. 297 
 
 Early on the morning of the 17th the mob began again to 
 assemble about the hall. The board of managers called upon 
 the police and the 'mayor for protection ; but the day passed 
 without any efficient measures by these officials for the dis 
 persion of the rioters and the promotion of order. But about 
 sunset the mayor informed the board that he would disperse 
 the mob if the building was placed in his hands. The keys 
 were accordingly given to him : and he addressed the riotous 
 assemblage, assuring them that there would be no meeting 
 that evening, as the building had been given up to the authori 
 ties for protection. He reminded the excited and lawless thou 
 sands before him that he looked on them as his police ; for, he 
 said, " we never call out the military here." Bidding the 
 crowd good night, he retired to his office. 
 
 The mob, separating for a short time, immediately re-assem 
 bled before the hall, and commenced their assaults upon its 
 doors and windows. Summoning his force of police and fire- 
 companies, the mayor found himself utterly powerless for the 
 protection of the hall ; and that beautiful building, consecrated 
 to freedom and to free discussion, was soon enveloped in flames. 
 It is estimated that fifteen thousand persons looked on that 
 work of destruction, unable, if willing, to stay its progress. 
 Having accomplished their object, the rioters, with character 
 istic cowardice, meanness, and brutality, assailed, during the 
 next two days, the negroes of the city. They attacked and set 
 fire to "the shelter for colored orphans," a charitable insti 
 tution, having no connection with the Abolitionists. Bethel 
 Church was attacked and damaged ; and the private dwellings 
 of colored persons were surrounded, and their inmates threat 
 ened with violence. The conduct of the mayor and the city 
 authorities throughout this affair was utterly inefficient, and 
 in the highest degree discreditable. Liberty, justice, and law 
 were sacrificed by them on the altar of prejudice against race 
 and color. 
 
 The police committee afterward sought to screen themselves 
 from deserved reproach, in an official report, by apologizing for 
 the atrocities of the mob and criminating the Abolitionists as 
 the really guilty parties. The excitement, they contended, was 
 
 38 
 
298 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 occasioned by the determination of the owners of the building 
 to persevere in openly promulgating in it " doctrines repulsive 
 to the moral sense of a large majority of our community." 
 
 That impotent report, with its false assumptions, reckless 
 assertions, and evasive statements, only demonstrated the fee 
 bleness and imbecility of the civil authority and police force 
 of Philadelphia, and was but a poor apology for manifest 
 neglect of public duty. The actors themselves in those scenes 
 of arson and brutality were generally actuated by low, vulgar, 
 and malicious hatred of the African race ; while too many of 
 the thousands who witnessed those lawless deeds, stood by 
 inactive, and saw the incendiary torch applied to that magnifi 
 cent hall, erected and consecrated to freedom of speech, were 
 impelled by the unmanly desire to propitiate Southern favor, 
 the sordid greed of Southern gain, and the ignoble fear of 
 Southern offence. 
 
CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 SLAVERY AND THE SLAVE-TRADE IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 
 
 The Seat of Government. Sectional Claims. Capital fixed on Slave Soil. 
 Slave Codes of Virginia and Maryland indorsed. Inhumanity of the Slave 
 Laws. Jails used by Slave-traders. Randolph's Resolution. Speech. 
 Judge Morrell. Petition of the Citizens against the Traffic. Mr. Miner's 
 Resolutions and Speech. Resolutions adopted. Committee. Communica 
 tion of the Grand Jury against the Slave-trade. Slave-traders licensed by 
 the City of Washington. Men and "Women whipped on their bare backs. 
 Laws against Free Negroes. Responsibility of the Northern People. Arrest, 
 Imprisonment, and Trial of Dr. Reuben Crandall. 
 
 THE Constitution having conferred upon Congress sole ju 
 risdiction in all cases whatsoever over a territory not exceeding 
 ten miles square, to be ceded to the Federal government as 
 the capital of the nation, the question of location came up 
 toward the close of its first session. It excited the deepest 
 interest, and the strongest sectional feelings were manifested. 
 The Eastern States would have been content to retain the seat 
 of government in the city of New York. Pennsylvania sought 
 to win it back to Philadelphia. Southern members insisted 
 upon locating it upon the Potomac. Eastern members, sup 
 ported by Pennsylvania, strove to conciliate the South by a 
 proposition to locate it on the banks of the Susquehanna ; but 
 that proposition was strenuously resisted. The House was 
 told by even the moderate Mr. Madison that, " if that day's 
 proceedings had been foreseen, Virginia would never have rati 
 fied the Constitution." These conflicting claims and sectional 
 interests defeated, at that session, all propositions for the lo 
 cation of the national capital either on the Susquehanna, the 
 Delaware, or the Potomac. At the next, however, a " bar 
 gain " was consummated, by which the House of Representa 
 tives, after taking the yeas and nays thirteen times, decided, 
 
300 KISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 by a majority of three, in favor of the Potomac. Thus the 
 capital of the new republic was placed on soil then and thence 
 forward polluted by the system of human slavery, and two 
 generations of statesmen have thus been surrounded by the 
 perverting and blinding influences of slaveholding society. 
 
 Instead of providing a code of humane, equal, and uniform 
 laws for the government of the territory ceded by Maryland 
 and Virginia, Congress enacted, on the 27th of February, 
 1801, that the laws of the former should be enforced on the 
 north side and those of the latter on the south side of the 
 Potomac. Thus the nation, by accepting and adopting as its 
 own these cruel and revolting statutes, became guilty of the 
 astounding inconsistency of enacting for the capital of a Chris 
 tian republic, just starting on its national career, the colonial 
 legislation of a monarchial government adopted for the con 
 trol of the wild hordes from Africa which its policy had forced 
 upon them. 
 
 In 1827 the House Committee of the District of Columbia 
 affirmed, in a report, that " in this District, as in all slavehold 
 ing States, the legal presumption is that persons of color going 
 at large, without any evidences of their freedom, are abscond 
 ing slaves, and prima facie liable to all the legal provisions 
 applicable to that class of persons." This committee further 
 stated that in the portion of the District ceded by Virginia " a 
 free negro may be arrested and put in jail for three months 
 on suspicion of being a fugitive, then to be hired out to pay 
 his jail fees ; and, if he does not prove his freedom within 
 twelve months, to be sold as a slave." And in the territory 
 ceded by Maryland, it reported that " if a free man of color 
 should be apprehended as a runaway, he is subjected to the 
 payment of all fines and rewards given by law for the appre 
 hension of runaways ; and, on failure to make such payment, 
 is liable to be sold as a slave." Thus by the act of, the nation, 
 for which the whole people were responsible, a colored citizen 
 visiting its capital was " by legal presumption an absconding 
 slave," and " might be apprehended as a runaway," be " sub 
 jected to the payment of fines and rewards," or be " sold as 
 a slave for the payment of jail fees." 
 
SLAVERY AND SLAVE-TRADE IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 301 
 
 By a statute of Maryland, enacted in 1717, and continued 
 in force by act of Congress, the testimony of no free negro or 
 mulatto could be received as evidence in any matter whatever 
 wherein any white person was concerned. This legal pre 
 sumption that color was evidence of servitude, this act invali 
 dating the testimony of persons of color, placed the property, 
 the liberty, and the lives of free persons of color in the capital 
 of the nation at the mercy of avaricious, violent, and aban 
 doned white men. Every colored man whose feet pressed the 
 soil of the District was presumed to be a slave, and his tes 
 timony afforded him no protection whatever. Greedy and 
 grasping avarice might withhold from him the fruits of his toil, 
 or clutch from him his little acquisitions ; the brutal might visit 
 upon him, his wife, and his children, insults, indignities, blows ; 
 the kidnapper might enter his dwelling and seize and drag his 
 loved ones from his hearthstone ; every outrage the depravity 
 of man could invent or suggest might be perpetrated on him, 
 his family, his race, but his oath on the Evangelists, though 
 his name might be written in the Book of Life, could neither 
 protect him from wrong nor punish the wrong-doer. 
 
 These laws and ordinances, sanctioned by Congress, and 
 for which the people of the United States were responsible, 
 bore the legitimate fruits of injustice and inhumanity, dis 
 honor and shame. Crimes against persons of African descent 
 were often perpetrated in the national capital. They were 
 seized, imprisoned, fined, and sometimes sold into perpetual 
 servitude. The laws offered tempting bribes to the base, the 
 selfish, and the unprincipled to become manstealers and kid 
 nappers. These bribes converted government officials not 
 only into slave-catchers, but also into slave manufacturers. 
 Thousands of persons of African descent were seized and im 
 prisoned, and the jail became a work-shop, where the sordid 
 and cruel traffickers plied their trade in the bodies and souls 
 of men. 
 
 The augmented value of slave labor gave increasing activity 
 to the domestic slave-traffic, and the capital early became a 
 great slave-mart. There grew up a race of official and un 
 official man-hunters, greedy, active, dexterous ; ever ready, 
 
302 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 by falsehood, trickery, and violence, to clutch the black man 
 who carried not with him his title to freedom. 
 
 The atrocities there perpetrated moved to indignation John 
 Randolph, though ever vigilant in watching the interests of 
 slave-masters and ever ready to defend the slave system. He 
 submitted a resolution in 1816 for the appointment of a com 
 mittee to consider the expediency of putting an end to the 
 slave-trade in the District. He denounced it as a " nefarious " 
 traffic, " in comparison with which the traffic from Africa to 
 Jamaica is a mercy, a virtue." He invoked the House to 
 put a stop " to a practice not surpassed for abomination in any 
 part of the world." " Not even upon the rivers upon the Afri 
 can coast," said he, " is there so great and nefarious a slave- 
 market as in this metropolis, the very seat of government of 
 this nation, which prides itself on freedom." He declared that 
 there could be no comparison between taking the negro from 
 his native wilds and " tearing the civilized negro from his 
 friends, his wife, his children, his parents." " I have," he 
 said, " this day heard a horrible fact from a respectable gen 
 tleman : A poor negro, by hard work and by saving his allow 
 ance, laid by money enough to purchase the freedom of his 
 wife and child. The poor fellow died, and the next day the 
 woman and child were sold. I was mortified at being told by 
 a foreigner of high rank : i You call this a land of liberty, and 
 every day things are done in it at which rlie despotisms of 
 Europe would be horror-struck.' " The resolution was adopted, 
 the committee appointed, and Mr. Randolph was made its 
 chairman. He presented a report stating the facts relating 
 to the slave-trade in the District ; but he failed to report a 
 measure for the suppression, or even the regulation, of a 
 traffic which he had in such unmeasured terms denounced. 
 
 Judge Morsell, too, of the Circuit Court of the United States, 
 bore his testimony to the enormity of the brutal commerce. In 
 a charge to the grand jury, he said that " the frequency with 
 which the streets of the city have been crowded with manacled 
 captives, sometimes on the Sabbath, could not fail to shock 
 the feelings of all humane persons." So thought many citi 
 zens of the District; for on the 24th of March, 1828, more 
 
SLAVEEY AND SLAVE-TRADE IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 303 
 
 than one thousand of its inhabitants presented a memorial to 
 Congress, in which they declared that " it was not alone from 
 the rapacity of slave-traders that the colored race in this Dis 
 trict were doomed to suffer ; that the laws sanction and direct 
 a procedure unparalleled in glaring injustice by anything 
 among the governments of Christendom." This, it is to be 
 borne in mind, was Southern testimony ; and yet, notwith 
 standing its unequivocal and damaging character, the nation 
 adopted no measures to abate, or even to regulate, the ter 
 rible trade, or in any way to relieve it of its fearful hardships 
 and horrors. 
 
 In January, 1829, Mr. Miner of Pennsylvania introduced a 
 preamble and resolutions concerning slavery and the slave- 
 trade in the District, setting forth the power of Congress, the 
 responsibility of the government, the laws, and the practices 
 that had grown up ; and he proposed that the committee on 
 the District be instructed to inquire into the slave-trade in the 
 District, and report such amendments to existing laws as 
 might seem just ; and further to consider the expediency of 
 providing for the gradual abolition of slavery itself therein. 
 In support of his proposition, Mr. Miner made an earnest and 
 effective speech. He declared that the slave-trade, as it ex 
 isted in the capital, was " marked by instances of injustice and 
 cruelty scarcely exceeded on the coast of Africa " ; and that it 
 was a " mistake to suppose it a mere purchase and sale of 
 acknowledged slaves." He stated that the extent and cruelty 
 of the traffic, so long ago as 1802, had drawn from a grand 
 jury in Alexandria a presentment, in which grievances were 
 clearly set forth and legislative redress demanded. He dis 
 closed many appalling acts of unblushing injustice and atro 
 city. " We feel deeply," said Mr. Miner, " for the sufferings 
 of Ireland ; we weep for the miseries of the Greeks ; but we 
 suffer, in a race of a different color, under our own eye and 
 our own jurisdiction, scenes of greater cruelty and injustice 
 than are acted on the other side of the Atlantic. We move 
 on the surface of the stream, where the sunbeams play, and 
 where the glittering waves sparkle with hope, joy, and pleas 
 ure ; and we pass on unconscious of the dark counter-current 
 
304 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 that flows beneath, imbittered by the tears and impelled by the 
 sighs of the wretched." 
 
 Mr. Weems of Maryland opposed the adoption of the reso 
 lutions. But the resolution concerning the slave-trade was 
 adopted by a vote of more than two to one, and even that 
 concerning gradual emancipation received a vote equally 
 strong. And yet, notwithstanding these decisive votes, Mr. 
 Stevenson, a slaveholding speaker, so constructed the commitr 
 tee that no further action was taken upon the subject. 
 
 In 1829 the grand jury made a communication to Congress 
 in which it was said that " the whole community would be 
 gratified by the interference of Congress for the suppression 
 of these receptacles and the exclusion of this disgusting traffic 
 from the District." The " Washington Spectator," in 1830, 
 indignantly denounced those " processions," so often seen in 
 the streets of that city, of human beings handcuffed in pairs 
 or chained in couples, wending their way to the slave-ships 
 which were to bear them to the distant South ; and yet this 
 abominable traffic, denounced by judges and grand juries, citi 
 zens and presses, instead of being suppressed by Congress, 
 was legalized two years afterward by the corporation of the 
 city of Washington ; and slave-traders were licensed, for the 
 paltry sum of four hundred dollars, to pollute the capital of 
 the nation with their brutalizing commerce. 
 
 Congress in 1820 had empowered the corporation of Wash 
 ington to punish slaves by whipping, not exceeding forty stripes, 
 and it was enacted that for several trifling offences men and 
 women should be thus whipped on their bare backs.' As late 
 as 1836 the city authorities enacted that any free colored per 
 son going at large after ten o'clock at night should be locked 
 up until morning. Under color of that burdensome and op 
 pressive enactment, colored persons going to or returning from 
 their callings were often seized and imprisoned. By statute, 
 free colored persons were required to exhibit to the mayor satis 
 factory evidence of their title to freedom, and to enter into bonds 
 with five securities, in the penalty of one thousand dollars, the 
 bond to be renewed every year ; and for failure a fine of twenty 
 dollars was to be imposed, and they were to be sent to the 
 
SLAVERY AND SLAVE-TRADE IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 305 
 
 workhouse. It was made the duty of police constables to enter 
 religious meetings of persons of color after the hour of ten 
 o'clock at night, and disperse Christian men and women, even 
 in the act of listening to the story of salvation, and of offering 
 to their Creator the gratitude and prayers of contrite hearts. 
 
 From 1827 to 1850 the corporation of Washington and 
 Georgetown continued to enact cruel, degrading, and indecent 
 statutes, offending the taste, insulting the reason, and pervert 
 ing the moral sense of civilized man. As these facts became 
 known, through the persistent proclamation of the earnest men 
 and women engaged in this new reform ; and it was shown 
 that these inhuman and outrageous statutes were not the laws 
 of some slaveholding State, the municipal regulations of some 
 Southern city, but of the capital of the nation, deriving all their 
 force from congressional legislation, large numbers of North 
 ern citizens revolted from such voluntary complicity with any 
 thing so disgraceful, and readily lent their influence and names 
 to the effort for the abolition of slavery and the slave-trade in 
 the District of Columbia. Hence the petitions, and the persists 
 ency with which they were pushed, for that purpose. 
 
 Still, though there were these Northern exhibitions of inter 
 est and a growing indignation, there were constantly occurring 
 at the capital, as well as elsewhere, illustrations of a very dif 
 ferent character. The gross infringements by the Slave Power 
 of the rights of whites as well as blacks, the degrading and 
 intolerable surveillance to which the nation submitted, and the 
 torpidity with which the people regarded these flagrant out 
 rages, find many examples in the history of those days. Of 
 them is the case of Dr. Reuben Crandall, brother of Miss Cran- 
 dall of the Canterbury School, who went to Washington in 
 1835 to lecture on one of the natural sciences. He was a 
 Christian gentleman of unblemished reputation, of scientific 
 attainments, and deeply interested in the cause of education. 
 While engaged in his office, he received some packages wrapped 
 in newspapers, among which were a few copies of the u Eman 
 cipator " and " Antislavery Reporter!" As he was unpacking 
 his boxes, at the request of a gentleman present he gave him 
 a copy of one of those publications. Having read it, the gen- 
 
306 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 tleman left it at a neighboring store. Falling into the hands 
 of others, it produced no little excitement. Indeed, so great 
 was the agitation created by the unwitting circulation of the 
 offending document, that Dr. Crandall was arrested, thrown 
 into jail, and the fear was freely expressed by the officers that 
 he was in danger of a mob. He was brought to trial before a 
 United States court, ably defended, and acquitted, but not until 
 he had lain in a common jail, charged with crime, for nearly 
 eight months. The enormity of this outrage appears greater 
 from tha indictment under which he was tried. It contained 
 five counts, charging him with publishing malicious and wicked 
 libels, with the intent to excite sedition and insurrection among 
 the slaves and colored people of the District. The evidence 
 relied on was incorporated into the indictment in the form of 
 extracts from these antislavery publications, found in his pos 
 session. Among them was this extract from a letter from 
 Arthur Tappan to Mr. Gurley, secretary of the American Col 
 onization Society : " We will not insult your understanding, 
 sir, with any elaborate attempt to prove to you that the de 
 scendants of African parents, born in this country, have as 
 good a claim to a residence in it as the descendants of Eng 
 lish, German, Danish, Scotch, or Irish parents ; that no man's 
 right to freedom is suspended upon, or taken away by, his de 
 sire to remain in his native country." In another count there 
 were extracts from another article. Among them, this : " Our 
 plan of emancipation is simply this : to promulgate the doc 
 trine of human rights in high places and low places, and in all 
 places where there are human beings ; to give line upon line." 
 Such were the charges under color of which a Christian gen 
 tleman of culture and refinement was arrested, confined, and 
 tried in the capital of this Christian nation. What must have 
 been the necessities of a system that could not bear the pres 
 ence of a few such papers and pamphlets ? What must have 
 been the moral condition of a city that would perpetrate such 
 an act ? And what must have been the tone and temper of the 
 nation that could, without remonstrance, permit one of its 
 citizens to linger for weary months in a felon's cell, for having 
 in his possession a few papers that expressed sentiments that 
 he, and every Christian, should cherish ? 
 
CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 PETITIONS AGAINST SLAVERY AND THE SLAVE-TRADE IN THE DIS 
 TRICT OF COLUMBIA. DENIAL OF THE RIGHT OF PETITION. 
 
 Presentation of Antislavery Petitions. Debate thereon. Petitions laid on 
 the Table. Meeting of the XXI Vth Congress. Presentation of Antislavery 
 Petitions. Excited Debate. Mr. Jarvis's Resolution. Mr. Pinckney's 
 Resolution. Report of the Committee. Petitions ordered to be laid on 
 the Table. Presentation of Antislavery Petitions in the Senate. Mr. Cal- 
 houn's Motion. Debate thereon. Mr. Calhoun's Motion to reject Petitions 
 defeated. Mr. Buchanan's Motion to reject the Prayer of Petitioners adopted. 
 Long Debate. Servility of Northern Members. The South victorious. 
 
 ANTISLAVERY agitation was producing its legitimate results. 
 The facts and statements, the reasonings and appeals, of the 
 advocates of immediate emancipation excited the apprehen 
 sions, if not the convictions, of a portion of the people, and 
 prompted the desire to be purged from all complicity with such 
 outrages^ such high-handed crimes against the laws of God 
 and the claims of humanity. Estopped by the compromises 
 of the Constitution from interfering with slavery in the States, 
 men felt all the more anxious to rid themselves of all respon 
 sibility for its existence in the District of Columbia, over which 
 it was admitted that Congress had " sole jurisdiction," and in 
 which both slavery and the slave-traffic existed in its most 
 vigorous and revolting forms. 
 
 Memorials were largely circulated, very extensively signed, 
 and presented to Congress, invoking its action. John Quincy 
 Adams, having been elected a member of the XXIId Congress, 
 presented, early in the session, fifteen memorials for the abo 
 lition of slavery and the slave-trade in the District. He 
 expressed, however, the hope that the subject would not be 
 discussed in the House, and took occasion to say that he could 
 not give his support to the prayer of the petitioners. " Slav- 
 
308 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ery," he said, " in the District, is of little importance " ; al 
 though he admitted that its existence there was as much a 
 violation of principle as its existence in the States and Terri 
 tories. The petitions presented by Mr. Adams were referred 
 to the Committee on the District of Columbia. Mr. Doddridge 
 of Virginia, its chairman, promptly reported that it would be 
 unsafe to abolish slavery under existing circumstances, and 
 wrong to do so until Virginia and Maryland moved in the 
 matter. 
 
 At the closing session of the XXIIId Congress John Dick- 
 son of New York presented a memorial of the American 
 Antislavery Society, and also the petition of several hundred 
 ladies of that State, in favor of the abolition of slavery and 
 the slave-trade in the District of Columbia. Early in Feb 
 ruary, 1835, he addressed the House in an elaborate speech in 
 favor of the prayer of the petitioners. He contended that 
 neither the Old nor the New Testament, the heathen philoso 
 phy nor the Declaration of Independence, recognized differen 
 ces on account of color in the rights of man. Mr. Chinn of 
 Virginia, remarking that he did not wish to disturb the deep 
 sympathy nor the tender mercies of the gentleman from New 
 York, or of the fair memorialists who had made him their 
 champion, moved to lay the whole subject on the table ; and 
 his motion was agreed to by a majority of forty. 
 
 In February Mr. Phillips of Massachusetts presented a peti 
 tion from three thousand six hundred ladies of his State. Mr. 
 Dickson presented a memorial from the mayor of Rochester 
 and other citizens, and moved that it be laid on the table and 
 printed. This motion brought up Mr. Johnson of Louisiana. 
 He repudiated the interference of . the Northern people with 
 the rights and property of the South. Whenever the North, 
 he declared with deep feeling, should procure legislation by 
 Congress in regard to this species of property, " that moment 
 the Union would be dissolved." Millard Fillmore, afterward 
 President, disavowed most unequivocally, then and forever, 
 any desire on his part to interfere with the rights, or what was 
 termed the property, of the citizens of other States ; though 
 he was in favor of printing the memorial. Mr. Clay of Ala- 
 
PETITIONS AGAINST SLAVERY AND THE SLAVE-TRADE. 309 
 
 bama said this memorial was calculated to excite " the most 
 direful calamities " in that part of the Union from which he 
 came. 
 
 Mr. Wise of Virginia said that the District was common 
 ground ; that, if gentlemen had a right to come upon that 
 ground with " carriages and horses," he had a right to come 
 upon it with " his slaves," and to remain as long as he pleased. 
 " I speak," he said, " for all as strongly as one man can speak 
 for many for millions that the South will fight to the 
 hilt against the abolition of slavery, unless the inhabitants 
 themselves, owning slaves, shall petition for it. True Chris 
 tians and philanthropists will always find their principles and 
 the cause of humanity best subserved by being the friends of 
 slaveholders, rather than of the slaves." The House, on mo 
 tion of Mr. Archer of Virginia, by more than seventy major 
 ity, laid the whole subject on the table. During the session, 
 however, several similar petitions were presented by John 
 Quincy Adams. 
 
 On the assembling of the XXIVth Congress, Mr. Fairfield 
 of Maine presented to the House petitions for the abolition of 
 slavery in the District, remarking, however, that he did not 
 wish to be considered as favoring the views of the petitioners. 
 These petitions, on motion of John Y. Mason of Virginia, 
 afterward a member of the Cabinet, and minister to France, 
 were laid on the table by a strong vote, only thirty-one voting 
 for their reception. A few days afterward an antislavery peti 
 tion, presented by Mr. Briggs of Massachusetts, was referred 
 without debate to the Committee on the District of Columbia. 
 On the same day another was presented by William Jackson 
 of the same State, for a long time thereafter a most practical 
 and efficient worker in the cause of emancipation. Mr. 
 Hammond of South Carolina moved that it be not received. 
 " The large majority," he said, " by which similar petitions 
 had been rejected, a few days ago, has been very gratifying to 
 me and to the whole South. I had hoped that vote would 
 satisfy gentlemen charged with such petitions of the impro 
 priety of presenting them ; but as it does not have that effect, 
 I ask the House to put a more decided seal of reprobation on 
 
310 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 such petitions by promptly rejecting this." The Speaker stated 
 that he was not aware that such a motion had ever been sus 
 tained by any former action of the House. Mr. Hammond 
 then moved that the House reject the petition. On this mo 
 tion he said he did not wish to go into a discussion of the 
 question involved, but he wished to put an end to these peti 
 tions. He could not sit there and submit to their being brought 
 forward until the House had become callous to the consequen 
 ces. In the course of the debate which sprang up on this 
 motion, Mr. Sutherland of Pennsylvania reminded the House 
 that it had already, on that day, that very morning, referred a 
 memorial on this very question to the Committee on the District 
 of Columbia. The Speaker admitted the fact, but added that 
 " it was doubtless through inadvertence ; that the members of 
 the House did not generally hear it." Mr. Patton of Virginia 
 then moved to reconsider the vote by which the memorial pre 
 sented by Mr. Briggs was referred. 
 
 On that motion an excited debate arose. In this dis 
 cussion were developed the ideas and purposes of the dif 
 ferent parties. A very small minority sympathized with the 
 specific prayer of the petitioners ; but there were differences 
 of opinion in the majority as to the best method of rejecting 
 that prayer. Mr. Hunt of New York said : " Gentlemen on 
 all sides merely differ as to the means of effecting a general 
 and decisive end, an end they are all seeking, to give quiet 
 and composure on this exciting question." Substantially 
 agreeing with the South, but still regarding the right of peti 
 tion " a sacred one," he could " never consent to infringe 
 upon it even by implication." Believing that " the quiet of 
 the community could not be insured by suppressing informa 
 tion and inquiry," he would " refer this and all similar memo 
 rials to the Committee on the District of Columbia, or to some 
 select committee, with instructions to make a report that 
 should put this question forever at rest, silence the fanatics 
 on the one hand, and satisfy our brethren of the South on the 
 other." 
 
 Mr. Thomas of Maryland defended the same course. Dep 
 recating the repressive policy, he said : " I am prepared to 
 
PETITIONS AGAINST SLAVERY AND THE SLAVE-TRADE. 311 
 
 vote for the reception of the petition, and to declare distinct 
 ly that the prayer of these petitioners is unreasonable and 
 ought not to be granted." Mr. Beardsley of New York 
 would receive the petition, but " reject its prayer " ; and then, 
 he added, " they will see no firebrands in this House." Mr. 
 Pierce of New Hampshire, afterward President, favored the 
 same action for the same end, though he believed the public 
 sentiment of the North was sound, there being " not one in 
 five hundred who would not have these rights of our Southern 
 brethren protected at any and every hazard." The Southern 
 members were divided, some contending that the above was 
 the best method of quieting agitation, others that the stamp 
 of reprobation should be branded on all antislavery agitation 
 by rejecting the petitions on the very threshold of Congress. 
 
 At this point of the discussion John Quincy Adams, whose 
 name is so generally identified with this great struggle, 
 addressed the House. Disowning all sympathy with the 
 purpose of the petitioners, he said he would receive the pe 
 tition because he deemed the right of petition " sacred, to 
 be vindicated at all hazards ; while it presents the only effec 
 tive way to get this question out of the view of the nation and 
 this House." Alluding to his former course, he said that in 
 1832 he presented similar petitions, though he gave notice to 
 the House and to the country that he should not support them. 
 " In 1834," he said, " similar petitions were presented, and 
 referred to a committee ; and from the moment they were 
 referred they went to the tomb of the Capulets A dis 
 tinguished member, Mr. Dickson, made an eloquent speech 
 of two hours in defence. No reply was made. Not a word 
 
 was said Other petitions were so referred, and then 
 
 they slept the sleep of death." Mr. Adams's course on this 
 occasion very much astonished and aggrieved the friends of free 
 dom, and was sharply criticised by Mr. Lundy, Mr. Garrison, 
 and other prominent advocates of the cause. They felt that, 
 even if he had doubted the value of such efforts, he might 
 safely have exhibited more sympathy with the ultimate pur 
 pose of the petitioners. 
 
 But there was one member who, like Mr. Dickson in the pre- 
 
312 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ceding Congress, distinctly and unequivocally avowed himself 
 in favor of fhe prayer of the petitioners. " The petitioners," 
 said Mr. Slade of Vermont, " wish the abolition of slavery in 
 the District of Columbia ; so do I. They wish to abolish the 
 slave-trade in the District; so do I." He was in favor of re 
 ferring all antislavery petitions to a committee. The House, 
 however, reconsidered the vote to refer the petition presented 
 by Mr. Briggs to the Committee on the District of Columbia, 
 and then laid it on the table by a majority of seventy-seven. 
 
 Early in January, 1836, Mr. Jarvis of Maine submitted a 
 resolution declaring that the subject of the abolition of slavery 
 in the District of Columbia ought not to be entertained by 
 Congress ; and, if any petition praying for it should thereafter 
 be presented, it ought to be laid on the table without being re 
 ferred or printed. Mr. Jarvis was one of the most zealous of 
 that class of Northern men who, emulous in their subserviency, 
 seemed to court the distinction of bowing low and of making 
 great sacrifices of principle, humanity, and personal honor to 
 propitiate the slave oligarchy, and thereby maintain the ascend 
 ency of the Democratic party and secure the election of Mr. 
 Van Buren to the presidency. And thus it happened that the 
 cause of humanity and of liberty was always imperilled as 
 much by Northern subserviency as by Southern intolerance 
 and exactions ! 
 
 Mr. Wise pronounced the resolution " entirely evasive and 
 unsatisfactory to the South." " Nothing," he said, " can 
 satisfy them but a bold, direct, and manly vote." He moved 
 to amend the resolution of Mr. Jarvis so as to declare that 
 there was no power of legislation granted to Congress to abol 
 ish slavery in the District, and that any attempt to do so would 
 be dangerous to the Union. 
 
 The representatives from South Carolina, like the senators 
 from that State, were foremost in asserting the rights and 
 powers of slaveholders. They vied with each other in support 
 of slavery by speech and vote. Mr. Pickens pronounced their 
 system of domestic servitude to be " the same patriarchal sys 
 tem that existed in the first ages of society." " Ours," he 
 said, " is the ancient system of society that existed amongst 
 
DENIAL OF THE EIGHT OF PETITION. 313 
 
 the Greeks and the Romans, and to a certain extent in the feudal 
 serf system of the Gallic race." With a shameless and auda 
 cious effrontery he admitted and affirmed the " robber's right " 
 to be the only foundation of their peculiar institution, for he 
 specifically declared their " system to be a frank and bold one, 
 that sustained itself by open and undisguised power." They 
 had nothing, he said, to conceal or disguise, and he boldly 
 avowed to the world that they owned the blacks through both 
 " intellectual and physical force." 
 
 Mr. Hammond, too, expressed extreme views, proclaiming 
 that the " doom of Ham has been branded on the form and 
 features of his African descendants," and that " the hand of 
 fate has united his color and his destiny." He made, too, the 
 impudent and preposterous claim that " domestic slavery pro 
 duces the highest-toned, the purest and best organization of so 
 ciety that has ever existed on the face of the earth." Avowing 
 that their last thought would be to give up the institution un 
 der which they were born and bred, and which they would 
 maintain or die in its defence, he said, " I warn the Abolition 
 ists, ignorant and infatuated barbarians as they are, that, if 
 chance shall throw any of them into our hands, they may ex 
 pect a felon's death." 
 
 Mr. Pinckney, avowing that he was " for the suppression of 
 abolition " by " procuring a direct vote and a practical result 
 upon the whole subject of the abolition of slavery," submitted a 
 resolution to the effect that all antislavery petitions and papers 
 which had been or might be submitted should be referred to 
 a select committee, with instructions to report that Congress 
 had no power to interfere with slavery in the States, and that 
 it ought not to interfere with slavery in the District of Colum 
 bia, because that would be a violation of the public faith, un 
 wise, impolitic, and dangerous to the Union. This resolution 
 was adopted, a select committee of nine members was appointed, 
 and Mr. Pinckney was made chairman. In the formation of 
 the committee, however, the usual courtesy was withheld, and 
 not a member known to be in favor of the prayer of the peti 
 tioners was placed upon it. On the 18th of May, the commit 
 tee made a long and elaborate report, occupying an hour and 
 
 40 ' 
 
314 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 a half in the reading. It concluded with resolutions declaring 
 that Congress possessed no constitutional authority to interfere 
 with slavery in the States ; that it ought not to interfere in any 
 way with slavery in the District of Columbia ; and that " for 
 the purpose of arresting agitation and restoring tranquillity to 
 the public mind " all petitions or papers relating in any way 
 to slavery should be laid on the table without being printed or 
 referred. Upon these resolutions an earnest, furious, and pro 
 tracted debate sprang up, in which hardly a word was uttered 
 for freedom. 
 
 The most extreme representatives of slavery objected to the 
 resolutions because they did not contain the explicit declara 
 tion that Congress possessed no constitutional power to abolish 
 slavery in the District of Columbia. So demoralized had the 
 nation become, that the resolutions requiring all antislavery 
 petitions and papers to be laid on the table without being con 
 sidered or referred were adopted by a vote 'of one hundred and 
 seventeen to sixty-eight. Nearly all those who voted in the 
 negative being Whigs from the free States held with Mr. 
 Adams that the resolution was a direct violation of the Con 
 stitution of the United States, the rules of the House, and the 
 rights of their constituents. 
 
 While antislavery petitions were receiving the attention of 
 the House they were also before the Senate. Early in January 
 Mr. Morris of Ohio presented two petitions to that body pray 
 ing for the abolition of slavery and the slave-trade in the Dis 
 trict of Columbia. Mr. Calhoun promptly objected to their re 
 ception because " one half of the Union was deeply slandered 
 in them " ; because " the subject was not within the power of 
 Congress " ; and because " agitation on the subject must 
 cease." " This," he said, " is a preliminary abolition move 
 ment. These Abolitionists move first on the District of Colum 
 bia, which is the weakest point, in order to operate afterward 
 on the States. I will resist them as firmly in this movement 
 as I would on the direct question of emancipation." He ex 
 pressed the conviction that/ 4 nothing can, nothing will stop 
 these petitioners but a prompt and strong rejection of them." 
 
 This debate, commenced by Mr. Calhoun upon his motion 
 
DENIAL OF THE RIGHT OF PETITION. 315 
 
 to reject antislavery petitions, was continued for more than 
 two months. Nearly all the Southern and many of the North 
 ern senators participated in it. Southern senators of extreme 
 opinions agreed with Mr. Calhoun in sternly refusing to receive 
 the petitions ; others were in favor of receiving them, and in 
 stantly rejecting their prayer. A few believed it to be the con 
 stitutional duty of the Senate to receive the petitions, refer 
 them, and have a committee report upon them. 
 
 Mr. Buchanan presented the petition of the Cain Religious So 
 ciety of Friends of Pennsylvania. This memorial prayed Con 
 gress to enact such laws as would secure the freedom of every 
 human being residing within the constitutional jurisdiction of 
 Congress, and prohibit every species of traffic in the persons 
 of men. Mr. Buchanan was in favor of receiving the petition, 
 and of instantly rejecting its prayer. The test vote was taken 
 upon this memorial. Ten senators voted for Mr. Calhoun' s 
 motion not to receive it, while thirty-five voted against it. 
 The question then arose on Mr. Buchanan's motion to reject 
 the prayer of the petitioners, and it was agreed to, only six 
 voting against it. Mr. Calhoun declined to vote in favor of this 
 " device to receive this petition and immediately reject it, with 
 out consideration or reflection." " To my mind," he said, 
 " the movement looks like a trick, a mere piece of artifice to 
 juggle and deceive. I intend no disrespect to the senator. I 
 doubt not his intention is good and believe his feelings are 
 with us, but I must say the course he has intimated is in my 
 opinion the worst possible for the slaveholding States. It 
 surrenders all to the Abolitionists, and gives nothing in turn 
 that will be of the least advantage to us." Failing to secure 
 the rejection of the petition, his colleague, Mr. Preston, ac 
 cepted Mr. Buchanan's " device," and invoked gentlemen of all 
 parties to unite against the " hot-headed and cold-hearted," 
 " ignorant and bloodthirsty fanatics," and to " stamp their ne 
 farious propositions with unqualified reprobation." 
 
 During this long debate, in which a majority of the senators 
 participated, harsh and violent utterances were made against 
 those who had felt it to be their duty to free the national cap 
 ital from the sin of slavery and the crime of slave-trading. 
 
316 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Mr. Buchanan denounced them as fanatics. By granting the 
 prayer of the petitions he said they would erect a citadel 
 from which Abolitionists and incendiaries could attack the 
 peace and safety of the citizens of Maryland and the District 
 of Columbia. " You create a point," he said, " from which 
 trains of gunpowder may be securely laid, extending into the 
 surrounding States, which may at any moment produce a fear 
 ful and destructive explosion. By passing such a law you in 
 troduce the enemy into the very bosom of these two States, and 
 afford him every opportunity to produce a servile insurrection." 
 
 Robert J. Walker of Mississippi, afterward Secretary of the 
 Treasury, declared the Abolitionists to be guided by the blind 
 spirit of fanaticism. " What is this proposition," he inquired, 
 " which we are asked to receive and consider ? It is a proposi 
 tion to violate the Constitution and endanger the Union. It 
 is a proposition for rapine, plunder, and spoliation. It is 
 a proposition, not merely to attempt to render the slaves of 
 this District freemen, but, in its inevitable results and conse 
 quences, to attempt to render the freemen of this District 
 slaves. The mighty revolution proposed by these petitioners 
 would make this District a den of thieves and assassins, of lib 
 erated slaves and blacks already free. This proposition would 
 make the District an asylum for fugitive slaves from the States, 
 the grand citadel of Abolitionism, whence it would light the 
 torch of the incendiary and whet the knife of the assassin. 
 Can we, ought we, will we submit to this ? No, never ! " 
 
 Mr. White of Tennessee, then a candidate for the presi 
 dency, was in favor of the rejection of antislavery petitions. 
 He referred to the arrest and whipping of Amos Dresser by 
 the citizens of Nashville, and to the threat of the citizens of 
 Kentucky to demolish the building and destroy the types of 
 the " Philanthropist," established by James G. Birney, as evi 
 dences of the determined purpose of the people of the South. 
 Mr. Benton denounced the abolition societies. He said their 
 speeches, publications, petitions, pictures, went not to the 
 understanding of the slaves, but to their passions, inspired 
 vain hopes, and stimulated abortive but fatal insurrections. To 
 the antislavery societies of France, which contained " the best 
 
DENIAL OF THE RIGHT OF PETITION. 317 
 
 and the basest of human kind, Lafayette and the Abbe 
 Gregoire, those purest of philanthropists, and Murat and Ana- 
 charsis Cloots, those imps of hell in human shape," he as 
 cribed the massacre of San Domingo, which wrapped in flames 
 and drenched in blood that beautiful island. He referred to 
 the attempted insurrection at Pointe-Coupee in Louisiana, in 
 spired by the uprising of the slaves in San Domingo, and to 
 the condemnation and execution of fifty of the insurgents, who 
 were hung at intervals along the Mississppi for a hundred and 
 fifty miles, to warn all who were honest in, the three hundred 
 and fifty affiliated antislavery societies " to at once secede 
 from those associations that could have no other effect than 
 to revive such tragedies in the Southern States." 
 
 Mr. Benton warmly commended the action of the people of 
 the Northern States, with words that carried with them, how 
 ever, the strongest condemnation. " Their conduct," he said, 
 " is above all praise, above all thanks, above all gratitude. 
 They have chased off the foreign emissaries, silenced the gab 
 bling tongues of female dupes, and dispersed the assemblies, 
 whether fanatical, visionary, or incendiary, of all that congre 
 gated to preach against evils that afflicted others, not them, 
 and to propose remedies to aggravate the disease which they 
 pretended to cure. They have acted with a noble spirit. 
 They have exerted a vigor beyond all law. They have obeyed 
 the enactments, not of the statute-book, but of the heart ; and 
 while that spirit is in the heart I care nothing for laws written 
 in a book." 
 
 Northern senators, instead of words of honest and indig 
 nant rebuke which such language should have received from 
 their lips, joined in this denunciation of their own free States, 
 and of those men and women of large intelligence and stainless 
 lives, whose offence was their love of freedom and efforts for 
 its promotion, as reckless fanatics and wicked incendiaries. 
 Isaac Hill of New Hampshire expressed his abhorrence of 
 ' the doings of weak or wicked men, who were moving this 
 abolition question at the North." He referred to the removal 
 of an academy at Canaan, New Hampshire, which admitted 
 colored youth, by the citizens of that and the neighboring 
 
318 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 town ; to the escape of George Thompson, disguised in female 
 attire and under the darkness of night, from a mob at the 
 capital of the State, and the burning of his effigy in the pub 
 lic square amid discharges of artillery, as samples of the deep 
 feeling that pervaded New Hampshire. He quoted and com 
 mended, too, the resolutions and utterances of Democratic 
 meetings, conventions, and speakers, to show that " the South 
 ought to be fully satisfied with the present disposition of the 
 North." 
 
 But the most significant, degrading, not to say disgraceful, 
 speech of that debate was made by Silas Wright. Benja 
 min Watkins Lee of Virginia had made perhaps the ablest 
 speech in opposition to the abolition of slavery in the Dis 
 trict of Columbia, in which, referring to a work on slavery 
 recently published by Dr. William Ellery Channing of Boston, 
 he declared that it had filled his mind with deep sorrow, and 
 that it had impaired his strong hope that " the intelligence 
 and good sense of the North would be exercised to suppress 
 this cause of mischief and agitation." Mr. Wright followed 
 with the declaration that he should have been content to have 
 given a silent vote, but he could not do so after reading the 
 extracts from the publication of that distinguished clergyman. 
 He then proceeded to declare that Dr. Channing, in the ex 
 tracts which had been quoted, had shown himself " as ignorant 
 of the opinions and feelings of the great mass of the Northern 
 citizens as of the merits and virtues of the people of the 
 South." Having taken issue with his opinions, he proceeded 
 to satisfy Southern senators that the sentiments of the people 
 of New York, on the subject of slavery, were as sound as were 
 the sentiments of the people of the South. "I am satisfied," 
 he said, "the general feeling of my State is the general feel 
 ing of the people of the non-slaveholding States." In proof 
 of this general declaration he referred in detail to the Utica 
 mob of 1835, which broke up the antislavery convention there 
 assembled, and destroyed the antislavery press of that city. 
 He referred boastfully to the facts that the grand jury had 
 brought in no bills against any of the rioters, and that from 
 the committee of twenty-five, chosen by the mob to carry out 
 
DENIAL OF THE RIGHT OF PETITION. 319 
 
 their purposes, one man had been chosen State senator, and 
 another had been made attorney-general of the State. " I 
 have mentioned these facts," said Mr. Wright, " and I might 
 mention many others of a similar character, to show that the 
 determined feeling of resistance to these dangerous and 
 wicked agitators in the North had already reached a point 
 beyond law and above law." 
 
 Mr. Wright was one of the most eminent and trusted lead 
 ers of the Democratic party, the personal and political friend 
 of Mr. Van Buren, then the Democratic candidate for the 
 presidency, and this substantial indorsement of that violent 
 outrage on the freedom of speech and the constitutional rights 
 of American citizens was doubtless intended to reassure the 
 slaveholders and to commend that candidate to the confidence 
 and support of the South. 
 
 Amid these denunciations, these approvals of lawless vio 
 lence, these humiliating surrenders of the constitutional rights 
 of American citizens, a few senators calmly and firmly main 
 tained the right of the people to petition, and to have their 
 petitions received, referred, and considered. Mr. Morris of 
 Ohio vindicated the right of the people to be heard in their 
 petitions, and reminded senators that while the people believed 
 they possessed that right, " no denial of it by Congress will 
 prevent them from exercising it." Mr. Prentiss of Vermont 
 regretted the harsh expressions which had been applied to the 
 petitioners, and reminded senators that they had fallen into 
 the common error of supposing that all who differed from 
 them did so from unworthy motives, and not from honest con 
 victions. "The petitioners," he said, "have been denounced 
 as incendiaries ; they have been charged with criminal, with 
 treasonable intentions", with intentions to excite a servile war 
 and subject the whole Southern country to pillage, havoc, and 
 devastation. With some of the persons who have signed peti 
 tions on this subject I am well acquainted. I know them to 
 be intelligent, patriotic, highly respectable. Their proposi 
 tions may be strongly stated ; their argument may be bold ; 
 their illustrations may not be suited to the taste or the judg 
 ment of those whose opinions they oppose ; but that all, the 
 
320 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 whole combined, proceeds from a consciousness on their part 
 of doing and saying what is right, I neither have nor can 
 entertain any doubt." He closed his calm, logical, and states 
 manlike speech with the expression of the opinion that slavery 
 would cease to exist in the District. * 
 
 Mr. Webster, too, was in favor of receiving these petitions 
 and referring them to the proper committees. " To reject," 
 he said, " the prayer of a petition at once without reference or 
 consideration is not respectful " to those whose right it is to 
 petition for the redress of grievances. Mr. Morris, then a 
 Democratic member from Ohio, who had bravely vindicated 
 the right of petition, was not present or did not vote. Web 
 ster and Davis of Massachusetts, Prentiss and Swift of Ver 
 mont, Knight of Rhode Island, and Hendricks of Indiana, all 
 Northern Whigs, boldly and manfully maintained the right 
 of petition by voting against that discreditable device. 
 
CHAPTER XXIY. 
 
 NORTHERN LEGISLATION DEMANDED. 
 
 Spirit of the Abolitionists. Mr. Sullivan's Pamphlet. Dr. Leonard "Woods. 
 Mr. Hazard's Eeport. Charleston Post-office rifled. Public Meeting. 
 Conduct of the New York Postmaster. Amos Kendall's Letter. His Course. 
 Report of Mr. Calhoun. Governor McDuffie's Message. Resolutions of 
 South Carolina Legislature. Resolutions of Southern States. Governor 
 Ritner's Message. Governor Gayle's Demand for Mr. Williams. Message 
 of Governor Marcy. Governor Dorr. Report of Mr. Stevens. Failure to 
 legislate. Edward Everett. His Readiness to shoulder a Musket to put 
 down Insurrection. Mr. Cambreling rebukes him. His Response to South 
 ern Demands. His Message. Referred to a Select Committee. Resolution 
 of Southern States. Action of Massachusetts Antislavery Society. Hearing 
 before the Committee. Speeches of Mr. May, Mr. Loring, Mr. Garrison, 
 Mr. Goodell. Mr. Lunt interrupts Mr. GoodeU. Dr. Follen insulted by 
 Mr. Lunt. Dr. Follen sustained by Mr. May. Memorial to the Legisla 
 ture. Another Hearing. Speakers interrupted by Mr. Lunt. Excitement 
 of the Audience. Mr. Lunt's Report. Resolutions laid on the Table. 
 
 DEEDS of violence and the reign of riot did not, however, 
 repress agitation or crush out Abolitionists. The declaration 
 of Charles King, son of the illustrious Rufus King, and editor 
 of the " New York American," that " fire could not burn the 
 convictions of these men out of them," had been clearly 
 demonstrated. Their spirits rose as the storm of popular 
 violence beat more fiercely on their heads. In the face of 
 their maddened countrymen they exhibited the unconquerable 
 spirit of devotion, courage, and martyrdom. 
 
 Other agencies were, therefore, invoked. Legislation was 
 demanded of the national and State governments. Grand 
 juries made presentments, and the judicial tribunals were 
 invoked to suppress and to punish. In the summer of 1835, 
 when mob violence was manifesting itself in every form, and 
 the laws were defied even by gentlemen of property and stand, 
 
 41 
 
322 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ing, a pamphlet, written by William Sullivan, was published 
 in Boston, in which the hope was expressed that " Massachu 
 setts will enact laws declaring the printing, publishing, and 
 circulating pamphlets on slavery, and also the holding meet 
 ings to discuss slavery and abolition, to be public, indictable 
 offences, and to provide for the punishment thereof in such a 
 manner as will more effectually prevent such offences." This 
 startling proposition, put forth by a learned lawyer and gen 
 tleman of high social position, received the censure of neither 
 the press, the pulpit, nor the people. 
 
 The " Literary and Theological Review," published in the 
 city of New York, and edited by Leonard Woods, Jr., after 
 ward president of Bowdoin College, affirmed that the Aboli 
 tionists were " justly liable to the highest civil penalties and 
 ecclesiastical censures." Though the " Review" was largely 
 supported by the Congregational and Presbyterian clergymen 
 of the New England and Middle States, even this extreme 
 position met with little opposition or dissent. While many, 
 however, of those who then approved and applauded this sen 
 timent changed their views, and adopted and defended more 
 liberal opinions, this editor continued, even amid the subse 
 quent developments of rebellion and civil war, to exhibit a 
 spirit which justly subjected him to the suspicion of disloyalty 
 to his government. 
 
 At a public meeting at Newport, Rhode Island, Mr. Hazard 
 of that city presented resolutions in favor of legislation against 
 the Abolitionists. At the October session of the legislature a 
 committee was appointed, of which he was made chairman, 
 for the purpose of reporting a bill against abolitionism, and 
 of subjecting Abolitionists to the infliction of legal penalties. 
 Politicians and public presses, men learned in law and divin 
 ity, gave utterance to like sentiments, and manifested their 
 readiness to repress by laws what violence -had failed to crush. 
 Was it then a matter of surprise that Southern men should 
 demand what so many Northern men seemed forward to 
 proffer ? 
 
 On the 29th of July, 1835, the post-office at Charleston, 
 South Carolina, was forced open by a mob, the mails rifled, 
 
NORTHERN LEGISLATION DEMANDED. 323 
 
 and antislavery publications destroyed. A few days afterward 
 a public meeting was held to complete the work already be 
 gun, by ferreting out and punishing any Abolitionists that 
 might be found, or any persons in sympathy with them. At 
 that meeting the clergy, of all denominations, attended in a 
 body to give their sanction to its proceedings. Their services 
 were gratefully acknowledged by the damaging compliment of 
 a resolution adopted by that lawless assemblage. The post 
 master took the responsibility of arresting the circulation of 
 antislavery publications until he should receive special instruc 
 tions from Washington. Other postmasters in the South im 
 mediately followed his example. The postmaster in New York 
 proposed to the American Antislavery Society that it should 
 voluntarily desist from attempting to send its publications by 
 mail. It, however, promptly and peremptorily refused to 
 yield its legal rights. 
 
 Amos Kendall was then Postmaster-General. A native of 
 Massachusetts, he had taken up his residence in Kentucky, 
 became connected with the press, and was distinguished for 
 his zeal and ability in support of General Jackson, who had 
 placed him at the head of the Post-Office Department. In his 
 reply of the 5th of August to the postmaster of Charleston, 
 he admitted that the Postmaster-General had " no legal author 
 ity to exclude newspapers from the mail, nor to prohibit their 
 carriage or delivery on account of their character or tendency, 
 real or supposed." He expressed himself, however, unpre 
 pared to direct the postmaster to deliver antislavery papers. 
 " By no act or direction of mine, official or private," said this 
 high official, sworn to obey the laws, " could I be induced, 
 knowingly, to aid in giving circulation to -papers of this de 
 scription, directly or indirectly. We owe an obligation to the 
 laws, but a higher one to the communities in which we live ; 
 and, if the former be permitted to destroy the latter, it is 
 patriotism to disregard them. Entertaining these views, I 
 cannot sanction and will not condemn the step you have 
 taken." To Samuel L. Gouveneur, the postmaster of New 
 York, who had consulted him in regard to suppressing anti- 
 slavery papers through the mails, he replied, approving what 
 
324 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 he had done, but declaring that he was " deterred from- giving 
 an order to exclude the whole series of antislavery publications 
 from the Southern mails only by a want of legal power." This 
 position of that high functionary, so indefensible and revolu 
 tionary, encouraged his subordinates to set at defiance the 
 laws of their country, violate the sanctity of the mails, and 
 subject their contents to the surveillance of every petty post 
 master, whatever his motives or character might be. 
 
 President Jackson, in his annual message of that year, sug 
 gested to Congress " the propriety of passing such a law as 
 will prohibit, under severe penalties, the circulation in the 
 Southern States, through the mail, of incendiary publications 
 intended to instigate the slaves to insurrection." This propo 
 sition was referred to a select committee, of which John C. 
 Calhoun was chairman. On the 4th of February, 1836, this 
 committee made an elaborate report, accompanied by a bill. In 
 this report it was maintained that it belonged " to the States, 
 and not to Congress, to determine what is and what is not cal 
 culated to disturb their security "; that, if Congress might 
 decide that year what incendiary publications were, they might 
 decide next year what they were not, and thus enforce the cir 
 culation of abolition documents. This report maintained that 
 when the States had determined what incendiary publications 
 were, Congress must enact a law prohibiting their transmis 
 sion through the mail. By the doctrines of that report, when 
 any State pronounced certain publications to be " incendiary " 
 in their character, Congress and State legislatures were bound 
 to act in conformity with its decisions. By the provisions of 
 the act reported it was declared that it should " not be lawful 
 for any deputy postmaster in any State, Territory, or District, 
 knowingly to deliver to any person whatsoever any pamphlet, 
 newspaper, handbill, or other printed paper or pictorial repre 
 sentation touching the subject of slavery, when by the laws 
 of such State, Territory, or District such circulation is pro 
 hibited." 
 
 In his message to the legislature of South Carolina, in De 
 cember, 1835, Governor McDuffie elaborately defended slavery 
 as " the corner-stone of the republican edifice " ; declared the 
 
NORTHERN LEGISLATION DEMANDED. 325 
 
 laboring population, " bleached or unbleached, a dangerous 
 element in the body politic " ; and affirmed of the Abolition 
 ists and their measures that " the laws of any community 
 should punish this species of interference with death without 
 benefit of clergy." The legislature, accustomed to lead wher 
 ever slavery had a service to be performed, immediately adopted 
 a resolution in accord with his suggestion. Presuming on what 
 it chose to regard the justice and friendship of the non-slavehold- 
 ing States to carry out such measures, it called upon them to 
 " effectually suppress," by legislation, all abolition societies 
 within their respective limits. 
 
 During the same month North Carolina called upon its sister 
 States to pass penal laws against printing anything that might 
 have a tendency to make ' their slaves discontented. During 
 the next month Alabama called upon them to " enact such 
 penal laws as will finally put an end to the malignant deeds 
 of the Abolitionists." Virginia earnestly requested the non- 
 slaveholding States promptly to " adopt penal enactments, or 
 such other measures as will effectually suppress all associations 
 within their limits purporting to be or having the character of 
 abolition societies." Georgia, too, resolved that it was incum 
 bent on the people of the North " to crush the traitorous de 
 signs of the Abolitionists." 
 
 By such resolutions these Southern States demanded, in 
 effect, that the non-slaveholding States should suppress aboli 
 tion societies, and make it penal to print, publish, or distribute 
 antislavery newspapers, pamphlets, or tracts. They pro 
 claimed, too, that they should consider the abolition of slav 
 ery in the District of Columbia, or any interference with slavery 
 by any State or the general government, to be at once and un 
 der every possible circumstance resisted. Their demands were 
 officially communicated to the governors of the several States, 
 and by them brought to the notice of their respective legisla 
 tures. In communicating these demands Governor Ritner of 
 Pennsylvania was the only one of the Northern chief-magis 
 trates to resist these arrogant demands, and to defend the 
 sacred rights of freedom of speech and of the press, thus men 
 aced and endangered. 
 
326 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Governor Gayle of Alabama had already gone so far as to 
 demand of the governor of New York that Mr. Williams, the 
 publishing agent of the American Antislavery Society, should 
 be surrendered to him, to be tried by the laws of Alabama on 
 an indictment found against him by its grand jury, for publish 
 ing in the " Emancipator," in the city of New York, the sen 
 timent that " God commands and all nature cries out that man 
 should not be held as property. The system of making men 
 property has plunged two and a quarter millions of our fellow- 
 countrymen into the deepest physical and moral degradation, 
 and they are every moment sinking deeper." Mr. Williams 
 had never been in the State of Alabama, and of course had 
 never fled from it ; and this was distinctly admitted by the 
 governor when he made the -demand for his surrender. But 
 this audacious demand was not complied with. 
 
 There were those who believed that the Abolitionists might 
 be punished under existing laws ; while others were ready to 
 enact such laws as the slave-masters required. The governor 
 and legislature of New York were Democratic. They desired 
 the election of Mr. Van Buren to the presidency, and hence 
 were ready to make almost any concessions to their Southern 
 allies and friends. The legislature met early in January, 1836. 
 Governor Marcy, in his message, affirmed that the States would 
 not possess all the necessary means for preserving their ex 
 ternal relations of peace among themselves " without the power 
 to pass such laws " as were required by the Southern States. 
 He relied, however, for the present, on the influence of public 
 opinion which, he said, had already been manifested with unex 
 ampled energy and unanimity in striking exhibitions of popu 
 lar reprobation, elicited by the just fear of " the fatal issues in 
 which the uncurbed efforts of the Abolitionists may ultimately 
 end." The committee to whom the subject was referred made 
 a report, near the close of the session, in response to this dec 
 laration of the governor, in which they pledged the faith of 
 the State to enact such laws whenever they should be deemed 
 necessary. Early in February Mr. Hazard, chairman of the 
 committee, appointed at the October session of the legislature 
 of Rhode Island, reported a bill embodying provisions he had 
 
NORTHERN LEGISLATION DEMANDED. 327 
 
 suggested even before the demands of the Southern legislatures 
 were made. This bill, however, was defeated, mainly by the 
 efforts of George Curtis and Thomas W. Dorr, then represen 
 tatives of the city of Providence. 
 
 Governor Ritner standing alone, as already stated, in de 
 fence of free speech and a free press, commented in language 
 of deserved severity upon this cowardly timidity and disgrace 
 ful subserviency of Northern men, characterizing it as " the 
 base bowing of the knee to the dark spirit of slavery." " While 
 we admit and scrupulously respect," he said, " the constitu 
 tional rights of other States on this momentous subject, let us 
 not, by either fear or interest, be driven from aught of that 
 spirit of independence and veneration which has ever character 
 ized our beloved Commonwealth. Above all, let us never yield 
 up the right of free discussion of any evil which may arise in 
 the land or any part of it." These noble utterances of the 
 honest and worthy governor of Pennsylvania were penned by 
 Thomas K. Burrows, then secretary of State, now president of 
 an agricultural college in Centre County. In those days of 
 Northern sycophancy the manly words honored alike the heart 
 and head of him who penned them, as well as of him who put 
 upon them the seal of his official sanction. In a congratula 
 tory letter, Thaddeus Stevens compared this brave message to 
 the " shadow of a great rock in a weary land." 
 
 Mr. Stevens was chairman of the Judiciary Committee of the 
 House of Representatives. To that committee were referred 
 the resolutions of the Southern legislatures. Its report, un 
 like that of the legislative committee of Massachusetts, was 
 brave, manly, and independent. It unequivocally denied the 
 right of the slaveholding States to claim legislation against 
 free discussion. " Could any other State," it affirmed, " main 
 tain the right to claim from us such legislation, we and our 
 citizens would be reduced to a vassalage but little less degrad 
 ing than that of the slaves whose condition we assert the right 
 to discuss." It proclaimed as a fundamental truth, never to 
 be surrendered, that " every citizen of the non-slaveholding 
 States has a right to think and freely to publish his thoughts 
 on any subject of national and State policy." 
 
328 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 This report took issue, too, with the Southern legislatures 
 touching the power of Congress to abolish slavery in the Dis 
 trict of Columbia and the Territories. The report closed with 
 two resolutions, affirming that the slaveholding States alone 
 had the right to legislate on the subject of slavery within their 
 own limits ; while Congress had the constitutional power to 
 abolish slavery and the slave-trade within the District of Co 
 lumbia, a power it was expedient for it to employ. 
 
 This attempt of Southern legislatures and compliant poli 
 ticians to secure hostile legislation against the Abolitionists 
 signally failed. Not one Northern State complied with their 
 unreasonable and unconstitutional demands. Though execu 
 tive officials counselled submission, the more popular branches 
 of the State governments hesitated, and refused to yield. An- 
 tislavery men, who had been filled with well-grounded appre 
 hension, took courage from these defeats. They began to 
 realize that their endurance, courage, and constancy were im 
 pressing themselves upon the public mind. " In the dark and 
 troubled night " through which they were passing they saw, or 
 thought they saw, in these facts, " a star of hope " through the 
 rifted clouds, as if a less stormy and sanguinary future was 
 opening before them. 
 
 The zeal, activity, and uncompromising character of the 
 Abolitionists of Massachusetts had brought upon them in an 
 especial manner the hostility of the slave-masters and the 
 condemnation of Northern men with Southern principles. 
 The bold, outspoken, and unsparing criticisms of the " Liber 
 ator " upon slavery in all its forms, and upon all who coun 
 tenanced that iniquity, incensed its friends and encouraged its 
 enemies. At that time, perhaps, the most thorough and radi 
 cal antislavery men in the country were found in Massachu 
 setts, and nowhere was hostility to them more distinctly pro 
 claimed. 
 
 Edward Everett was then governor of Massachusetts. 
 Trained for the pulpit, he early yielded to the claims of litera 
 ture arid public affairs. He was a ripe and accurate scholar, a 
 gentleman of large attainments, a brilliant and polished rheto 
 rician, a graceful and impressive orator. He entered Con- 
 
NOKTHEKN LEGISLATION DEMANDED. 329 
 
 gress the earnest supporter of the administration of John 
 Quincy Adams. On the 9th of March, 1826, in response to 
 an imputation upon Northern representatives that they desired 
 to change the basis of representation, and would refuse to sup 
 press a servile rebellion, he took occasion to make an elaborate 
 speech, avowing his opposition to any such purpose, and his 
 readiness to render any aid the latter might require. " Sir," 
 he said, " I am no soldier. My habits and education are very 
 unmilitary ; but there is no cause in which I would sooner 
 buckle a knapsack on my back and put a musket on my shoul 
 der than that of putting down a servile insurrection at the 
 South." He rendered more sad and significant the tenor of 
 such a pledge by his defence of slavery in the same speech. 
 " The great relation of servitude," he said, " in some form or 
 other, with greater or less departure from the theoretic equal 
 ity of men, is inseparable from our nature. Domestic slavery 
 is not, in my judgment, to be set down as an immoral and irre 
 ligious relation. It is a condition of life as well as any other 
 to be justified by morality, religion, and international law." 
 
 These sentiments created no little surprise. Churchill C. 
 Cambreling, a native of North Carolina, then a leading mem 
 ber of the House from New York, sharply and eloquently 
 rebuked these gratuitous admissions, defences, and pledges. 
 If he had learned, he said, in the University of Gottingen, 
 such sentiments, instead of returning to his native land, he 
 would have journeyed eastward, would have " followed the 
 course of the dark-rolling Danube," " crossed the Euxine," 
 and "laid his head upon the footstool of the Sultan, and 
 besought him to place his feet upon the neck of the recreant 
 citizen of a recreant republic." 
 
 Entering the gubernatorial chair with such sentiments and 
 antecedents, it is not strange that Mr. Everett's response to 
 these Southern demands should have been humiliating in the 
 extreme. Though mortified and indignant, antislavery men 
 were not, therefore, surprised to read in his annual message 
 of that year these admissions and recommendations : " What 
 ever by direct and necessary operation is calculated to excite 
 an insurrection among the slaves has been held by highly 
 
 42 
 
330 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 respectable legal authority an offence against the peace of the 
 commonwealth, which may be prosecuted as a misdemeanor at 
 common law." And again : " The patriotism of all classes 
 must be invoked to abstain from a discussion which, by exas 
 perating the master, can have no other effect than to render 
 more oppressive the condition of the slave ; and which, if not 
 abandoned, there is great reason to fear, will prove the rock 
 on which the Union will split." 
 
 This portion of the message was referred to a joint com 
 mittee of five, of which George Lunt, then a senator from 
 the county of Essex and a resident of Newburyport, was chair 
 man. To the same committee were also referred the com 
 munications which had been received from the legislatures of 
 the several slaveholding States, requesting the enactment of 
 laws making it penal for citizens of non-slaveholding States to 
 speak or publish sentiments such as had been uttered in anti- 
 slavery meetings and printed in antislavery tracts and news 
 papers. It was a dark and trying hour for the friends of the 
 slave. Everywhere spoken against, bitterly assailed by the 
 public press, and subjected to mob violence, they had reason 
 to be alarmed at these demands for penal legislation. The 
 board of managers of the Massachusetts Antislavery Society 
 took immediate action. By their order, Rev. Samuel J. 
 May, 'the corresponding secretary, addressed a letter to the 
 legislative committee, asking permission to appear before it, 
 and give reasons why there should be no action against the 
 freedom of speech and of the press, or condemnatory of the 
 Abolitionists. The request was granted, and on the 4th of 
 March a hearing was had in the hall of the House of Repre 
 sentatives. 
 
 Mr. Lucas, a member of the committee, thought the gentle 
 men who had sought a hearing were premature in their action ; 
 that they had no reason to suppose that the committee would 
 do anything prejudicial to them; and that they should bave 
 waited until the committee had reported. To this objection 
 Mr. May replied that he and his associates belonged to that 
 class of persons censured by the governor in his message, and 
 referred to in the communications from the Southern States. 
 
NORTHERN LEGISLATION DEMANDED. 331 
 
 To avert any action of the legislature that might infringe upon 
 the liberty of speech or of the press, or any legislative censures 
 upon the Abolitionists, they had sought an interview with the 
 committee. Mr. Lucas then remarked that it was very im 
 proper for the gentlemen of the Antislavery Society to proceed 
 upon the supposition that the legislature would enact any laws 
 abridging the liberty of speech and of the press, which it could 
 not constitutionally do. To these remarks Mr. May replied 
 that the Abolitionists did not fear the enactment of any penal 
 laws ; but they were apprehensive that condemnatory resolu 
 tions might be adopted, which they would deprecate even 
 more than penal laws. Mr. Moseley, member of the commit 
 tee from Newburyport, expressed the hope that nothing would 
 preclude the committee from giving a hearing, as he wished 
 for information, desired to know what Abolitionism was, to 
 what it was tending, and how far it went. Mr. Lucas having 
 withdrawn his objection, Mr. May then proceeded to sketch 
 the origin and history of the abolition movements in the 
 United States. The antislavery societies, he said, consisted 
 of a band of men associated together to overthrow the system 
 of American slavery by intellectual and moral means. This 
 position of the Abolitionists was thus presented to the commit 
 tee with great accuracy and clearness by one who had been 
 among the very earliest to accept the doctrine of immediate 
 emancipation, and who, having been thus identified with the 
 antislavery cause, was familiar with its origin, principles, and 
 history. 
 
 Ellis Gray Loring followed in a well-defined, clear, and for 
 cible argument. He denied the right of the legislature to 
 enact penal laws, or pass votes of censure upon the doings of 
 abolition societies. He strenuously denied, too, that the 
 Abolitionists had done anything inconsistent with the law of 
 nations or the Constitution of the United States. He also 
 claimed the moral right to labor for the extirpation of slavery, 
 or any other evil. He closed his speech with these words : 
 " A great principle is involved in the decision of the legis 
 lature. I esteem as nothing, in comparison, our feelings or 
 wishes as individuals. Personal interests sink into insignifi- 
 
332 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 cance here. Sacrifice us, if you will ; but do not wound liberty 
 through us. Care nothing for men ; but let the oppressor and 
 his apologist, whether at the North or the South, beware of the 
 certain defeat which attends him who is found fighting against 
 God." 
 
 The committee was then briefly addressed by Mr. Garrison. 
 He maintained that the Abolitionists were laboring to accom 
 plish the very object for which the Union was formed ; and 
 that their doctrines, if obeyed, and not too late, would save it. 
 He declared that the alternative was presented to the people 
 of New England either to submit to be gagged by Southern 
 taskmasters or to labor unceasingly for the removal of slavery 
 from the country. " We loudly boast of our free country," he 
 said, " and of the union of these States ; yet I have no coun 
 try ! As a New-Englander and as an Abolitionist, I am ex 
 cluded by a bloody proscription from one half of the national 
 territory ; and so is every man who is known to regard slavery 
 with abhorrence. Where is our Union ? and of what value is 
 it to me, or to any one who believes that liberty is the inalien 
 able right of every man, independent of the color of his skin 
 or the texture of his hair ? We cannot enjoy the privileges 
 of the Union. The right of free and safe locomotion from 
 one part of the land to the other is denied to us, except on peril 
 of our lives ! They who preach that slaveholding is sin, and 
 that immediate emancipation is the duty of every master, 
 might as safely leap into a den of lions, or into a fiery fur 
 nace, as to go into the Southern States ! " 
 
 William Goodell reminded the committee that, as the people 
 were not prepared to receive a law which should infringe the 
 liberty of speech, the opposers of abolition were driven to the 
 necessity of operating indirectly against them. He protested 
 against any legislative censure, because it would be a usurpa 
 tion of authority. The legislature was not a judicial body, and 
 had no right to pronounce condemnation on any one. He was 
 here interrupted by Mr. Lunt, who sharply said : " You must 
 not indulge in such remarks, sir. We cannot sit here and 
 permit you to instruct us as to the duties of the legislature." 
 In spite, however, of this interruption, Mr. Goodell proceeded, 
 
NORTHERN LEGISLATION DEMANDED. 333 
 
 and maintained with great force that the Constitution secured 
 to the Abolitionists the right to do all they had done or in 
 tended to do. 
 
 Professor Charles Follen had been selected by the board of 
 managers as one of the committee to appear before the legisla 
 tive committee. Born in Germany, he had joined in his youth 
 the young men of that country in emancipating his native land 
 from French domination. Devoted to liberty, he was driven 
 by persecution to seek a home in the United States. Hon 
 ored for his profound scholarship and beloved for his private 
 virtues, he was made an instructor in Harvard University. On 
 the establishment of the " Liberator " he early sought out its 
 editor, and at great personal sacrifice took and maintained his 
 position among the despised Abolitionists. He commenced his 
 speech with a series of philosophical remarks upon the rights 
 of man, the spirit and purposes of republican institutions in 
 the United States, and maintained that liberty of speech was 
 essential to the maintenance of the government. He alluded 
 to the attempts to excite odium against the Abolitionists, and 
 to the demands of Southern legislatures for the suppression of 
 their doctrines by penal laws. He referred to the Faneuil 
 Hall meeting of the citizens of Boston, and to its censure of 
 the Abolitionists, which the mob regarded as a warrant for its 
 proceedings on the 21st of October. " Now, gentlemen," he 
 asked, " may we not reasonably anticipate that similar conse 
 quences would follow the expression by the legislature of a 
 similar condemnation ? Would not the mob again undertake 
 to execute the informal sentence of the general court ? Would 
 it not let loose again its bloodhounds upon us ? " 
 
 " Stop, sir ! " exclaimed Lunt. " You may not pursue this 
 course of remark. It is insulting to this committee, and the 
 legislature which they represent." 
 
 Dr. Follen calmly remarked that he had not intimated, nor 
 did he believe, that the legislature would countenance an 
 act of violence. But Mr. Lunt curtly replied : " The com 
 mittee consider the remarks you have made very improper, 
 and cannot permit you to proceed." Dr. Follen then sat 
 down, amid evidences of deep emotion and displeasure on 
 
334 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the part of the audience at this conduct of the chairman. 
 Mr. Moseley earnestly remonstrated with Mr. Lunt ; and Mr. 
 May explicitly declared his dissatisfaction at the course pur- 
 sued by the committee. He expressed his regret that the 
 chairman had stopped Dr. Follen, and concurred entirely with 
 that gentleman in expressing the opinion that a vote of censure 
 by the legislature would give encouragement to such scenes 
 of violence. 
 
 To these remarks Lunt sharply replied : " Whatever you, 
 sir, and your associates, may think of the remarks of Dr. 
 Follen, it is for the committee to decide whether they were 
 proper or improper. You are not to dictate to us in what man 
 ner we shall conduct the proceedings of this examination." 
 He told the representatives of the Antislavery Society that they 
 had no right to claim a hearing, and that it was a matter of 
 special favor that they had been admitted to that interview at all. 
 Mr. May reminded the committee that the Senate Chamber was 
 then occupied by committees listening to individuals touching 
 the interests of moneyed institutions ; that they had sought an 
 interview on a subject infinitely greater than all the moneyed 
 interests in the land, the cause of freedom and humanity. 
 To this Lunt tartly answered : " I conceive, sir, that you are 
 here to exculpate yourselves, if you can, from the charges 
 laid against you ; and not to instruct us as to what we are to 
 do in reference to the communications we have received from 
 certain other States." 
 
 To this impertinent and gratuitous remark Mr. May re 
 sponded : " We are not here, sir, as culprits. We do not feel 
 dike culprits, nor do we mean to act as such. We know that 
 we are aiming to accomplish a great public good, and to avert 
 great national evils. We feel that we are standing up before 
 the world in the defence of high moral and religious principles, 
 principles the continued disregard of which must bring ruin 
 on our country. We have come in the hope that we may do 
 something to induce the State of Massachusetts to take a stand 
 worthy of herself, to stand up as a bulwark that shall stay and 
 turn back the proud waves of oppression which are rolling over 
 the land." After consultation, Mr. May notified the committee 
 
NORTHERN LEGISLATION DEMANDED. 335 
 
 that they would present a remonstrance to the legislature the 
 next day, and hoped that they might hereafter meet the com 
 mittee with a better understanding of their rights. 
 
 The next day a memorial was presented to the legislature, 
 complaining of this treatment by the committee, and asking 
 the recognition of their right to appear and give their reasons 
 why the legislature should not pass resolutions of condemna 
 tion against the Abolitionists. This memorial was referred to 
 the committee, and another hearing was granted in the hall 
 of the House of Representatives, which was thronged by gen 
 tlemen and ladies, who manifested the deepest interest in the 
 proceedings. 
 
 Samuel E. Sewall addressed the committee against yielding 
 to the demands of the slaveholding States, which would, 
 he said, be to subvert the foundation of civil liberties, and 
 make it criminal to obey the laws of God and follow the ex 
 ample of Jesus Christ. He maintained that, if Massachusetts 
 were to pass the laws required of her, punishing her citizens 
 for speaking and writing against slavery, it would not repress 
 the opinions of Abolitionists. " Who and what," he asked, 
 " are the men whose mouths it is proposed k> stop by violence 
 and unconstitutional laws ? Men of integrity, of piety, of zeal, 
 of perseverance, of intelligence, men who are conscientiously 
 devoted to their opinions, and as ready to suffer imprisonment, 
 fines, stripes, persecutions, and death for the sake of their 
 opinions and their consciences, as ever was any persecuted 
 sect." 
 
 Dr. Follen maintained, with mingled mildness and firmness, 
 the sacred rights of free discussion. The legislature, he con 
 tended, could not censure freedom of speech in the Abolition 
 ists without preparing the way to censure it in other citizens 
 who might for the moment be obnoxious to the majority. He 
 expressed the opinion that the mobs which had brought so 
 much discredit upon the country had acted under the delusion 
 that the Abolitionists wanted to infringe the compacts of the 
 Constitution and destroy the Union. " As a friend of liberty," 
 ne said, "I am glad to be able to look upon the popular ex 
 citement from which my friends have suffered in this light ; 
 
336 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 but when Judge Lynch has presided, I must say as I said the 
 other day " "I call you to order ! " passionately exclaimed 
 the chairman. " This is not respectful to the committee." Dr. 
 Follen expressed his unconsciousness of saying anything dis 
 respectful to the committee, and significantly asked if he must 
 understand that speaking disrespectfully of mobs was speak 
 ing disrespectfully of the committee. To this inquiry Lunt 
 replied that the allusion was improper, and could not be per 
 mitted while he occupied the chair. Mr. Moseley expressed 
 his dissent from the decision of the chairman, saw nothing 
 disrespectful in Dr. Follen's remarks, and pronounced him 
 entirely in order. The Doctor then proceeded, and closed 
 without further interruption. 
 
 William Goodell followed in a terse, able, and eloquent 
 speech, in which he charged upon those who promulgated the 
 doctrines embodied in the documents from the Southern States 
 before the committee an attempt " to destroy the free labor of 
 the North, and reduce our free laboring citizens to the physi 
 cal and moral condition of their slaves." He quoted the lan 
 guage of Mr. Leigh of Virginia, then in the Senate of the 
 United States, and of Mr. McDuffie of South Carolina, in which 
 they maintained, in substance, that the laboring population of 
 no nation on earth is entitled to liberty, or capable of enjoying 
 it. He then charged the Southern legislatures with a deep and 
 foul conspiracy against the liberties of the free laboring people 
 of the North. Here he was interrupted by the chairman, and 
 told that " he must not charge Southern States with a foul con 
 spiracy, nor treat their public documents with disrespect." 
 Mr. Goodell, proceeding, quoted the language of Governor 
 McDuffie's message and the action of the South Carolina legis 
 lature ; and, pointing to the Southern documents lying upon the 
 table of the committee, characterized them as fetters for North 
 ern freemen, and asked this pregnant question : " Mr. Chair 
 man, are you prepared to attempt putting them on ? " 
 
 Here Mr. Lunt cried out with great warmth, " Stop, sir ! Sit 
 down, sir! The committee will hear no more of this." Mr. 
 Goodell firmly remarked that his duty was discharged ; that 
 they came there as freemen, and they would go away as free- 
 
NORTHERN LEGISLATION DEMANDED. 337 
 
 men should. The audience had watched the proceedings with 
 the deepest interest ; and some one exclaimed, as the voice of 
 Mr. Goodell fell upon the ear : " Let us go quickly, lest we 
 be made slaves ! " Mr. May appealed again to the chairman 
 for a hearing, but the latter intimated that the committee had 
 heard enough. 
 
 As the excited and indignant audience was retiring, Dr. 
 Gamaliel Bradford of Plymouth County, not a member of 
 the Antislavery Society, came forward and made an earnest 
 appeal for liberty of speech and of the press, and of the right 
 of private judgment. When he sat down, George Bond, a 
 prominent merchant and a gentleman of high character and 
 influence, asked leave to address a few words to the commit 
 tee. Leave having been granted, he expressed his fears that 
 the action of the committee would produce excitement through 
 out the commonwealth. " I have certainly heard nothing," he 
 remarked, " from the gentlemen of the Antislavery Society, 
 that called for the course that has been adopted ; and it does 
 seem to me that the committee are too fastidious, too hyper 
 critical." " Be careful of what you say, sir," ejaculated Mr. 
 Lunt. In spite of this interruption, Mr. Bond went on, and 
 implored the committee to allow the antislavery gentlemen to 
 say what they wished to say, although their language might 
 not be such as to suit the committee. But the committee 
 broke up without a formal adjournment ; and, as the chair 
 man was retiring, Mr. Moseley, one of his own townsmen, said 
 to him : " I am not satisfied with your course. You have been 
 wrong from the beginning. I will not sit again on such a 
 committee." 
 
 Many persons who witnessed the discreditable conduct of 
 the chairman of that committee freely expressed their indig 
 nation, and from that time committed themselves to the cause 
 of liberty, then so imperilled. Dr. William Ellery Charming, 
 who had attended the hearing, much to the gratification of the 
 Abolitionists, with whom he had not co-operated, approached 
 Mr. Garrison and offered him his hand, adding expressions 
 of sympathy and encouragement. Seth Whitmarsh, a Demo 
 cratic member of the Senate from the county of Bristol; 
 
 43 
 
338 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Robert Rantoul, Jr., a leading Democratic member of the 
 House ; and George S. Hillard, a Representative from Bos 
 ton, sharply criticised, in their places, the action of the 
 committee. 
 
 Mr. Lunt, in his report, spoke of the demands of Southern 
 legislatures for the enactment of penal laws for the suppres 
 sion of antislavery societies, meetings, and publications, as 
 " of the most solemn and affecting character ; as appeals to 
 our justice as men, to our sympathies as brethren, to our 
 patriotism as citizens ; to the memory of the common trials 
 and perils of our ancestors and theirs ; to all the better emo 
 tions of our nature ; to our respect for the Constitution ; to 
 our regard for the laws ; to our hope for the security of all 
 those blessings which the Union and that only can preserve to 
 us." The committee further declared that " the right of the 
 master to his slave is as undoubted as the right to any other 
 property " ; that " any attempt, whether direct or indirect, to 
 deprive him of this property is a violation of the fixed laws of 
 social policy, as well as of the ordinary rules of moral obliga 
 tion " ; and that " his argument that the property is his own 
 would seem to be unanswerable." The conduct of the Aboli 
 tionists was declared to be " not only wrong in policy, but 
 erroneous in morals " ; and the charges brought against the 
 Abolitionists by the South were declared to be strictly applica 
 ble to them. To the report was appended a series of reso 
 lutions expressing " entire disapprobation of the doctrines 
 avowed and the general measures pursued by such as agitate 
 the general question of slavery." This report and resolutions 
 were laid upon the table and never acted upon. 
 
 This course of Mr. Lurit excited so much feeling against 
 him in Essex County that he was not put in nomination for the 
 Senate the next year ; but he was elected to the House. Both 
 in public and private life, however, he has persistently adhered 
 to the position he then assumed, and all measures for emanci 
 pation and the overthrow of the Slave Power have encountered 
 his bitter and relentless opposition. Nor during the slave 
 holders' Rebellion did his tongue or pen ever meet the true 
 demands of loyalty. 
 
CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 INCENDIARY PUBLICATION BILL. ADMISSION OF ARKANSAS. 
 CONVERSION OF FREE SOIL INTO SLAVE SOIL. ATTEMPT TO 
 CENSURE MR. ADAMS. RIGHT OF PETITION DENIED. 
 
 President Jackson's Message. Referred to a Special Committee. Mr. Cal- 
 houn's Report. Incendiary Publication Bill. Debate thereon. Mr. Van 
 Buren's casting Vote. Defeat of the Bill. Application of Arkansas for Ad 
 mission into the Union. Constitution guarantees Perpetual Slavery. De 
 bate on the Admission. Mr. Adams's Amendment rejected. Arkansas 
 admitted. The Boundaries of Missouri extended. Free Soil made Slave 
 Soil. Success of the Slaveholders. Second Session of the XXI Vth Con 
 gress. Presentation of Antislavery Petitions. Presentation of a Petition 
 by Mr. Adams purporting to come from Slaves. Violent Scene in the House. 
 
 Mr. Patton's Motion to return the Petition to Mr. Adams. Motion of Mr. 
 Thompson to censure Mr. Adams. Substitute moved by Mr. Lewis. Angry 
 Debate. Mr. Adams's Defence. Triumph of Mr. Adams. Speech of Mr. 
 Slade. Violent Scene. Caucus of Southern Members. Adoption of Mr. 
 Patton's Resolution. Antislavery Papers not to be debated, printed, or read. 
 
 Subserviency of Congress. 
 
 WHEN Congress assembled in 1835, the country was deeply 
 excited by recent events. The year had been marked by riot 
 ous demonstrations and lawless violence. Bitter animosities 
 toward the hated and dreaded Abolitionists pervaded the 
 South. Her people were vehement in demanding action 
 against them by Northern legislatures and by Congress ; and 
 her representatives came to Washington fully imbued with the 
 passions of their constituents. 
 
 President Jackson in his message invited attention to what 
 he was pleased to call " the painful excitement in the South, 
 produced by attempts to circulate through the mails inflamma 
 tory appeals addressed to the passions of the slaves, calculated 
 to stimulate them to insurrection, and to produce all the hor 
 rors of a servile war." He expressed the opinion that public 
 sentiment would check such proceedings of misguided per- 
 
340 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 sons ; but, if it failed to do so, he thought that the non-slave- 
 holding States would be prompt to exercise authority in sup 
 pressing such attempts. He suggested to Congress " the 
 propriety of passing such a law as will prohibit, under severe 
 penalty, the circulation in the Southern States, through the 
 mail, of incendiary publications, intended to instigate the 
 slaves to insurrection." 
 
 Mr. Calhoun moved the reference of so much of the Presi 
 dent's message as related to the transmission of incendiary 
 publications through the mail to a select committee. After a 
 brief debate his motion was agreed to, and a committee of 
 five consisting of Calhoun, King of Georgia, Man gum of 
 North Carolina, Linn of Missouri, and Davis of Massachu 
 setts was appointed. A bill was reported, accompanied 
 by an elaborate report from the pen of Mr. Calhoun. The 
 report was concurred in by Mangum ; but Davis, King, and 
 Linn were prompt to declare that they did not concur in all 
 the positions of that report. Mr. King even went so far as 
 to characterize it as not only inconsistent with the bill, but 
 with " the existence of the Union itself, and which, if estab 
 lished and carried into practice, must hastily end in its disso 
 lution." 
 
 The report maintained that slavery in the Southern States 
 could not be abolished without " disasters unexampled in the 
 history of the world " ; that to destroy the existing relations 
 would be to place the two races " in a state of conflict, which 
 must end in the expulsion or extirpation of one or the other." 
 It maintained, too, that social and political equality between 
 them was impossible ; that no power on earth could overcome 
 the difficulty ; that, without such equality, to change the pres 
 ent condition of the African race would be but to change the 
 form of slavery, would make them the slaves of society, in 
 stead of the slaves of individuals. It avowed that the slave- 
 holding States would not quietly submit to be sacrificed, that 
 every consideration would impel them to the most daring and 
 desperate resistance ; and that the subversion of the relation 
 between master and slave would be followed by convulsions, 
 would " devastate the country, burst asunder the bonds of the 
 
INCENDIARY PUBLICATION BILL. 341 
 
 Union, and ingulf in a sea of blood the institutions of the 
 country." 
 
 The bill was taken up for consideration early in April, and 
 its provisions explained by Mr. Calhoun. Mr. Davis of Mas 
 sachusetts, a member of the committee, opposed it in a speech 
 of great clearness and force, in which he demonstrated its 
 unconstitutionally and insidious and dangerous character. 
 He thought it very impolitic to pass a law that would make 
 every citizen feel that he was restrained in his privileges in 
 consequence of slavery. He warned gentlemen that such 
 an act would **ouse up the spirit of resentment against slavery 
 and excite the people to oppose it. " But if you would tran 
 quillize public feeling," he said, " I would recommend to you 
 to keep slavery as far out of sight and hearing as possible, and 
 never call on the public to make sacrifices of their rights and 
 privileges to sustain it." 
 
 Mr. King, who dissented from the reasoning of the report, 
 gave his support to the bill ; but, in doing so, imputed to Mr. 
 Calhoun motives of action growing out of his relations with 
 President Jackson. After vindicating his motives and explain 
 ing his actions, Mr. Calhoun avowed that the refusal of Congress 
 to pass his bill would be virtually to co-operate with the Abo 
 litionists, and would make the officers of the Post-Office Depart 
 ment their agents in the circulation of incendiary publications. 
 He warned Congress that by the refusal to pass the bill it would 
 clearly enlist on the side of the Abolitionists against the South 
 ern States, and that the South would have nothing to hope 
 from them, let their decision be what it might. The South 
 never would, he said, abandon the principles of the bill, but 
 would resort to " State interposition as the rightful remedy." 
 He maintained that in " this well-tested and efficient remedy, 
 sustained by the principles developed in the report and asserted 
 in this bill, the slaveholding States have an ample protection. 
 Let it be fixed, let it be riveted in every Southern mind, that 
 the laws of the slaveholding States for the protection of their 
 domestic institutions are paramount to the laws of the general 
 government in regulations of commerce and the mail, and that 
 the latter must yield to the former in the event of conflict; 
 
342 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 and that, if the government should refuse to yield, the States 
 have a right to interpose, and we are safe. With these princi 
 ples, nothing but concert would be wanting to bid defiance to- 
 the movements of the Abolitionists, whether at home or abroad, 
 and to place our domestic institutions, and, with them, our secur 
 ity and peace, under our own protection and beyond the reach 
 of danger." 
 
 Mr. Benton would not make the United States a packhorse 
 for the Abolitionists ; but he could not vote to invest ten thou 
 sand postmasters with such authority, even to suppress aboli 
 tion publications. Mr. Webster spoke at length against the 
 passage of a bill which he deemed contrary to that provision of 
 the Constitution which prohibits Congress from passing any 
 law abridging the freedom of speech or of the press. Mr. 
 Clay, too, opposed the passage of the bill, which he declared 
 lo be of " a most dangerous tendency." He avowed that it 
 ras calculated to destroy all the landmarks of the Constitution, 
 establish a precedent for dangerous legislation, and lead to 
 incalculable mischief ; and he distinctly announced that from 
 the first to the last he was opposed to the measure. Mr. Bu 
 chanan gave his support to the measure, maintaining that 
 it was in conformity with the President's recommendation, 
 and was demanded by the necessities of the country. Other 
 senators participated in the debate, which ran through several 
 weeks. 
 
 On the engrossment of the bill, Mr. Calhoun demanded the 
 yeas and nays. Eighteen senators voted for it, and eighteen 
 against it. Yice-President Yan Buren was then a candidate 
 for the presidency. When the vote was taken on the en 
 grossment he was walking in the space in the rear of the chair 
 of the presiding officer. Mr. Calhoun called for the Yice- 
 President, and Mr. Yan Buren promptly took the chair and 
 gave his casting vote in favor of the bill. Mr. Wright and 
 Mr. Tallmadge of New York, political friends of Mr. Yan 
 Buren, voted for that extraordinary measure. After further 
 debate, the final vote was taken on the passage of the bill, 
 and it was rejected by a vote of nineteen to twenty-five. 
 Mr. Benton, Mr. Clay, Mr. Crittenden, and four other Southern 
 
ADMISSION OF ARKANSAS. 343 
 
 senators, voted against this measure, which received the sup 
 port of Van Buren, Wright, and Buchanan. These Northern 
 statesmen were unquestionably actuated by policy rather than 
 by principle. In so acting they recognized the controlling 
 influence of slavery and bowed to its dominant behest. 
 
 The Territories of Arkansas and Michigan applied to Con 
 gress for enabling acts, but Congress neglected or refused 
 their application. The people of these Territories, failing to 
 obtain authority to hold conventions, had framed State consti 
 tutions, and in the winter of 1836 asked admission into the 
 Union. A bill for the admission of Michigan was reported by 
 Mr. Benton, and another for the admission of Arkansas was 
 reported by Mr. Buchanan. One was a free State, the other a 
 slave State. It was the purpose of the supporters of the ad 
 ministration that they should go through together, so as to 
 keep up the equilibrium between the free and the slave States. 
 
 Mr. Morris of Ohio, believing slavery to be wrong in princi 
 ple and mischievous in practice, said he would vote against the 
 admission of Arkansas, if he thought he had the right to do so. 
 But he considered that his political obligations and the duties 
 he owed to the Constitution required him to vote for its admis 
 sion. Holding such views, he announced that he could not 
 refuse his vote, though the constitution of that State did rec 
 ognize the existence of slavery. On the other hand, Mr. Swift 
 of Vermont declared that as he found by the constitution of 
 Arkansas that slavery was made perpetual, he could never give 
 his assent to her admission. 
 
 The bills for the admission of Arkansas and Michigan were 
 promptly passed by the Senate, with slight opposition. In the 
 House, after a brief debate, they were committed to the com 
 mittee of the whole, and on the 9th of June a struggle com 
 menced which continued twenty-five hours. Several members 
 participated in the debate. The constitution of Arkansas pro 
 vided that the general assembly should have no power to pass 
 laws for the emancipation of slaves without the consent of the 
 owners, or laws to prevent immigrants from bringing slaves 
 with them. Mr. Adams moved to amend the bill so as to de 
 clare that nothing in the act should be construed as an assent 
 
344 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 by Congress to the articles of the constitution relating to slav 
 ery and the emancipation of slaves. Mr. Adams held that 
 Arkansas had a right to come into the Union " with her slaves 
 and her slave laws." " It is written/' he said, " in the bond ; 
 and, however I may lament that it ever was so written, I must 
 faithfully perform the obligations. I am content to receive her 
 as one of the slaveholding States of the Union ; but I am un 
 willing that Congress, in accepting her constitution, should 
 even be under the imputation of assenting to an article in the 
 constitution of a State which withholds from its legislature the 
 power to give freedom to the slave." 
 
 During the debate which followed, Mr. Wise inquired of Mr. 
 Adams whether, if his amendment should be adopted, Arkan 
 sas would be admitted by the bill as a State. To this inquiry 
 Mr. Adams replied : " Certainly, sir ; there is not in my 
 amendment the shadow of a restriction proposed upon the 
 State. It leaves the State, like all the rest, to regulate the 
 subject of slavery within herself by her own laws." 
 
 Declaring that upon the subject he could not go " the breadth 
 of a hair " beyond the obligations imposed upon him by the 
 Constitution, Mr. Briggs of Massachusetts emphatically avowed 
 that he could not give his sanction to the constitution of Ar 
 kansas, which doomed a large portion of her present and future 
 population to unconditional and interminable slavery ; nor 
 could he betray his own sense of propriety, or be treacherous 
 ous to the freemen who sent him there. 
 
 During that excited and disorderly debate, Mr. Wise of Vir 
 ginia announced that, as a Southern man, he felt it his duty to 
 take a stand in behalf of slavery, which he dignified as an in 
 stitution of the South. He announced that, if the members 
 from the North sought to impose restrictions upon slavery, the 
 men of the South might be impelled to introduce slavery in the 
 heart of the North. 
 
 To this menace Mr. Cushing of Massachusetts, after express 
 ing the hope that it was not a deliberate and cherished purpose, 
 but a hasty thought struck out in the ardor of debate, thus 
 eloquently replied : " To introduce slavery into the heart of 
 the North ! Yain idea ! Invasion, pestilence, civil war, may 
 
CONVERSION OF FREE SOIL INTO SLAVE SOIL. 345 
 
 conspire to exterminate the eight millions of free spirits who 
 now dwell there. This, in the long lapse of ages incalculable, 
 is possible to happen. You may raze to the earth the thronged 
 cities, the industrious villages, the peaceful hamlets of the North. 
 You may lay waste its fertile valleys and verdant hillsides. 
 You may plant its very soil with salt, and consign it to ever 
 lasting desolation. You may transform its beautiful fields into 
 a desert as bare as the black face of the sands of Sahara. You 
 may reach the realization of the infernal boast with which Attila 
 the Hun marched his barbaric hosts into Italy, demolishing 
 whatever there is of civilization or prosperity in the happy 
 dwellings of the North, and reducing their very substance to 
 powder, so that a squadron of cavalry shall gallop over the site 
 of populous cities, unimpeded as the wild steeds on the savan 
 nas of the West. All this you may do ; it is within the bounds 
 of physical possibility. But I solemnly assure every gentle 
 man within the sound of my voice, I proclaim to the country 
 and to the world, that until all this be fully accomplished to 
 the uttermost extremity of the letter you cannot, you shall 
 not, introduce slavery into the heart of the North." 
 
 The amendment of Mr. Adams received but thirty-two 
 votes. Fifty members only voted against the admission of 
 Arkansas ; and most of their votes were cast not on account 
 of the cruel provision of her constitution, dooming her slaves 
 to hopeless and perpetual servitude, but for other reasons, per- 
 mal, political, or prudential. Indeed it is to be feared that 
 jry few were governed in their votes by the fixed and unal- 
 jrable purpose of opposing a provision so abhorrent to human 
 iture, the doctrines of liberty, and the precepts of Chris 
 tianity. 
 
 Nor was this the only victory of the Slave Power at this 
 jsion. To extend the boundaries of slavery, the Missouri 
 Compromise line was changed, so as to give to Missouri a free 
 territory, lying between the line of that State and the Missouri 
 River, large enough to form seven counties. Under the per 
 suasive influences of the delegation from that State, John M. 
 iyton, from the Committee on the Judiciary, reported a bill 
 jiving that fertile territory, larger than the States of Delaware 
 
 44 
 
346 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 and Rhode Island combined, to Missouri. It passed both 
 Houses with hardly any opposition. This territory was not 
 only free, but it had been recently assigned by treaty to the 
 Sac and Fox Indians. A new treaty with these tribes was 
 negotiated and ratified, the Indians were removed from the 
 coveted territory, and the slaveholders entered with their 
 bondmen. From this territory, given to slavery in 1836, 
 went forth the hordes of border-ruffians that overran Kansas 
 twenty years afterward, seeking by fraud and violence to plant 
 slavery west of the Missouri River. 
 
 But violent and repressive measures did not avail ; they did 
 not check, they did but increase, the agitation of that period. 
 Something more potent than laying abolition petitions on the 
 table without debate, without being printed or referred, was 
 necessary to arrest the action of the men and women who 
 acknowledged the guilt of any responsibility for the existence 
 and preservation of slavery and the slave-trade in the District 
 of Columbia. Consequently, at the second session of the 
 XXI Vth Congress, a large number of petitions were presented 
 praying for their abolition. But the House, under the lead of 
 Mr. Hawes of Kentucky, voted again, by a large majority, that 
 such petitions should be laid upon the table without being 
 printed or referred. 
 
 But Mr. Adams, in the persistent prosecution of his avowed 
 policy of presenting petitions whether he approved of their 
 purpose or not, stated to the presiding officer in February that 
 he had in his possession a paper upon which he desired his de 
 cision. It came from persons declaring themselves to be slaves, 
 and he wished to know whether it would be considered as com 
 ing under the rule of the House. The speaker said it was a 
 novel case, which he would submit to the House for its decis 
 ion. This became the occasion of a heated and characteristic 
 discussion. Mr. Lawler of Alabama objected to its going to 
 the table. Mr. Lewis of the same State contended that the 
 slaveholding representatives ought to demand of the House 
 the full exercise of its power to punish any member who 
 should offer such a petition. If this was not done, and that 
 promptly, he contended that the members from the slavehold- 
 
PRESENTATION OF ANTISLAVERY PETITIONS. 347 
 
 ing States should immediately in a body leave the House and 
 return to their constituents. Mr. Grantland of Georgia 
 avowed his willingness not only to second the motion for the 
 punishment of the offender, but to go all length in securing its 
 infliction ; and Mr. Alford of the same State was prepared to 
 move that the paper should be burned. 
 
 Mr. Patton of Virginia said that he had examined the peti 
 tion, which purported to have come from nine women of Fred- 
 ericksburg, in his State. He stated, upon his responsibility as 
 a man, that he could find the name of no woman of decent 
 respectability of that town upon the paper. He recognized 
 among them one name only, and that of a mulatto woman of 
 notoriously infamous character and reputation. The rules 
 being suspended, he moved that the petition be taken from the 
 table and returned to the gentleman who presented it. 
 
 Mr. Thompson of South Carolina moved an amendment, that 
 Mr. Adams had been guilty of a gross disrespect to the House 
 in presenting a petition purporting to come from slaves, and 
 that he be instantly brought to the bar of the House to receive 
 the severe censure of the Speaker. This motion of Mr. 
 Thompson received some significance from the fact that he 
 was a Whig, revealing, as it did, the anxiety of the leading 
 politicians of that party to stand well with the South. At the 
 same time it afforded a fair illustration of the mode by which 
 the leaders of the Slave Power were enabled to control the 
 two national parties, as, by thus pitting them against each 
 other, they generally gained their support to their most ex 
 treme and aggressive measures. Mr. Thompson also gave 
 utterance to the most ultra sentiments on the subject of 
 slavery ; saying that he was thankful and proud that he was 
 born an American, a slaveholder, and a South-Carolinian. 
 He also expressed the opinion that African slavery, in all its 
 bearings, was a blessing. 
 
 Mr. Haynes of Georgia expressed his great astonishment 
 that a member of the House could be guilty of so great an 
 outrage upon the dignity of that body. Mr. Granger of New 
 York, a prominent and influential Whig, was the first member 
 from the free States to define his position. He did it by ex- 
 
348 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 pressing his surprise at Mr. Adams's course, and by informing 
 the House that he was opposed to the abolition of slavery in the 
 District so long as it remained in Maryland. Mr. Lewis then 
 presented a substitute for Mr. Thompson's resolution, declaring 
 that, by his attempt to introduce a petition from slaves " pray 
 ing for the abolition of slavery in the District," Mr. Adams 
 had committed an outrage on the rights and dignity of a por 
 tion of the people, a flagrant contempt of the dignity of the 
 House, and, by proposing to extend to slaves a privilege be 
 longing to white people only, he had " invited the slave popu 
 lation of the South to insurrection." Mr. Thompson accepted 
 the substitute. 
 
 During these violent proceedings and exhibitions of wrath 
 Mr. Adams remained calm, simply remarking, at that stage of 
 the proceedings, to Mr. Lewis, that he should be more careful 
 of his facts, inasmuch as this was a petition against, and not 
 for, abolition in the District. This quiet rejoinder greatly 
 nettled the Southern members, and Mr. Thompson at once 
 presented a modification of the resolution, to the effect that 
 Mr. Adams, by creating the impression that the petition was 
 for the abolition of slavery, when he knew it was not, had 
 trifled with the House. Deprecating the " levity which was 
 attempted to be thrown upon the subject," he inquired : " Is it 
 a mere trifle to hoax members from the South ? to irritate al 
 most to madness the entire delegation from the slave States ? " 
 To these fierce interrogatories Mr. Adams, without rising from 
 his seat, replied that he hoped he should " not be held respon 
 sible for all the follies of Southern members." 
 
 Mr. Mann, a Democratic representative from New York, 
 took the occasion to define his position. Deprecating Mr. 
 Adams's course, he avowed, for himself, constituents, and 
 friends, that they would abide by the compromises of the 
 Constitution and " live up to the contract ; " and Mr. Cambre- 
 ling, from the same State, pronounced the " petition a hoax," 
 " probably better understood by the gentleman from Massa 
 chusetts than by his assailants." 
 
 During three days of excitement and invective Mr. Adams 
 had remained quiet in his seat, not even taking notes of what 
 
ATTEMPT TO CENSURE MR. ADAMS. 349 
 
 had been so fiercely and acrimoniously charged against him. 
 After the storm had somewhat subsided, he rose to reply, and 
 received that profound attention which was due to his age, ex 
 perience, and position. He said, if it had been a petition of 
 slaves for the abolition of slavery he should have at least 
 paused before he brought the subject before the House in any 
 form. However sacred he might hold the right of petition, he 
 would still exercise a discretionary power in bringing before 
 the House petitions which, in his opinion, ought not to be pre 
 sented. The mere circumstance, however, of a petition being 
 from a slave would not prevent him from presenting it. If a 
 horse or a dog had the power of speech, or of writing, and 
 should send him a petition, he would present it to the House. 
 
 petition was a prayer, a supplication to a superior being, 
 that which is offered to our God. He declared that the framers 
 of the Constitution would have repudiated the idea that they 
 were giving the people the right of petition. " That right," he 
 affirmed, " God gave to the whole human race when he made 
 man. My doctrine is that the right of petition is the right 
 of prayer, not depending on the condition of the petitioner." 
 
 Mr. Adams said that Mr. Patton made no objection when he 
 presented a petition from women of infamous character ; but 
 he did object when they came from colored people. He had 
 presented petitions from ladies as eminently entitled to be 
 called such as any aristocrats in the land ; but he had usually 
 called them " women," and that, said he, to my heart, is a 
 dearer appellation than ladies. Mr. Thompson had said there 
 was such an institution in Washington as a grand jury, and 
 had intimated that Mr. Adams might be indicted for stirring 
 up insurrection. To this menace Mr, Adams replied : " The 
 only answer I make to such a threat from that gentleman is to 
 invite him, when he returns home to his constituents, to study 
 a little the first principles of liberty. That gentleman appears 
 lere as the representative of slaveholders, and I should like 
 
 be informed how many there are of such representatives on 
 his floor who indorse the sentiment involved in that menace." 
 
 These pointed and telling questions brought forth such an- 
 rers as the more reflecting Southern minds saw to be neces- 
 
350 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 sary to relieve themselves and their section from the false posi 
 tion in which Mr. Thompson's incautious remarks had placed 
 them. Mr. Underwood of Kentucky promptly replied that he 
 did not indorse it. Mr. Wise asked if any man from the 
 South did indorse it. He was sure he did not. Mr. Thomp 
 son, seeing the dilemma in which he had placed himself, said 
 he referred to the laws of South Carolina, by which a member 
 was liable to indictment who should present such a petition. 
 
 Mr. Adams, with deep earnestness and amid great sensation, 
 exclaimed, that, if that was the law of South Carolina, and 
 members of her legislature were amenable to petit and grand 
 juries for words spoken in debate, " God Almighty receive my 
 thanks that I am not a citizen of that State ! " He closed by 
 an appeal to the House and to the nation, affirming that it was 
 not he, but those who objected to the discharge of his duty, who 
 were answerable for the consumption of time. This heroic 
 speech of "the old man eloquent" produced a profound im 
 pression, and the resolutions of censure were rejected by a 
 large majority ; though a resolution, introduced by Mr. Taylor 
 of New York, that slaves do not possess the right of petition, 
 secured to the people of the United States, was adopted by an 
 almost unanimous vote, only eighteen voting against it. 
 
 While Mr. Adams encountered such fierce invective and op 
 position from Southern men and their Northern sympathizers, 
 there were those who stood by him and gave him both coun 
 tenance and support. Mr. Lincoln, from his own State, took 
 his place by his side, and avowed that he had cheerfully and 
 willingly presented antislavery memorials, and that he intended 
 to do so. Although not an Abolitionist, he vindicated the 
 purity and philanthropic spirit of petitioners for the abolition 
 of slavery and the slave-trade at the capital. Caleb Gushing, 
 from the same State, maintained with great ability that the 
 right of petition was not a right derived from the Constitution, 
 but a pre-existing right of man, secured by a direct prohibition 
 in the Constitution to pass any law to impair or abridge it. 
 Mr. Evans of Maine also defended Mr. Adams, and vindicated 
 the right of petition. 
 
 William Slade of Vermont had been a member of the 
 
 i 
 
RIGHT OF PETITION DENIED. 351 
 
 XXIYth Congress, and had stood firmly by the side of Mr. 
 Adams in his devoted advocacy of the right of petition. Loath 
 ing slavery and the slave-trade, he was in favor of their sup 
 pression in the District of Columbia. Detesting the arrogant 
 assumption of their champions, he was for freedom of speech 
 and action. The legislature of his State had passed resolutions 
 in favor of the suppression of the slave traffic, and of the abo 
 lition of slavery in the national capital. In presenting them 
 and the memorials of many citizens of his State, he moved 
 their reference to a select committee, with instructions to re 
 port a bill for their abolition and suppression. Proceeding to 
 state the reasons for his motion, he was interrupted by Mr. 
 Legar6 of South Carolina, one of the ablest, fairest, and most 
 learned of his class. He urged Mr. Slade to ponder well his 
 course before he proceeded further ; and he warned him that 
 when the question was forced upon the people of the South 
 they would be ready to take up the gauntlet. 
 
 Mr. Slade, unmindful of the interruptions and warnings of 
 the representative of South Carolina, continued his remarks. 
 When he was asked by Mr. Dawson, a Whig representative 
 from Georgia, to yield the floor for an adjournment, he firmly 
 declined. Continuing his remarks, he was called to order by 
 Mr. Wise for reading a judicial decision of one of the Southern 
 courts defining a slave to be a chattel. The Speaker, Mr. Polk 
 of Tennessee, always a willing instrument of the Slave Power, 
 decided that it was not in order to discuss slavery in the States. 
 Mr. Slade denied that he was discussing Slavery in the South 
 ern States, as he was simply quoting a judicial decision of a 
 Southern court, just as he might quote a legal opinion delivered 
 in England. The Speaker, reminding him of the excitement 
 pervading the House, suggested that he should confine him 
 self strictly to the subject of his motion. 
 
 Quoting the Declaration of Independence and the bill of 
 rights of several of the States, he was again called to order by 
 Mr. Wise for reading papers without leave of the House. Mr. 
 Wise declared that he had " wantonly discussed the abstract 
 question of slavery " ; that he was " examining the State con 
 stitutions, to show that, as it existed in the States, it was against 
 
352 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 them and against the laws of God and man. This was out of 
 order." Mr. Slade, proceeding to read the memorial of Dr. 
 Franklin and an opinion of Mr. Madison on slavery, was again 
 called to order by Mr. Griffin of South Carolina. The Speaker 
 decided that they could not be read without the permission of 
 the House. Mr. Slade then proposed to send the papers to the 
 Clerk to be read, when the Speaker decided that it would not 
 be in order for the Clerk to read them. 
 
 Mr. Slade, proceeding, referred to the feeling in Virginia on 
 the subject of slavery when the government was organized. 
 But he was interrupted by Mr. Ehett of South Carolina, who 
 impertinently inquired what the opinions in Virginia fifty years 
 ago had to do with slavery in the District of Columbia. Mr. 
 Wise rose under great excitement. He said that Mr. Slade 
 had "discussed the whole abstract question of slavery, of 
 slavery in Virginia, of slavery in my own district ; and I now 
 ask all my colleagues to retire with me from this hall." Mr. 
 Slade reminded the Speaker that he had not yielded the floor. 
 Mr. Halsey of Georgia then called on the delegation from Geor 
 gia to withdraw with him. Amid this scene of excitement, 
 noise, and confusion, the voice of Mr. Rhett was heard calling 
 upon the entire delegation from all the slaveholding States to 
 retire from the hall, and to meet in the room of the Committee 
 on the District of Columbia. Mr. McKay of North Carolina, a 
 leading member of the Democratic party, objected to Mr. 
 Slade's proceeding any further, and demanded the enforcement 
 of the rule requiring a member, when called to order, to take 
 his seat ; and, if decided to be out of order, requiring leave of 
 the House before speaking again. Mr. Slade asked leave to 
 proceed. Pending the question of granting leave, the House, 
 on motion of Mr. Rencher of North Carolina, adjourned ; sixty- 
 three members, mostly Northern Whigs, voting against the 
 motion. 
 
 On the announcement of the adjournment, Mr. Campbell of 
 South Carolina said he had " been appointed as one of the 
 Southern delegation to invite gentlemen representing slave- 
 holding States to attend a meeting now being held in the room 
 of the Committee on the District of Columbia." At this meet- 
 
RIGHT OF PETITION DENIED. 353 
 
 ing members from the slaveholding States agreed to a resolu 
 tion to silence debate ; and it was placed in the hands of Mr. 
 Patton of Virginia to be offered as an amendment of the rules 
 at the opening of the House the next day. The resolution was 
 submitted by Mr. Patton and read; and the House, by a 
 vote of one hundred and thirty-five to sixty, suspended the 
 rules for its reception. Mr. Patton, the organ of the seceding 
 slaveholding members, asserted that the resolution involved 
 " a concession, a concession which we make for the sake of 
 peace, harmony, and union." He then moved the previous 
 question upon the adoption of this resolution : " That all peti 
 tions, memorials, and papers touching the abolition of slavery, 
 or the buying, selling, or transferring slaves, in any State, or 
 District, or Territory of the United States, be laid on the table 
 without being debated, printed, read, or referred, and that no 
 action be taken thereon." 
 
 The previous question being sustained, the resolution was 
 adopted, more than two thirds of the House voting for it. The 
 Southern members of both parties and the Northern Demo 
 crats recorded their votes for it, though the Whigs of the free 
 States voted against it. 
 
 Thus was a member of the House of Representatives, in 
 the exercise of an unquestionable right, silenced by trickery 
 and violence. By this revolutionary act did its slaveholding 
 members, unmindful of their oath of office, secede from it, go 
 into a sectional conclave, and there concoct a resolution, to be 
 offered for the support of the House, as a condition precedent 
 of their return to the performance of their sworn duties ; 
 thereby abridging and practically denying the sacred right of 
 petition, and suppressing the freedom of debate. They were 
 aided, too, in passing this resolution, by more than fifty of the 
 Northern Democrats. Mr. Adams thus characterized this 
 action amid deafening cries of "Order": "I consider this 
 resolution a violation of the Constitution of the United States, 
 of the right of my constituents and of the people of the 
 United States to petition, and of every right to freedom of 
 speech, as a member of this House." 
 
 The XXVth Congress was still more subservient to the 
 
 45 
 
354 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 demands of the Slave Power. It voted not only to silence the 
 voice of the people, but its own. It struck down the sacred 
 right of the people to petition for the redress of their grievan 
 ces, by clamor, menace, and resolution, destroyed the freedom 
 of debate, and hushed the voice of the representatives of the 
 people. The Democratic party had elected Mr. Van Buren 
 President, and had secured a decisive majority in that Con 
 gress. By the most abject surrender to the demands of the 
 slaveholding interests did the President justify the appellation 
 generally applied to him as " a Northern man with Southern 
 principles " ; and his administration, thus begun, was among 
 the most unhesitating in its subserviency to the Slave Power. 
 
CHAPTER XXYI. 
 
 ACTIVITY OF THE ABOLITIONISTS. ACTION OF NORTHERN LEGIS 
 LATURES. 
 
 The Abolitionists hopeful. Meeting of the Massachusetts Antislavery Society 
 in the Capitol. Mr. Stanton's Eesolutions. Public Sentiment. Forma 
 tion of the Illinois Antislavery Society. Black Laws of Ohio. Condition 
 of the Colored People in Ohio. Hearing before a Committee of the Massa 
 chusetts Legislature. Mr. Stanton's Speech. Action of the Legislature. 
 Decision of Judge Shaw. James C. Alvord. Resolutions against Texas. 
 Legislatures of Connecticut and Vermont. 
 
 Two features of the early stages of the uprising against 
 slavery were peculiarly striking and suggestive. There was 
 the manifest failure of those early pioneers to comprehend the 
 magnitude and inveteracy of the evil to be removed, or the 
 tremendous grasp in which it held the nation in its every 
 department of individual and associated life. There was, 
 too, an enthusiastic but unwarranted confidence in a speedy 
 triumph. Evidences abound. They are seen in the proceed 
 ings of antislavery conventions and anniversaries, in the anti- 
 slavery reports, speeches, and journals, of those days. Even 
 Mr. Garrison, whose abilities and opportunities of judging 
 were certainly not small, shared largely in these illusions of 
 hope and in this evident under-estimate of the greatness and 
 severity of the contest on which they had entered. Though much 
 be conceded to the charm of novelty, the enthusiasm of youth, 
 and the pardonable confidence of the neophyte, unhackneyed 
 as yet and without the lessons gained in the stern school of 
 experience, it is difficult to account for these over-sanguine 
 expressions. Especially does this appear in view of the deter 
 mined opposition they were obliged to encounter, almost al 
 ways and everywhere, in their attempts to reach the popular 
 ear and heart. Not only were they excluded, as they com- 
 
356 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 plainingly asserted, from churches and halls, but they were 
 driven by rioters from their own quarters, and hardly permit 
 ted to walk .the streets without the hootings and sometimes 
 the more personal and physical violence of the mob. Nor was 
 this the mere temporary ebullition of the hour. It continued 
 until no inconsiderable number of those early and sanguine 
 men and women felt constrained to come out of both churches 
 and parties, as hopelessly in bondage to this haughty and dom 
 inating power of the land. 
 
 Doubtless it was well that such was the fact. Had they 
 fully comprehended the desperate nature of the struggle, 
 fathomed the depth of their country's degradation and peril, 
 gauged the full measure of its apostasy and the slow progress 
 of truth, had they known the extent of the great and terrible 
 wilderness on which they had entered, and the length of their 
 journeyings to the promised land, the hearts of many would 
 have sunk within them, and they might have relinquished the 
 attempt before it was well begun. 
 
 During the years of 1834 - 35 the operations of the New 
 England Antislavery Society, which had, owing to the forma 
 tion of the American Society, taken the name and become the 
 Massachusetts Antislavery Society, were conducted on a more 
 extended scale than ever. It employed efficient agents, while 
 several other gentlemen of capacity, zeal, and eloquence largely 
 contributed to the advancement of the cause. Its fourth an 
 nual meeting was held in January, 1836, in the city of Boston. 
 Its committee of arrangements had been refused the use of all 
 the churches and halls large enough to accommodate its mem 
 bers ; and they were compelled to hold the meeting in their 
 little room in Washington Street, used for ordinary purposes, 
 for the meetings of the executive committee, and for other 
 assemblages during the year. Earnest and radical antislavery 
 speeches were made by Professor Charles Follen, William 
 Goodell, Rev. Cyrus P. Grosvenor, Rev. Orange Scott, Henry 
 C. Wright, and others. 
 
 Its fifth anniversary was held in January, 1837, in the loft 
 of the stable attached to the Maryborough Hotel. Its report, 
 which was very elaborate, was read by Mr. Garrison. The 
 
ACTIVITY OF THE ABOLITIONISTS. 357 
 
 meeting was addressed by Amos Dresser, who gave a narra 
 tive of the cruel treatment he had received in Tennessee, the 
 recital of which excited deep and tearful emotion. Rev. 
 Samuel J. May eloquently referred to the fact that the So 
 ciety could not secure a comfortable place of meeting in his 
 native city; that every church and hall had been closed 
 against them, and that they were driven into a stable. The 
 legislature had been applied to for the use of the hall of the 
 House of Representatives for an evening meeting of the So 
 ciety ; and its application had been successful, the members 
 from Boston, however, generally voting against it. Referring 
 to this fact, Henry B. Stanton wittily said : " When Boston 
 votes we go into a stable, but when the State votes we go into 
 the State House." 
 
 On the evening of the 25th of January, the pioneer anti- 
 slavery society, as its friends affectionately styled it, assem 
 bled, for the first time, in the hall of the House of Repre 
 sentatives. Rev. Orange Scott was the first speaker. He 
 maintained that the sum and substance of antislavery doc 
 trines are that " slavery is sin and must be immediately aban 
 doned." Mr. Stanton spoke in support of resolutions in favor 
 of the immediate abolition of slavery and of the slave-trade in 
 the District of Columbia, and of the right of petition. While 
 he was speaking an effort was made to create a disturbance 
 by persons near the entrance of the hall. But Mr. Stanton, 
 after a moment's pause, proceeded in his speech with great 
 eloquence and power, completely subduing the mob spirit and 
 enchaining the attention of the audience. The reporter failed 
 in his task, because, as he said, " he would not attempt to 
 report a whirlwind or a thunder-storm." Ellis Gray Loring 
 made a learned argument in support of a resolution, declar 
 ing that allegiance to his country, to liberty, and to God re 
 quired that every man should be an abolitionist and should 
 openly espouse the antislavery cause. 
 
 The debate on granting the use of the hall to the society, 
 in which several members participated, and in which Mr. Rug- 
 gles of Fall River spoke with commanding eloquence and 
 power for the right of free discussion, and the speeches made 
 
358 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 during the evening, exerted a potent influence on the members 
 of the legislature, the effects of which were manifested before 
 the close of the session. The society continued its meeting 
 during the next day, and speeches breathing the spirit of self- 
 consecration and devotion to the cause were made. It was 
 especially manifested in the speech of Rev. Mr. Root of Dover, 
 New Hampshire. " The great moral war," he said, " is but 
 begun. The collision of truth with error, of duty with expe 
 diency, will produce commotion ; but truth and duty must and 
 will prevail. Should my name reach the next generation, let 
 it be found in connection with abolition. I would sooner be 
 execrated as a Tory of the Revolution than be known here 
 after as one who stood aloof from the movements now in pro 
 gress for laying the last stone of the yet unfinished Temple of 
 Liberty. But above all, when I am summoned to judgment, 
 let me then be found to have been the unflinching friend of 
 God's poor." 
 
 Mr. May commenced with great plainness of speech upon 
 the fact that in the city of Boston the cause of impartial lib 
 erty was shut out from all the halls and churches under the 
 control of its citizens. He referred to the fact that the col 
 ored and other citizens of Massachusetts suffered serious 
 abridgment of their privileges, that slaveholders might not be 
 disturbed in their unrighteousness. He maintained, too, that 
 the citizens of New England were implicated in the sin of 
 slavery, and were forbidden to repent and do works meet for 
 repentance. He avowed his readiness to wear the chain him 
 self, rather than remain silent in view of the great wrongs 
 man was inflicting on his fellow. 
 
 Mr. Garrison, referring to the accusation made against him 
 of using harsh language, declared that he was not eager to 
 repel that accusation, for he could not suffer himself to be 
 turned aside from the warfare against merciless oppressors 
 to discuss the proprieties of diction with captious critics. 
 " Who," he asked, " are my accusers ? The entire South, 
 reeking with pollution and blood, slaveholders, slave-deal 
 ers, slave-drivers, recreant priests, and lynch committees, 
 Northern apologists for crime, and terror-stricken recreants 
 
ACTIVITY OF THE ABOLITIONISTS. 359 
 
 to liberty, all charge me with using hard language ! Am I 
 to give heed to such instructors, or aim to suit their tastes ? 
 While millions are groaning in bondage, and women are sold 
 by the pound in our country, it is solemn trifling to think of 
 sitting down coolly to criticise the phraseology of those who 
 are pleading and toiling for their deliverance." 
 
 Resolutions were introduced by Mr. Stanton censuring the 
 action of members of Congress who had voted to deny the 
 right of petition ; applauding John Quincy Adams ; calling 
 upon the whole people of the Commonwealth to rally to the 
 rescue of the Constitution and to the cause of God's perishing 
 poor ; invoking the legislature to request their representatives 
 to vote for the immediate abolition of slavery and the slave- 
 trade in the District of Columbia ; and summoning the people 
 to vote for no member of the national or State legislature who 
 is not in favor of the freedom of speech and of the press, and 
 of the right of petition. He declared that the resolutions 
 were not designed to have a partisan bearing ; but that they 
 spoke of the duties, not of a party, but of all parties and 
 creeds. 
 
 Rev. Robert B. Hall approved of all the resolutions but the 
 last. That he opposed because he deprecated political action, 
 which would, he thought, excite much clamor and do much 
 harm. Mr. Garrison expressed much surprise at such senti 
 ments from one of the original signers of the declaration 
 adopted by the convention at Philadelphia, in which it was 
 expressly proclaimed that Abolitionists were to use " moral 
 and political action " for the removal of slavery. He avowed 
 that Abolitionists ought not to vote for any man who would 
 not maintain the right of petition and vote for the abolition of 
 slavery when Congress had the power. Abolitionists, he main 
 tained, had nothing to do with politics, as understood among 
 politicians and political parties of the day ; but " they have 
 something to do with politics so far as relates to this question." 
 
 Mr. Stanton proclaimed that the motto of Abolitionists is : 
 " Duty is ours, consequences are God's." Political action, 
 he contended, was then bad, and would be, though Abolition 
 ists should remain silent. " Shall the people," he asked, " so 
 
360 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 act as to renovate the politics of this country, and thus save 
 our liberties ; or shall they slumber on until they have passed 
 away forever ? " The resolutions were unanimously passed, with 
 the exception of the last, and that passed with only the dis 
 senting vote of Mr. Hall. That vote fully and unreservedly 
 committed the members of the Massachusetts Antislavery So 
 ciety to political action for the removal of slavery where Con 
 gress possessed the power under the Constitution of the United 
 States, and is very significant, especially as viewed in con 
 nection with the opposite non-voting policy so loudly and so 
 persistently proclaimed afterward by the same individuals. 
 
 Nor were there wanting similar demonstrations in the other 
 New England States, though in none were they so vigorous 
 and well sustained. Still in all these were societies and active 
 efforts more or less effective ; and this was specially true of 
 New York. The city was the headquarters not only of its 
 own, but of the national society. In the central and western 
 portions of the State, more largely settled from New England, 
 there was much activity. In New Jersey there was little 
 attempted and little accomplished. In Pennsylvania there 
 had been a sad reaction after the days when the old Pennsyl 
 vania Abolition Society was a power there and did so much to 
 keep that Commonwealth moored to the principles of its great 
 founder and to those of the Revolution. But its contiguity to 
 the slave States, and its large German element, mainly intent 
 on material good, gave little encouragement or success to anti- 
 slavery efforts, though there, as elsewhere, they were made. 
 
 Indeed, in consequence of antislavery agitation, both within 
 and without the State, a State convention was called, mainly 
 by leaders of the Democratic party, professedly, to strengthen 
 the bonds of the Union, though really to discountenance 
 and put down such agitation. It failed, in the language of 
 Judge Woodward, who was a member and in sympathy with 
 its object, because Thaddeus Stevens, then in the zenith of his 
 powers and popularity, " ridiculed the convention into nothing 
 ness." He was not equally successful, however, in the con 
 vention for revising the constitution ; for, with all his powers, 
 he could not prevent that body from inserting the word 
 
ACTIVITY OF THE ABOLITIONISTS. 361 
 
 " white " into the suffrage clause of that instrument. The 
 ignominy and partisan profligacy of that action were evinced 
 by the unblushing request, which seems to have been success 
 ful, and which was set forth in a memorial from Bucks County, 
 in which it was urged, as a reason why the word " white " 
 should be inserted, that negro votes sometimes controlled elec 
 tions ; " and that at the last election one member of the assem 
 bly, the county commissioner, and auditor were returned as 
 elected by the force of the votes of blacks, when the oppo 
 nents would have been elected except for the negro suffrage" 
 
 While Eastern Abolitionists were thus actively engaged in 
 their work, and meeting its peculiar exigencies, their brethren 
 at the West were not idle. Nor were they without their share 
 of vicissitudes, substantially like those in the New England 
 and the Middle States, though affected by the composite char 
 acter of the population, even then, of that section of the coun 
 try. The fact, too, that the defenders and abettors of slavery 
 there, as elsewhere, made demands against which many who 
 were not Abolitionists revolted, like John Quincy Adams, in 
 behalf of the right of petition, and Mr. Lovejoy for the free 
 dom of the press, exerted its influence. Concerning Illinois, 
 Dr. Edward Beecher says that in it " there was an original 
 leaven of antislavery principles in its earliest settlement, and 
 preceding the discussions at the East ; and the influence of 
 this, added to that of papers from the East, awakened an ex 
 tensive interest in the subject over the whole State." But, 
 while there might have been this " leaven of antislavery," the 
 prevailing tone of thought and feeling, as the great'body of its 
 early settlers were from slaveholding States, was the reverse. 
 Accordingly it was seen in the ejection of Mr. Lovejoy's press 
 from St. Louis, that, when the lines were drawn, the vast pre 
 ponderance of the popular sentiment and influence was on the 
 side of the oppressor. 
 
 These facts, more clearly developed by the Alton riots and 
 the murder of Lovejoy than by any previous demonstration, 
 decided many minds, before hesitating, that the time had 
 come for concerted action. Accordingly, when the conven 
 tion of "the friends of the slave and of free discussion," 
 
 46 
 
362 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 called to meet at Upper Alton, Illinois, on the 26th of October, 
 1837, was broken up by the intrusion of proslavery men, who 
 took the organization of the meeting into their own hands, 
 adopted proslavery resolutions, and then dissolved the meeting, 
 the supporters of law and order, whatever their views upon 
 slavery had hitherto been, saw, in the words of Dr. Beecher, 
 that " some organized, systematic effort was absolutely neces 
 sary to save our own liberties from the ruthless hands of un 
 principled men." 
 
 A new call was issued, and two days later the convention 
 met and formed the "Illinois State Antislavery Society." 
 Having perfected their organization, adopted a constitution, 
 and chosen their officers, Elihu Wolcott being president and E. 
 P. Lovejoy secretary and chairman of the executive commit 
 tee, they discussed and adopted a series of resolutions, at once 
 comprehensive and thorough, and based upon the great princi 
 ples of the Declaration of Independence and the Word of God. 
 Among the resolutions was one declaring that " the cause of 
 human rights, the liberty of speech and of the press, impera 
 tively demand that the press of the i Alton Observer ' be re 
 established at Alton, with its present editor " ; and pledging 
 its members with the aid of Alton friends and " by the help of 
 Almighty God," to take measures for its re-establishment. A 
 preamble, couched in language of singular solemnity and force, 
 prefixed to the constitution, and also a declaration of senti 
 ments, reported by Dr. Beecher, were adopted. Fifty-five sig 
 natures were appended to the constitution. 
 
 A committee, consisting of Wolcott, Beecher, and Carter, 
 was appointed to issue an " address to the citizens of the State 
 on the subject of slavery, freedom of speech, of the press," etc. 
 That also was a paper of singular ability and eloquence, placing 
 the cause on the high ground of Christian principle, and enun 
 ciating with great clearness and force the primal truths of 
 human rights and the paramount claims of God's Holy Word. 
 But the strong Southern element which entered so largely into 
 the population of Illinois prevented any very general adoption 
 of such sentiments, however scriptural and republican in spirit 
 and purpose. There were, indeed, ever faithful men and 
 
ACTIVITY OF THE ABOLITIONISTS. 363 
 
 women, churches and communities ; but the great body joined 
 in the general apostasy, consenting to, if not defending, the 
 giant wrong. 
 
 Ohio was settled, especially its eastern and northern por 
 tions, by a different class of citizens. There the New England 
 element was strong ; and, being removed from the corrupting 
 influences of cities and of commercial and manufacturing in 
 terests, society, at least in many localities, did not deteriorate 
 as rapidly and fatally as did that which was left behind. There 
 were many strong and earnest men in the abolition ranks, and 
 many active antislavery associations ; though the southern por 
 tion of the State, like Indiana and Illinois, was strongly tinctured 
 with proslavery sentiments, that had secured legislation and 
 laws which they inspired and which were enacted at their 
 behests. Its State Society, of which Leicester King, some 
 years afterward nominated as a candidate for the Vice-Presi 
 dency by the Liberty party, was president, held a convention 
 in April, 1835, continuing three days. At this convention, in 
 addition to a consideration of the general subject, particular 
 attention was paid to the condition of the colored people in 
 the State, as also to the inhuman and barbarous laws which 
 disgraced its statute-books, and which were only too faithfully 
 executed by its inhabitants, especially by those residing in and 
 near Cincinnati and on the borders of the Ohio River. 
 
 Indeed, a prominent feature of the meeting was the reading 
 and discussion of two very able and exhaustive reports from 
 committees appointed to consider " the condition of people of 
 color," and the " laws of Ohio " concerning them. These 
 laws forbade the entrance into the State of negroes and mulat- 
 toes without giving two freehold sureties to the amount of five 
 hundred dollars for their good behavior and for their support 
 if they should become a public charge. The penalty for not 
 giving such sureties was "to be removed in the same manner 
 as is required in the case of paupers." By another section it 
 was enacted that if " any person being a resident of this State 
 shall employ, harbor, or conceal any such negro," he shall 
 pay a sum not exceeding one hundred dollars, and be liable 
 for his support if he become a public charge. By another 
 
364 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 statute it was enacted that no black or mulatto person should 
 give evidence in court in a controversy or case in which a 
 white person was involved. 
 
 It was easy, of course, for the committee to point out not 
 only the inhumanity and wickedness of such legislation, but 
 its unconstitutionality, or, at least, its incompatibility with 
 the constitution of the State, which declares " that ALL are 
 born free and. independent, and have certain natural and 
 inalienable rights." Nor was it any less easy to point out the 
 evil workings of such statutes on the people thus hampered 
 and held in check and constraint by them. " Few amongst 
 the w.Mtes," they say, " would be able to obtain sureties on such 
 condit: tfis ; and much less blacks, who are strangers and pen 
 niless, and against whose race there exists a general preju 
 dice." As if to make their condition insupportable, all per 
 sons were forbid hiring or employing them. And if, in spite 
 of all such cruel and unjust disabilities, any should succeed in 
 life, and amass wealth, the section confronted them, forbidding 
 their evidence in court on any subject in which a white man 
 is involved. It was, then, but a legitimate inference when the 
 committee declared that the " influence of such laws could 
 not be otherwise than destructive to their moral and intellec 
 tual character and their pecuniary interests. Mental debase 
 ment, moral degradation, self-disrespect, unyielding prejudice 
 on the part of the whites, and the most distressing poverty, 
 are the natural and necessary consequences of their perni 
 cious, unjust, and impolitic laws." 
 
 Nor was it strange that the committee on the condition of 
 the colored people " was obliged to report that of the estimat 
 ed seven thousand and five hundred in the State, as a class, 
 we find them ignorant, many of them intemperate and vicious," 
 intemperance, ignorance, and lewdness " being their beset 
 ting vices ; that, instead of seeking to gain freeholds, and 
 depending upon farming for subsistence, they congregate in 
 towns, and become day laborers, barbers, and menial ser 
 vants." There were, however, redeeming facts, and satisfac 
 tory mention was made of " a settlement in Stark County, 
 where there were three hundred people, mostly farmers," with 
 
ACTIVITY OF THE ABOLITIONISTS. 365 
 
 a meeting-house and school-house, the whole population, with 
 few exceptions, abstaining from intoxicating drinks. 
 
 A more specific inquiry was made in the spring of 1835, by 
 the Antislavery Society of Lane Seminary, into the condition 
 of the twenty-five hundred colored people of Cincinnati. 
 From its report it appears that, as far back as 1829, a sys 
 tematic effort was made by its citizens to aid in the removal 
 of the free people of color from the United States. This 
 movement not only excited the passions and prejudices of the 
 lower stratum of society, but inspired the action of the com 
 manding classes and of the authorities. The trustees of the 
 township issued a proclamation that any colored man who did 
 not fulfil the requirements of the law should leave the city. 
 But, as that was simply impossible, only a small portion could 
 or did leave. The mob then attempted to expel them by 
 force ; and for three days riot ran wild in the city. The col 
 ored people, appealing in vain to the city authorities, barri 
 caded their houses, and thus alone the fury of the rioters was 
 resisted. Thus hampered and oppressed in Ohio they sent a 
 deputation to Canada, to find a place of refuge under a mon 
 archy. The reply of the governor was as reassuring to them 
 as it was severe and damaging to the recreant citizens of the 
 Union. " Tell the republicans," he said, " on your side of the 
 line, that we royalists do not know men by their color. Should 
 you come to us, you will be entitled to all the privileges of the 
 rest of her Majesty's subjects." In consequence of this gra 
 cious permission large numbers emigrated; and, in a few 
 years, more than a thousand found a home in what was called 
 Wilberforce Settlement. 
 
 Those who remained, however, suffered every indignity and 
 injustice. Public schools and mechanical associations were 
 closed against them, and the most ordinary labor was refused 
 them, a clergyman, in one instance, dismissing a member 
 of his church from his employment because it was against the 
 law to employ him. The poor man, spending many days in 
 the unavailing search for employment, and returning to the 
 minister for advice, received the disheartening reply: " I can 
 not help you ; you must go to Liberia." Thus did the spirit 
 
366 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of slavery everywhere reveal itself to be the same heartless 
 and fiendish element, disturbing alike the normal condition of 
 society and that of the individuals of which that society was 
 composed. Men under its influence lost much of their man 
 hood, and communities were made willing to exhibit the most 
 revolting features of barbarism itself. 
 
 The high-handed measures of Congress, in its denial of the 
 right of petition and freedom of speech, caused much excite 
 ment and indignation in the free States. The antislavery men 
 of Massachusetts, sharing largely in these feelings, were among 
 the first to give expression to this sense of wrong, as they 
 were firm in their purpose to resist these encroachments, 
 and to secure, if possible, a reversal of such hostile legisla 
 tion. Consequently, during the session of the legislature in 
 1837, a large number of petitions were presented, calling upon 
 that body " to protest without delay, in the name of the people 
 of this Commonwealth," against the rule of Congress which 
 laid upon the table all memorials and other papers concern 
 ing slavery, without being printed, read, or referred. These 
 memorials were referred to an able committee of one from 
 each county, of which Artemas Lee of Templeton, Worcester 
 County, was chairman. The committee granted a full, fair, 
 and courteous hearing to the friends and representatives of the 
 memorialists, a favor made more noticeable ancl grateful to 
 them by its striking contrast with the insolent and supercil 
 ious course of Mr. Lunt, chairman of a similar committee of 
 the previous legislature. 
 
 Henry B. Stanton and George S. Hillard appeared in be 
 half of the petitioners, and urged their claims with ability 
 and eloquence. Mr. Hillard's speech was able and scholarly, 
 exciting in the friends of freedom hopes of future service 
 which his subsequent career did not justify. It was eclipsed, 
 however, by the remarkable effort of his colleague. Mr. Stan- 
 ton's argument on that occasion was regarded, by those whose 
 good fortune it was to hear it, as one of those rare exhibitions 
 of eloquence which now and then burst upon a delighted and 
 enraptured auditory. It was a kind of epoch in one's life- 
 
ACTION OF NORTHERN LEGISLATURES. 367 
 
 time, to be remembered, but seldom repeated or paralleled. It 
 wrought its effects upon the audience, however, perhaps more 
 by its gorgeous diction, vivid coloring, and magnetic power, 
 as the speaker described the ideal possibilities of some coming 
 stage of human progress, than by the vigor of its reasoning, 
 or its special adaptedness to the state of public feeling and 
 sentiment as then existing. Its effects upon the audience, as 
 described by those who heard it, were almost magical. It was 
 stereotyped, and two hundred thousand copies were circulated. 
 Mr. Garrison thus refers to it in his report : " The occasion 
 was one of great moral sublimity. Mr. Stanton, though labor 
 ing under physical indisposition, was happily enabled not 
 only to meet, but even to transcend, the high expectation of 
 the friends of liberty. His words became living coals, and 
 his eloquence bore all things onward like an overflowing 
 stream." 
 
 " The effects of antislavery agitation," Mr. Stanton said, 
 " are not hemmed in by State lines, nor circumscribed by local 
 boundaries. They are moral in their nature ; obey no laws 
 but those of the human mind ; owe allegiance to no constitu 
 tion but that of the immortal soul. Impalpable, but real, the 
 truths we proclaim overleap all geographical divisions, and lay 
 their strong grasp upon the conscience. Moral light, diffused 
 at the North, is like the Aurora Borealis ; it will travel onward 
 to the South. The slaveholder may intrench himself behind 
 bristling bayonets, but the truth, armed with the omnipotence 
 of its Author, breaks through the serried legions. At Mason 
 and Dixon's line he may pile his prohibitory statutes to the 
 clouds as his wall of defence ; but truth, like light, is elastic 
 and impressible, and, mounting upward, will overleap the sum 
 mit and penetrate his concealment. Yes, sir, if the Union were 
 rent into ten thousand fragments, yet, if on any fragment there 
 was a slaveholder, antislavery agitation would search him out, 
 and scatter upon his naked heart the living coals of truth. 
 God has written the verity of our principles on the inside of 
 every oppressor in the land. He can destroy the record only 
 with his nature. And if the American slaveholder, returning 
 wearied with the destruction of every antislavery pamphlet 
 
368 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 and press and society and man in the nation, should seek 
 repose in his chamber, these words, written with the finger of 
 God, would flame out from its walls in letters of blinding 
 intensity : ' Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unright 
 eousness, and his chambers by wrong ; that useth his neigh 
 bor's service without wages, and giveth him not for his work!" 
 
 The buoyant hopes thus eloquently portrayed were, however, 
 hardly fulfilled. The history of the struggle, then commen 
 cing and now complete, did not realize the bright anticipations 
 so brilliantly sketched by the fervid orator of that occasion. 
 These words were spoken in 1837 ; what did twenty years' 
 fighting reveal ? The nation rocked from centre to circumfer 
 ence, and on the eve of rebellion and disruption, not upon the 
 question whether slavery should be abolished at the South, but 
 whether it should not be extended to the North. In the mean 
 time Texas had been annexed ; the Mexican War had been 
 fought ; the Missouri Compromise had been abrogated ; the 
 Fugitive Slave Law had been enacted ; the 7th of March 
 Speech had been spoken, and Mr. Webster had been thanked 
 by eight hundred of the prominent citizens of Massachusetts, 
 including clergymen, president and professors of its leading 
 college and theological seminary, for " recalling them to their 
 duties under the Constitution." Four years more revealed 
 the nation in the agonies of civil war, the South almost a unit 
 in the strife, at best but a lean minority of its ministers and 
 churches protesting against the treason or condemning its vil- 
 lanous cause. 
 
 Where were then the truths overleaping " all geographical 
 divisions," and laying their " strong grasp upon the con 
 science "? Where was that moral light, diffused like the 
 Aurora Borealis through the North, and travelling onward to 
 the South, penetrating the concealment of the slaveholder, 
 searching him out, and scattering " on his naked heart the 
 coals of living truth " ? 
 
 " Alas ! Leviathan is not so tamed." 
 
 Something more is wanting than moral light or the living 
 coals of truth. There must be a " living " conscience and a 
 
ACTION OF NORTHERN LEGISLATURES. 369 
 
 loyal heart. They were wanting, and so were the hoped-for 
 and promised results. A slaveholding government, instead 
 of relaxing its grasp, strengthened itself in the high places of 
 power, to be dislodged only by divisions in its own ranks, and 
 not by the greater strength of the friends of freedom ; instead 
 of contracting the area of slavery, enlarging it ; instead of re 
 garding it, with the fathers, exceptional and sectional, deter 
 mining to make it national and supreme. And had there been 
 only moral agencies, such would have been the result. It was 
 material, not moral force, the sword of steel and not the sword 
 of truth, that broke the power of the master and struck his 
 fetters from the bondman. It was God who, amid and by the 
 fires and convulsions of rebellion and civil war, undid the 
 heavy burdens and let the oppressed go free. The moral forces 
 then invoked and employed were, doubtless, a part of the pre 
 determined plan, and had their place among the measures 
 that were needed for the result to be secured. But the mode 
 finally adopted was so unlike anything planned for or anticipat 
 ed that the wisest and most earnest Abolitionist will be modest 
 in his claims, and ascribe the victory to God, rather than to 
 man, to Him whose prerogative it is to bring good out of 
 evil, and to make even the wrath of man praise Him. 
 
 Mr. Stanton thus expressed the unyielding purpose of those 
 for whom he spoke : " Undeterred by official proscription or 
 private denunciation, by prosecution at common law or perse 
 cutions without law, by legislative enactments or ecclesiastical 
 anathemas, the friends of the slave, guided by the wisdom, 
 cheered by the favor, and protected by the power of God, will 
 prosecute their work. And that man or that party who shall 
 attempt to arrest this cause in its onward progress will be 
 borne down by the advancing host." It was to this vigorous 
 protest and promised persistence of the antislavery men of 
 those days that was due the manly response of the Massachu 
 setts legislature to the prayer of the memorialists. A favora 
 ble report was returned, declaring that " the act of Congress, 
 in refusing to refer and consider the petitions of the people on 
 the subject of slavery, was a virtual denial of the right of peti 
 tion itself," and " at variance with the spirit and intent of the 
 
 47 
 
370 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Constitution, and injurious to the cause of freedom and free 
 institutions." The action of the senators and representatives 
 from Massachusetts was applauded, and the declaration made 
 that " Congress, having exclusive legislation in the District of 
 Columbia, possesses the right to abolish slavery in said Dis 
 trict, and that its exercise should only be restrained by a re 
 gard for the public good." After an earnest and animated 
 debate, these resolutions were sustained in the House by an 
 almost unanimous vote, only sixteen members voting in the 
 negative. 
 
 The Senate, under the lead of Charles Allen, voted unani 
 mously to amend the resolution asserting the power of Con 
 gress to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia, so as to 
 affirm " that the early exercise of such right is demanded by 
 the united sentiment of the civilized world, by the principles 
 of the Revolution and humanity." An additional resolution 
 was adopted, with only one dissenting voice, in favor of cir 
 cumscribing slavery within the limits of the States where it 
 had already been established, and opposing the admission of 
 any new State with a constitution establishing or admitting it. 
 The Senate finally receded from its action ; not from any dis 
 position to retreat from the principles it had avowed, but for 
 the purpose of preserving more unity of action with the House 
 of Representatives. 
 
 The legislature of Vermont, too, resolved, and sent its reso 
 lutions to each of the States, that neither Congress nor the 
 State governments have any constitutional power to abridge 
 the free expression of opinions, or their transmission through 
 the medium of the public mails ; and that Congress possesses 
 the power to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia. This 
 action of the legislatures of Vermont and Massachusetts indi 
 cated an advance in antislavery sentiment, cheering its friends, 
 exasperating its foes, and stimulating both alike to further en 
 deavors to promote their conflicting purposes and plans. 
 
 Other facts cheered and encouraged the friends of the slave. 
 In the month of August, 1836, the Supreme Judicial Court of 
 Massachusetts unanimously decided, in the case of the slave- 
 child Med, brought from New Orleans by Mrs. Slater, who came 
 
ACTION OF NORTHERN LEGISLATURES. 371 
 
 to reside with her father, Thomas Aves of Boston, that " an 
 owner of a slave in another State, where slavery is warranted 
 by law, voluntarily bringing such slave into this State, has no 
 authority to retain him against his will, or to carry him out of 
 the State against his consent, for the purpose of being held in 
 slavery." This important opinion was delivered by Chief Jus' 
 tice Shaw. The suit had been prosecuted with unfaltering 
 zeal by the Boston Female Antislavery Society. Samuel E. 
 Sewall and Ellis Gray Loring, assisted by Rufus Choate, con 
 ducted the case for the Commonwealth. The argument of 
 Mr. Loring was pronounced a masterly and exhaustive effort, 
 worthy of the cause he advocated and the great tribunal before 
 which it was delivered. 
 
 This decision was followed by another, hardly less important. 
 On the 20th of January, 1837, the judiciary committee of the 
 Massachusetts House of Representatives was directed to in 
 quire into the expediency of providing some process by which 
 one under personal restraint may try his right to liberty before 
 a jury. The chairman of the committee, James C. Alvord of 
 Greenfield, a young and able lawyer and rising statesman, of 
 whom high hopes were entertained, made an elaborate report, 
 in whi<5h the sacred right of trial by jury was vindicated. An 
 act was reported providing that " if any person is imprisoned, 
 restrained of his liberty, or held in duress, unless it be in the 
 custody of some public officer of the law, by force of a lawful 
 warrant or other process, civil or criminal, issued by a court 
 of competent jurisdiction, he shall be entitled, as of right, to 
 a writ of personal replevin, and to be thereby in the manner 
 specified in the act." The legislature, with entire unanimity, 
 gave its sanction to this important bill. 
 
 The sixth anniversary meeting of the Massachusetts Anti- 
 slavery Society was held at Boston in January, 1838. On its 
 application, the hall of the House of Representatives was 
 granted for its use, and it was thronged with members and 
 others anxious to listen to the eloquent advocates of immediate 
 emancipation. At the meeting Edmund Quincy submitted a 
 resolution, gratefully acknowledging the signal manner in 
 which the antislavery cause had been prospered during the* 
 
372 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 past year, and " the bright ray of promise which assures us 
 that the beams of the Sun of Righteousness will not forever 
 be obscured by the mists which rise from a sensual and mer 
 cenary world." 
 
 Mr. Quincy and his associates were, doubtless, too sanguine 
 and over-confident ; and yet there were cheering signs of pro 
 gress. Shortly afterward, the legislature of Massachusetts 
 adopted, with little opposition, a series of resolutions against 
 the admission of Texas ; against the admission of any more 
 slave States ; in favor of the abolition of slavery and the slave- 
 trade in the District of Columbia and the prohibition of slav 
 ery in the Territories. These resolutions were reported by 
 James C. Alvord, then a senator from Franklin County. They 
 were accompanied by two reports, in which the questions in 
 volved were discussed with great clearness and force. In the 
 autumn of that year Mr. Alvord was elected to Congress, much 
 to the gratification not only of the antislavery men of Massa 
 chusetts but of the whole country. He did not live, however, 
 to take his seat in the councils of the nation, and in his early 
 and premature grave were buried the high hopes which had 
 been excited by his brief and brilliant career. 
 
 While the questions involved in these resolutions were pend 
 ing before the legislative committee, Wendell Phillips ad 
 dressed it against the annexation of Texas, unveiling and 
 properly characterizing the plottings of the Slave Power in 
 that matter. Angelina E. Grimke, the first lady ever per 
 mitted to address a legislative committee in the Common 
 wealth, was allowed to appear before the same. Her appeals 
 were, earnest, eloquent, and full of pathos and tenderness. 
 She referred to her self-exile from South Carolina, her native 
 State, because she could not endure the sufferings to which the 
 bondmen were doomed ; and she invoked the action of the 
 legislature and the people of the North. Her self-possession 
 and dignity, her facts, arguments, and appeals, deeply im 
 pressed the committee, the legislature, and the people of the 
 Commonwealth. 
 
 The legislature of Connecticut, under the lead of Francis 
 Gillette, then a young representative from Hartford, afterward 
 
ACTION OF NORTHERN LEGISLATURES. 
 
 373 
 
 a member of the United States Senate, and always an earnest 
 and consistent advocate of freedom, repealed the black law 
 enacted in 1833 for the purpose of suppressing the colored 
 school of Miss Prudence Crandall. The same legislature 
 passed resolutions against the annexation of Texas, the slave- 
 trade in the District of Columbia, and in favor of the right of 
 petition, thus placing Connecticut by the side of Massachusetts 
 in the cause of freedom. 
 
 About the same time the legislature of Vermont, after lis 
 tening to a long and brilliant speech from Alvan Stewart 
 of New York, reported resolutions similar in character to 
 those adopted in Massachusetts. They were passed, too, in 
 the Senate, by a unanimous vote, and in the House without 
 division. Henry B. Stanton and other eloquent champions of 
 the cause addressed the legislatures and legislative committees 
 of other States ; and, where such hearings were refused, at 
 tended and pleaded the cause of freedom in other capitals 
 while their legislatures were in session. In all the other legis 
 latures of the Northern States, too, there were active and grow 
 ing minorities interested and engaged in the same great 
 work. 
 
CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 THE ALTON TRAGEDY, MURDER OF ELIJAH P. LOYEJOT. 
 
 Mr. Lovejoy discusses the Slavery Question. Maintains the Right of the Press 
 and Speech. Murder of a Negro. Charge of Judge Lawless. Destruc 
 tion of the Office of the "Observer." The Press destroyed at Alton. 
 The Slaveholders demand its Suppression. It is destroyed. Mr. Lovejoy 
 mobbed in Missouri. Insulted at Home. Speech to the Citizens. Excite 
 ment in Alton. Mr. Linder leads a Mob. State Society formed at Upper 
 Alton. Speech of Edward Beecher. Meeting at the Store to protect the 
 Press. Assault upon the Warehouse. The Fire returned. Mr. Lovejoy 
 shot ; died. Press thrown into the River. The Murder applauded or ex 
 cused by the Supporters of Slavery. Resolutions of the Boston Abolition 
 ists. Faneuil Hall refused. Dr. Channing's Letter. Mr. Hallett's Reso 
 lutions. The Hall granted. Address of Dr. Channing. Resolutions of 
 Mr. Hallett. Mr. Austin's Speech. Reply of Wendell Phillips. Excite 
 ment. Action of the National and Massachusetts Antislavery Societies. 
 Edmund Quincy. Non-Resistants. 
 
 ON the 7th of November, 1837, the cause of freedom re 
 ceived its first baptism of blood. On that day Rev. Elijah P. 
 Lovejoy was murdered by a mob at Alton, Illinois. No pre 
 vious event had so startled, alarmed, and fixed the attention 
 of the more conscientious and thoughtful portion of the coun 
 try. Nothing had so clearly indicated to antislavery men the 
 nature of the conflict in which they were engaged, the desper 
 ate character of the foe with which they were grappling. 
 
 Mr. Lovejoy was a native of Maine, and a graduate of 
 Waterville College in 1826. At the age of twenty-four he 
 went to the West, and became a teacher in St. Louis. Two 
 years afterward he became the editor of a political journal of 
 the National Republican party, and an active supporter of Henry 
 Clay. In 1832 he united with the Presbyterian Church, en 
 tered for a brief period the Theological Seminary at Princeton, 
 New Jersey, was licensed to preach by the Presbytery of Phila 
 delphia, and, in the autumn of that year, returned to Mis- 
 
THE ALTON TRAGEDY, MUEDER OF ELIJAH P. LOVEJOY. 375 
 
 souri, and established the St. Louis " Observer," a weekly 
 religious journal. During the ensuing year, while avowing his 
 hostility to immediate emancipation, he expressed the opinion 
 that, if slavery could be removed from Missouri, that great 
 State would start forward in a race of energy and improvement 
 which would place her in the front rank of her sister States. 
 While absent from the city, at a meeting of the synod, an 
 excitement commenced in regard to his strictures on slavery ; 
 and the alarmed proprietors of the paper issued a card, declar 
 ing their opposition to the wild scheme of the Abolitionists. 
 Before leaving home, he had received a communication from 
 nine leading citizens of St. Louis, friends and supporters of 
 the " Observer," begging him to " pass over in silence every 
 thing connected with the subject of slavery." Upon that 
 communication he made the indorsement that he did not 
 yield to the wishes expressed, had been persecuted for not 
 doing so, but had kept a good conscience, which had more 
 than repaid him for all he had suffered. " I have sworn eter 
 nal hostility to slavery, and by the blessing of God I will 
 never go back." 
 
 Returning to St. Louis, Mr. Lovejoy issued an address to 
 his excited fellow-citizens, in which he maintained with signal 
 boldness the right to discuss questions pertaining to slavery, 
 or any other evil which concerned the interests of humanity. 
 " I deem it," he said, " my duty to take my stand upon the 
 Constitution. Here is firm ground ; I feel it to be such ; and 
 I do most respectfully but decidedly declare to you my fixed 
 determination to maintain this ground. We have slaves, it is 
 true ; but I am not one." While avowing his purpose never 
 to surrender the freedom of speech and of the press, he ex 
 pressed the hope that he should maintain these rights with the 
 meekness and humility that became a Christian, but especially 
 a Christian minister. He reminded the inflamed people of St. 
 Louis that blood kindred to that which flowed in his veins had 
 flowed freely on the plains of Lexington and on the heights of 
 Bunker Hill, and he assured them that his blood should flow 
 as freely as if it were water, " ere," he said, " I surrender my 
 right to plead the cause of truth and righteousness before my 
 
376 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 fellow-citizens and in the face of all opposers." Protesting 
 against all attempts, by whomsoever made, to interfere with 
 the liberty of the press, he declared his fixed purpose to sub 
 mit to no such dictation. " I am," he said, " prepared to 
 abide the consequences. I have appealed to the Constitution 
 and the laws of my country ; if they fail to protect me, I 
 appeal to God, and with him I cheerfully rest my cause." 
 
 At the request of the proprietors of the " Observer," he 
 surrendered its editorship, and removed to Alton. The paper 
 soon passing into other hands as payment of a debt, its new 
 owner presented it to him, and he at once returned and entered 
 upon its publication. In the spring of 1836 an excited mob 
 took Francis J. Mclntosh, a mulatto, from the jail, where he 
 had been lodged for fatally stabbing one officer and wounding 
 another who had arrested him, carried him out of the city, 
 chained him to a tree, and burned him to death. As the mat 
 ter came before the grand jury, Judge Lawless in his charge 
 expressed the astounding sentiment that if a mob be hurried 
 on to its deeds of violence and blood by some " mysterious, 
 metaphysical, and almost electric frenzy," participators in it are 
 absolved from guilt, and are not proper subjects of punishment. 
 If such be the fact, he said, " act not at all in the matter ; the 
 case then transcends your jurisdiction, it is beyond the reach 
 of human law." 
 
 For commenting on this revolting deed, and the still more 
 revolting judicial opinion, Mr. Lovejoy's office was entered and 
 destroyed by a mob. He removed the press to Alton ; only, 
 however, to see it seized upon the bank of the river and broken 
 into fragments. A meeting of citizens was held at once, and 
 a pledge given to reimburse him for his loss. Mr. Lovejoy 
 assured them that it was not his purpose to establish an aboli 
 tion, but a religious press. Indeed, he was not an Abolition 
 ist, though he expected to live and die an uncompromising 
 enemy to slavery, and should hold himself at liberty to speak 
 and write as he pleased on any subject. In July, 1837, a pub 
 lic meeting assembled, bitterly denounced the " Observer " for 
 its publication of articles favorable to abolitionism, and cen 
 sured its editor. To a committee appointed by this meeting 
 
THE ALTON TRAGEDY, MURDER OF ELIJAH P. LOVEJOY. 377 
 
 Mr. Lovejoy declared, with great firmness, that liberty of 
 speech is something not to be called in question, that it was 
 a right which came from his Maker, belonging to man as man, 
 and inalienable. 
 
 Although the " Observer " was no longer printed in St. 
 Louis, its citizens and presses demanded that Illinois should 
 abate what they regarded as a nuisance, under the penalty of 
 losing the trade of slaveholding States, the same rod, in 
 deed, so long and successfully held in terror em by the domi 
 neering South over the abject North. Consequently, in the 
 month of August, Mr. Lovejoy's office and press were again 
 destroyed, during his absence ; and he was most grossly in 
 sulted on his return. Another press was purchased, and stored 
 in the warehouse of Gerry and Miller. The mob again assem 
 bled, broke open the building, destroyed the press, and threw 
 the fragments into the Mississippi. A few days afterward he 
 was mobbed again at the house of his mother-in-law, in St. 
 Charles, Missouri, on his return from church, where he had 
 officiated ; and he was compelled to leave clandestinely to save 
 his life. 
 
 Meetings were held in Alton by the excited inhabitants to 
 consider the question of the longer publication of the paper. 
 At one held on the 3d of November, at his request he was 
 permitted to speak in his own behalf. With manly firm 
 ness and Christian boldness he reminded his fellow-citizens 
 that he respected their feelings, and acted in opposition to 
 them with great regret. He valued their good opinion ; but 
 he must be, he said, " governed by higher considerations than 
 either the favor or the fear of man. I am impelled to the 
 course I have taken because I fear God. As I shall answer to 
 my God, in the great day, I dare not abandon my sentiments, 
 or cease in all proper ways to propagate them." Reminding 
 the meeting that if he had committed any crime they could 
 convict him, as they had the public sentiment and juries 
 on their side, he asked : " If I have been guilty of no viola 
 tion of law, why am I hunted up and down continually like 
 a partridge upon the mountain ? Why am I threatened with 
 the tar-barrel ? Why am I waylaid every day, and from 
 
 48 
 
378 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 night to night ? Why is my life in jeopardy every hour ? " 
 Planting himself on his unquestionable rights, he declared the 
 question to be, " Whether my property shall be protected ; 
 whether I shall be suffered to go home to my family at night 
 without being assailed and threatened with tar and feathers 
 and assassination ; whether my afflicted wife, whose life has 
 been in jeopardy from continued alarm and excitement, shall 
 night after night be driven from her sick-bed into the garret, 
 to save her life from brickbats and the violence of the mob." 
 This allusion to his family overcame his feelings, and he 
 burst into tears. The sympathy of the meeting was deeply 
 excited. Many sobbed aloud, and even some of his enemies 
 wept. Recovering himself, he begged forgiveness for having 
 been betrayed into weakness by the thought of his family ; and 
 he assured the meeting that he had no personal fears. Admit 
 ting that he was powerless, he said : " I know you can tar 
 and feather me, hang me up, or put me in the Mississippi. 
 But what then ? Where shall I go ? I have been made to 
 feel if I am not safe in Alton I shall not be safe anywhere." 
 
 There were some who, while insisting on the suppression of 
 his press and driving him from Alton, expressed the wish that 
 no unnecessary disgrace should be affixed to him. To such 
 suggestions he replied : " I reject all such compassion. You 
 cannot disgrace me. Scandal, falsehood, and calumny have 
 done their worst. My shoulders have borne the burden till it 
 sits easy upon them. I, and I alone, can disgrace myself; 
 and the deepest of all disgraces would be at a time like this 
 to deny my Master by forsaking his cause. He died for me ; 
 and I were most unworthy to bear his name should I refuse, if 
 need be, to die for Him." Reminding the meeting that he 
 had, on a recent visit to St. Charles, been torn from the fran 
 tic embrace of his family, he closed with this declaration : 
 " I have concluded, after consultation with my friends, and 
 earnestly seeking counsel of God, to remain at Alton, and here 
 to insist on protection in the exercise of my rights. If the 
 civil authorities refuse to protect me, I must look to God ; and, 
 if I die, I am determined to make my grave in Alton. Sir, I 
 dare not flee away from Alton. Should I attempt it, I should 
 
THE ALTON TRAGEDY, MURDER OF ELIJAH P. LOVEJOY. 379 
 
 feel that the angel of the Lord, with his flaming sword, was 
 pursuing me wherever I went. It is because I fear God that I 
 am not afraid of all who oppose me in this city." 
 
 His earnestness and manifest sincerity made a deep impres 
 sion upon the audience. Dr. Edward Beecher, who was pres 
 ent, thus describes the scene : "I have been affected often 
 times with the power of intellect and eloquence ; but never 
 was I so overcome as at this hour. He made no display, there 
 was no rhetorical decoration, no violence of action. All was 
 native truth, and deep, pure, and tender feeling. Many a hard 
 face did I see wet with tears as he struck the chords of feeling 
 to which God made the soul to respond. Even his bitter ene 
 mies wept. It reminded me of Paul before Festus, and of 
 Luther at Worms." 
 
 The crowd, however, then present, represented too faithfully 
 the popular sentiment of that section of the country to be 
 much controlled by the faith or eloquence of such a man. 
 They were far better prepared to respond to the counter ap 
 peals of John Hogan, then a Methodist minister and afterward 
 a Democratic member of Congress from St. Louis, who, launch 
 ing his vile epithets and fierce invectives upon Mr. Lovejoy 
 and the Abolitionists, inflamed the minds and stirred up to 
 deeper frenzy that class of men of which mobs are made. 
 
 The city was in a state of Intense excitement. Violence 
 was anticipated, as it had been foreshadowed by the disgrace 
 ful and disorganizing proceedings which had broken up a con 
 vention at Upper Alton, during the previous week, and had 
 defeated the purposes of its original promoters. The call was 
 to " the friends of the slave and of free discussion in Illinois " ; 
 and yet, by packing the convention with men of an opposite 
 faith, under the lead of W. F. Linder, attorney-general of 
 the State, a series of resolutions was adopted indorsing slav 
 ery and proclaiming that all interference with it should be 
 " discountenanced." And by the same vote that sustained 
 these resolutions was the convention adjourned sine die. The 
 men, however, who called the convention, were not to be thus 
 baffled. A subsequent meeting was called at the house of 
 Rev. Mr. Hurlburt of the same place ; and, although the 
 
380 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 formation of an antislavery society had not been one of the 
 fixed objects of the original convention, it was now seen to 
 be demanded, and it was accordingly effected. Officers were 
 chosen, and a most able address and declaration of senti 
 ments, from the pen of Dr. Beecher, were sent forth. To 
 add to the flame already burning so fiercely, a colonization 
 meeting was held about that time, at which fiery harangues 
 were made, more hostile to antislavery and its friends than to 
 slavery and its abettors. Of course, a conflict so acrimonious 
 and determined between principles so radical and antagonistic 
 must culminate in something more sanguinary than words. 
 The arrival of another press was the occasion of a demonstra 
 tion which ended in arson and blood. 
 
 The enemies of Mr. Lovejoy had determined to seize and 
 destroy it on its arrival ; while a few friends, equally in ear 
 nest, had determined to defend it. As the former were watch 
 ing for its coming, about fifty of the latter assembled at the 
 stone warehouse where it was to be stored on its arrival, and 
 organized an armed force for its defence. After that organiza 
 tion had been effected, about thirty remained, under the com 
 mand of a city constable. The looked-for press arrived at 
 three o'clock on the morning of the 7th of November, and 
 the intelligence of its arrival was made known by the blowing 
 of horns. The mayor, John McKrum, went to the warehouse 
 and aided in storing it. The utmost excitement, however, pre 
 vailed during the day, though the mayor came to the conclu 
 sion, after making inquiries, that no further violence was in 
 tended. There being no sign of an assault on the building, at 
 nine o'clock in the evening most of its defenders retired, 
 leaving about a dozen, willing to risk their lives, if needful, in 
 defence of Mr. Lovejoy and his property. 
 
 An hour or two afterward there came from the grog-shops 
 thirty or forty persons, who knocked at the door and demanded 
 the press. Mr. Gilman, one of the owners of the warehouse, 
 informed them that it would not be given up ; that they had 
 been authorized by the mayor to defend the property, and they 
 should do it at the hazard of their lives. Presenting a pistol, 
 the leader announced that they were resolved to have it at any 
 
THE ALTON TRAGEDY, MURDER OF ELIJAH P. LOVEJOY. 381 
 
 sacrifice. Stones were thrown, windows broken, and shots 
 were fired at the building. These shots were returned, and 
 several of the rioters were wounded, one mortally. Ladders 
 were obtained and preparations were made for firing the build 
 ing, and the cry was raised : " Burn them out." The mayor, 
 accompanied by a justice of the peace, was sent by the mob to 
 propose the surrender of the press on condition that no one 
 should be injured. To the demand of Mr. Oilman that the 
 mayor should call upon the citizens to save his building, the 
 latter replied that the mob was too strong, that he had failed 
 to persuade and was powerless to command. Admitting the 
 lawful right of persons within the building to defend the pror> 
 erty, he retired and reported the result to the rioters, who 
 raised the cry : " Fire the building and shoot every d d Abo 
 litionist as he leaves ! " With the aid of ladders, the mob 
 mounted the building and fired the roof. Five of the defend 
 ers sallied forth from the building, fired upon and dispersed 
 the mob, and returned. Mr. Lovejoy and two others then 
 stepped outside of the building, were fired upon by rioters con 
 cealed by a pile of lumber, and Mr. Lovejoy received five balls, 
 three of them in his breast. Returning at once to the count 
 ing-room, he expired almost instantly, exclaiming, " I am shot ! 
 I am shot ! " One of his friends was wounded, but not fatally. 
 After his death, those in the building offered to surrender ; 
 but their offer was declined. One of the number, going out 
 for the purpose of making terms with the rioters, was severely 
 wounded. Most of them left the building, but were fired upon 
 in their attempts to escape. The mob then rushed into the 
 building, seized the press, broke it, and threw the fragments 
 into the river. The next day Mr. Lovejoy's body was borne to 
 his home, amid the heartless rejoicings and scoffings of those 
 who had destroyed his property and taken his life. Thus 
 bravely fell one of the most heroic of that number of noble and 
 earnest men who early consecrated themselves to the great and 
 glorious purpose of maintaining, at fearful odds, that essential 
 palladium of a republic, freedom of thought, speech, and the 
 press. The conduct of the mayor was glaringly vacillating, 
 inefficient, and open to criticism and censure. He himself ad- 
 
382 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 mitted that his directions, on an occasion when the majesty 
 of law should have asserted its supremacy, had been the advice 
 of a citizen, rather than the command of an officer. 
 
 There were no demonstrations friendly or hostile at Mr. Love- 
 joy's burial, save a simple prayer at his grave. He was buried 
 on a bluff, overlooking, in its peaceful repose, the rolling river 
 and busy town beneath. For many years no stone marked the 
 spot. Not long since, however, an admirer and friend of the 
 martyr procured a simple monument, with this inscription : 
 
 Hie jacet 
 LOVEJOY. 
 Jam parce sepulto. 
 " Here lies Lovejoy ; now spare his grave." 
 
 What a change has a third of a century wrought. Then the 
 youthful minister of the gospel, hunted, in his own touching- 
 words, like a partridge on the mountains, and appealing in vain 
 for protection against the infuriated mob, found the officers of 
 government and the leaders of public opinion awed by the 
 demon of slavery, rather than inspired by the genius of liberty. 
 Now, that mob dispersed, many of its members and leaders 
 known to have come to a violent and ignominious end, and 
 that terrible system, the guilty source of all that violence, no 
 longer existing. The victim himself is admiringly cherished 
 in the nation's memory, and is sure of a grateful mention on 
 the pages of its history. 
 
 The murder of Lovejoy made a deep impression upon the 
 country. The friends of slavery and the enemies of free dis 
 cussion applauded, or at best excused, the bloody deed, while 
 the friends of liberty and of the freedom of speech and press 
 received the news with profound sorrow and alarm. They saw 
 in it a new revelation of the magnitude and serious character 
 of the contest on which they had entered. They saw, too, that 
 the conflict was not to be the bloodless encounter of ideas 
 alone, but one in which might be involved scenes of bloody 
 violence and personal hazard and harm. Had they understood 
 the full significance of that sanguinary act, and the desperate 
 character of their foe, as revealed in the events of subsequent 
 years, their alarm might well have been greater. 
 
THE ALTON TRAGEDY, MURDER OF ELIJAH P. LOVEJOY. 383 
 
 The Board of Managers of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery 
 Society was at once convened in Boston, and a series of res 
 olutions was adopted declaring that the guilt of that bloody 
 tragedy was not confined to the immediate actors therein ; that 
 it was one of the natural and inevitable consequences of toler 
 ating the system of slavery ; and that in the murder of this 
 Christian martyr the church, the press, and the people, who 
 justified the enslavement of their countrymen, instigated riots, 
 and connived at the prostration of lawful authority, had par 
 ticipated to a greater or less extent. 
 
 When the intelligence of the Alton tragedy, as it was com 
 monly characterized, reached Boston, Dr. William Ellery Chan- 
 ning and a hundred of its citizens applied for the use of Faneuil 
 Hall, to give expression to their horror at this murder of a 
 Christian clergyman. But their application was rejected. This 
 refusal, and especially the reasons assigned therefor, greatly 
 increased the popular indignation and apprehension ; affording, 
 as it did, but another illustration of the national vassalage and 
 subserviency to the Slave Power, when even the doors of the 
 Cradle of Liberty were rudely closed against those who would 
 mourn over the martyrdom of one of its bravest and most 
 heroic defenders. Men of all parties and sects were greatly 
 excited. With the fearless promptitude demanded by the crisis, 
 Dr. Channing addressed an appeal to the citizens of Boston to 
 reverse this arbitrary action of the city government. Avowing 
 that the purpose of the proposed meeting was to maintain the 
 sacredness and freedom of the press against all assaults, he 
 declared that to intimate that such action did not express the 
 public opinion of Boston, and that it would provoke a mob, 
 was to " pronounce the severest libel upon that city." " Has it 
 come to this ? " he asked. " Has Boston fallen so low ? May 
 not its citizens be trusted to come together to express the great 
 principles of liberty for which their fathers died ? Are our 
 fellow-citizens to be murdered in .the act of defending their 
 property and of assuming the right of free discussion ? and is 
 it unsafe in this metropolis to express abhorrence of the deed ? 
 If such be our degradation, we ought to know the awful truth ; 
 and those among us who retain a portion of the spirit of our 
 
384 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ancestors should set themselves to work to recover their de 
 generate posterity." He asserted that Boston, by this action 
 of her city authorities, had bade Alton go on to destroy the 
 press and put down the liberty of speech. 
 
 This thrilling appeal from one occupying Dr. Channing's 
 position made a deep impression. A public meeting was 
 called at the old Supreme Court room to " take into considera 
 tion the reasons assigned by the mayor and aldermen for with 
 holding Faneuil Hall, and to act in the premises as may be 
 deemed expedient." The room was filled to overflowing. 
 George Bond was made chairman, and Benjamin F. Hallett 
 was chosen secretary. After the reading of Dr. Channing's 
 letter, a series of pertinent resolutions, offered by Mr. Hallett, 
 was discussed and unanimously adopted. A committee of two 
 from each ward was appointed to renew the application, which 
 happily was successful. 
 
 On the 8th of December the meeting was holden. The hall 
 was filled to repletion by the citizens of Boston and vicinity. 
 Jonathan Phillips, a much respected citizen, was called to the 
 chair, and opened the meeting with a brief and pertinent 
 speech. Dr. Channing then made an eloquent and impressive 
 address. A series of resolutions, also from his pen, was read 
 by Mr. Hallett, and seconded and eloquently supported by 
 George S. Hillard. 
 
 Thus far everything had been decorous, dignified, and in 
 keeping with the occasion. The addresses had been listened 
 to with respectful attention, if not with unquestioning appro 
 bation. At this point James T. Austin, attorney-general of 
 the Commonwealth, a prominent lawyer, well known in Faneuil 
 Hall, a trained party-leader and most adroit caucus-speaker, 
 made an inflammatory and exciting speech. It was vocifer 
 ously applauded by the riotous element of the meeting, which, 
 it was estimated, constituted one third of the assembly. 
 Standing in that hall, consecrated to liberty and redolent with 
 the memories of its martyrs, the attorney-general of Massa 
 chusetts unblushingly declared that Lovejoy was not only pre 
 sumptuous and imprudent while he lived, but that " he died 
 as the fool dieth." He compared, with equal violence to truth 
 
 
THE ALTON TRAGEDY, MURDER OF ELIJAH P. LOVEJOY. 385 
 
 and taste, the murderers of Lovejoy with the men who de 
 stroyed the tea in Boston harbor. He declared that wher 
 ever the abolition fever raged there were mobs and murders. 
 Alluding to the bondmen in the most offensive terms, he 
 said : 
 
 " We have a menagerie here, with lions, tigers, a hyena and 
 elephant, a jackass or two, and monkeys in plenty. Suppose, 
 now, some new cosmopolite, some man of philanthropic feel 
 ings, not only toward man, but animals, who believes that all 
 are entitled to freedom as an inalienable right, should engage 
 in the humane task of giving freedom to these wild beasts of 
 the forest, some of whom are nobler than their keepers ; or, 
 having discovered some new mode of reaching their under 
 standing, should try to induce them to break their cages and 
 be free. The people of Missouri had as much reason to be 
 afraid of their slaves as we should have to be afraid of the 
 wild beasts of the menagerie. They had the same dread of 
 Lovejoy that we should have of the supposed instigator, if we 
 really believed the bars would be broken and the caravan let 
 loose to prowl about our streets." 
 
 Having pronounced this disgraceful and seditious harangue, 
 the attorney-general retired. Wendell Phillips ascended the 
 platform, and was met with the hostile demonstrations of the 
 partisans of Austin, who had just applauded so vociferously 
 his unfeeling and inhuman appeal to their vile passions and 
 still viler prejudices. Mr. Phillips was then a young lawyer, 
 unknown to most present, who had gone to the meeting with 
 no intention of taking any part in its proceedings. Though 
 his first words were met with boisterous outcries, he expressed 
 the hope that he would be permitted to avow his surprise at the 
 sentiments just uttered by such a man, and at the applause they 
 had received in that hall. He characterized and condemned 
 that gentleman's language in the strongest terms of reproba 
 tion, though it was done in terms and tones of thrilling elo 
 quence. " When I heard," he said, " the gentleman lay down 
 principles which placed the murderers of Alton side by side 
 with Otis and Hancock, with Quincy and Adams, I thought 
 those pictured lips," pointing to their portraits in the hall, 
 
 49 
 
386 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 " would have broken into voice to rebuke the recreant Ameri 
 can, the slanderer of the dead." 
 
 These words were received with mingled demonstrations of 
 censure and applause. " Sir," continued Mr. Phillips, " for 
 the sentiments he has uttered, on soil consecrated by the 
 prayers of the Puritans and the blood of patriots, the earth 
 should have yawned and swallowed him up." Here the uproar 
 became great, and he could not be heard. William Sturgis, 
 an eminent Boston merchant, ascended the platform and placed 
 himself by the side of Mr. Phillips ; but he, too, was met by 
 the loud cries of the excited rioters. " Phillips or nobody," 
 was their fiendish cry. " Make him take it back ! He sha' n't 
 go on until he takes it back ! " Obtaining a hearing, Mr. 
 Sturgis said : " I did not come here to take any part in this 
 discussion, nor do I intend to ; but I do entreat you, fellow- 
 citizens, by everything you hold sacred, I conjure you by every 
 association connected with this hall, consecrated by our fathers 
 to freedom of discussion, that you listen to any man who 
 addresses you in a decorous manner." 
 
 Resuming, Mr. Phillips firmly and peremptorily declared 
 that he could not take back his words, and reminded the 
 excited throng that the attorney-general needed not their 
 hisses against one so young, whose voice had never before 
 been heard in that hall. He closed his speech with the dec 
 laration that " when liberty was in danger Faneuil Hall had 
 the right, and it was her duty, to strike the key-note for the 
 Union ; that the passage of the resolutions, in spite of the oppo 
 sition, led by the attorney-general, will show more decidedly 
 the deep indignation with which Boston regards this outrage." 
 
 By this brave and brilliant speech Mr. Phillips, by one sin 
 gle bound, placed himself among the foremost and most popu 
 lar of American orators, a position he has maintained by the 
 increasing suffrages of the nation. Then began that advocacy 
 of human rights which for more than a generation he continued 
 with tireless and persistent zeal. To it he consecrated culture, 
 learning, and that marvellous eloquence on which the multi 
 tudes of a generation hung with never-waning delight. Fear 
 less and fierce in his denunciation of the wrongs of the op- 
 
THE ALTON TRAGEDY, MURDER OF ELIJAH P. LOVEJOY. 387 
 
 pressed, he was always merciless in his castigation of the 
 oppressor and his abettors. Confident, too, in his own plans 
 and modes of action, he was, perhaps, too apt to be critical, 
 censorious, and sometimes intolerant toward those who were 
 equally honest, earnest, and unselfish in their devotion to the 
 same cause to which his and their labors were alike conse 
 crated. But if some others were more judicious and practical 
 in action, none equalled him on the platform and few surpassed 
 him with the pen. 
 
 Hundreds, however, went from that meeting unchanged in 
 thought and purpose, even by the terrible event that occasioned 
 it, by the imposing presence and fervid eloquence which char 
 acterized it, or by the humiliating utterances that disgraced it. 
 The virus of slavery had so poisoned the public mind and 
 heart that the sentiments and feelings of the large body of the 
 citizens of Boston were more nearly expressed by the brutal 
 harangue of Austin than by the classic words of Channing or 
 the fervid and indignant eloquence of Phillips. They still 
 believed, with Hubbard Winslow, a Congregational clergyman 
 of that city, who, within a month, in his Thanksgiving dis 
 course, asserted that " the unchristian principles and meas 
 ures " of the Abolitionists tended to fill the land " with vio 
 lence and blood " ; and that the mournful disaster at Alton 
 was but their legitimate result. They accepted, too, his strange 
 and subversive doctrine that " republican liberty is not the lib 
 erty to say and do what one pleases ; but liberty to say and do 
 what the prevailing voice and will of the brotherhood will 
 allow and protect." 
 
 The executive committee of the American Antislavery So 
 ciety set apart the anniversary of the landing of the Pilgrims 
 for simultaneous meetings throughout the free States, to com 
 memorate the tragical death of Mr. Lovejoy. To this call the 
 Abolitionists very generally responded. Many meetings were 
 held in various portions of the country, and the essential bar 
 barism and cruelty of slavery were made to be more distinctly 
 seen and apprehended in the light of that bloody deed. As a 
 legitimate result large accessions were made to the ranks of 
 the pronounced and avowed Abolitionists. 
 
388 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 A special meeting of the Massachusetts Antislavery Society 
 was held in Boston. Amos A. Phelps gave a detailed state 
 ment of the tragic affair at Alton. William Lloyd Garrison 
 spoke briefly, but with his usual strong and severe denuncia 
 tion, not only of the mob, but of the cause which inspired it. 
 Orestes A. Brownson defended, with great vigor and force, 
 freedom of thought, of speech, and of the press. Of the mar 
 tyred dead Mr. Phillips spoke eloquently. He referred mourn 
 fully to the alleged fact that the rioters at Alton were heard 
 encouraging each other with references to " old Boston." He 
 characterized, with becoming indignation, her humiliation 
 when her name was made " the motto and war-cry of the 
 mob." 
 
 Edmund Quincy, like Mr. Phillips, was then a young Boston 
 lawyer. He had become somewhat interested in the discus 
 sions upon slavery, but as yet had not fully committed himself 
 to the antislavery cause. But this event solved all doubts, 
 removed all hesitations, and fixed his determination. He 
 came to that meeting to lay, as an offering, his talents and 
 social position upon the altar of an unpopular cause, dripping 
 with the first fresh blood of martyrdom. In this his first 
 antislavery speech he eloquently enunciated and vindicated the 
 fundamental principles of the conflict, and referred, with much 
 beauty and pathos, to " the sublime idea that throughout the 
 vast extent of the free portions of this continent the sons and 
 daughters of New England are gathered together, on this the 
 birthday of their common mother, to pay due honor to the 
 memory of a brother who has willingly laid down his life in 
 defence of those principles of liberty to which she owed her 
 birth." His labors, then commenced, continued with unabated 
 activity until, by the adoption of the Thirteenth Amendment, 
 slavery disappeared ; when, with Mr. Garrison, he retired from 
 an organization which that great consummation seemed to them 
 to render no longer necessary. Mr. Quincy had not the melliflu 
 ous, brilliant, and impressive eloquence of Mr. Phillips ; but he 
 brought to the conflict unrivalled wit, a polished and trenchant 
 pen that had few equals. By voice and pen he rendered effec 
 tive service to the antislavery cause, though often more cans- 
 
THE ALTON TRAGEDY, MURDER OF ELIJAH P. LOVEJOY. 389 
 
 tic than charitable toward an opponent, and sometimes appar 
 ently more anxious to make a point than to do strict justice, 
 even to a co-laborer. He presented, too, with great clearness, 
 the views of that class of reformers with whom he acted, and 
 was among the ablest exponents of that type of abolitionism 
 of which Mr. Garrison was the recognized leader. His re 
 ports, while secretary of the Antislavery Society, were models 
 of patient and exhaustive research, of keen and brilliant rhet 
 oric. Nor can they now be read without vivid impressions of 
 the desperate nature of the disease which was then afflicting, 
 disgracing, and endangering the nation, and clear conceptions 
 of the remedies he and those he represented were endeavoring 
 to apply to its cure. 
 
 While the great body of the Abolitionists and friends of free 
 discussion thus honored the self-sacrificing and martyr spirit 
 of Mr. Lovejoy, and justified his heroic defence of sacred 
 rights assailed by armed ruffianism, there were a few among 
 them who did not applaud, but rather condemned, his course. 
 Especially was this true of a section of that small, active, but 
 rather pugnacious portion of the New England Abolitionists 
 who had adopted the extreme doctrine of non-resistance. 
 They, deeming Mr. Lovejoy's position inconsistent with their 
 own, not only questioned its wisdom, but even characterized 
 it as indefensible. Such manifestations, however, clearly re 
 vealed the impracticable tendencies of their views, and fore 
 shadowed not only the manifest harm and hindrance they 
 unquestionably occasioned to the antislavery labors of the 
 most of those who entertained them, but also the heavy bur 
 den they laid upon the cause itself. 
 
CHAPTER XXVIII. 
 
 CALHOUN'S KESOLUTIONS. ATHEKTON'S RESOLUTIONS. ASHBUR- 
 
 TON TREATY. 
 
 Calhoun's Resolutions. Smith's Amendment. Allen's Motion. Debate. 
 Atherton's Resolutions. Southern Whigs. Mr. Slade. Speech of Mr. 
 Clay. Speech of Mr. Morris. Resolutions of Vermont. Meeting of the 
 XXVIth Congress. Mr. Wise's Resolutions. Mr. Thompson's Resolutions. 
 Menace of Cooper. Mr. Botts. Motion of Mr. Adams. Amendment of 
 William Cost Johnson. Feeling of the South. Letter of the World's Con 
 vention to Southern Governors. Quintuple Treaty. Protest of General 
 Cass. Ashburton Treaty. Debate in the Senate. The Treaty sustained. 
 
 THE zeal and activity of the early Abolitionists, the evident 
 impression they at first made upon the public conscience and 
 reason, the rapidly increasing indications manifested by the 
 press, State legislatures, and even by Congress, that antislavery 
 ideas were spreading and gaining a stronger hold upon the 
 popular mind and heart, gave no little concern to the cham 
 pions of the Slave Power. Their unsuccessful attempts to 
 secure penal enactments from Northern legislatures for the re 
 pression of free discussion, and organized efforts in behalf of 
 emancipation, and the failure of riots and mobs to awe or subdue 
 the rising spirit of liberty, impelled them to renewed activity 
 at Washington to secure, if possible, the enunciation of prin 
 ciples and the adoption of measures by the general govern 
 ment which they had failed to extort from the State legisla 
 tures. 
 
 Animated by this purpose, Mr. Calhoun, the ever-watchful 
 advocate and guardian of slavery, was quick to detect the ap 
 parent drift of things and scent the danger from afar. With 
 a mind of extraordinary acuteness, he drew conclusions from 
 premises however furnished, whether by the principles of his 
 own false philosophy, the concessions of the Constitution, or 
 
CALHOUN'S RESOLUTIONS. 391 
 
 these popular demonstrations of the Northern States ; and, at 
 the same time, exhibited the spectacle of a strong and down 
 right man, profoundly in the wrong, seeking boldly and with 
 out equivocation, on the arena of debate and legislation, ends 
 others were pursuing by menace, violence, or indirection. 
 
 In December, 1837, he introduced a series of resolutions 
 defining the relative powers of the general and State gov 
 ernments upon slavery. The first four referred to slavery in 
 the States, and the fifth referred to it in the Territories and 
 the District of Columbia. The latter emphatically declared 
 that the intermeddling of any State or any of its citizens to 
 abolish slavery in the District, or in any of the Territories, on 
 the ground or under the pretext that it was " immoral or sin 
 ful," would be a " direct and dangerous attack on the institu 
 tions of all the slaveholding States." The resolutions did not 
 deny the power of Congress to abolish slavery in the District, 
 or any of the Territories ; but simply denounced its exercise. 
 Even Mr. Calhoun himself at that time did not defend or hold 
 the dogma that Congress had no power to abolish slavery in 
 the District of Columbia or in the Territories. 
 
 Early in January, 1838, the Senate proceeded to the consid 
 eration of these resolutions. As ever, the North furnished its 
 quota of recreants who, not content with withholding their sup 
 port from its interests, fought actively and openly against them. 
 
 Mr. Norvell of Michigan desired to amend the first resolu 
 tion, and proceeded to denounce the Abolitionists. He as 
 serted that, under the pretext of its being a religious duty to 
 extirpate slavery, " the incendiary leaders of abolitionism, in 
 their fanatical exertions, will throw back for fifty years every 
 hope of emancipation. Their humanity only rivets the chains 
 of slavery still tighter." 
 
 To the proposed modifications of the resolutions Mr. Cal 
 houn assented, as he was willing to make any concession to the 
 opponents of the doctrines of abolitionism. Mr. Hubbard of 
 New Hampshire hastened to declare that the adoption of Mr. 
 Calhoun' s resolution would tend to allay the spirit of aboli 
 tionism in the North. 
 
 On the other hand, it was moved by Mr. Smith of Indiana 
 
392 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 to amend the resolutions so that nothing contained in them 
 should be construed as expressing an opinion adverse to the 
 sentiment that all men are created equal, to the freedom of 
 speech and the press, and to the preservation of the Union. 
 Referring to the remarks made relative to the punishment of 
 Abolitionists, Mr. Morris of Ohio said he considered such avowals 
 as subversive of all freedom and inimical to the institutions of 
 the country. All men had an imprescriptible right, above all 
 government, to freedom of speech and the right of petition. 
 " I feel bound," he said, " to defend the rights of freedom of 
 opinion, freedom of thought, freedom of speech, and freedom 
 of the press, to the latest breath I may draw." 
 
 Mr. Wall of New Jersey questioned the right of the Senate 
 to sit making creeds and drawing up abstract constitutional 
 codes for the people ; but Mr. .Young of Illinois advocated the 
 resolutions as they were, and comforted Mr. Calhoun with the 
 assertion that in his State they set down as Abolitionists all 
 who signed an abolition memorial. It was then proclaimed 
 by Mr. Lumpkin -of Georgia, that, if the wisdom of their friends 
 in the non-slaveholding States could not devise ways to stay 
 the fury of the Abolitionists, the slaveholding States must 
 execute their laws, and punish the Abolitionists in the most 
 exemplary manner. 
 
 The Senate, on motion of Mr. Allen of Ohio, modified Mr. 
 Smith's amendment so as to declare that nothing in the reso 
 lutions was intended to recognize the right of Congress to im 
 pair the freedom of speech within the States. Mr. Smith fur 
 ther opposed the resolutions, saying he would extend to the 
 South the full force of their constitutional guaranties in the 
 protection of their domestic institutions as they were. He 
 wished the senators representing that interest to understand 
 distinctly that he would " cavil on the ninth part of a hair on 
 any question going to extend the principles or boundary of 
 slavery one inch." Mr. Benton thought the resolutions should 
 be referred to a select committee, to report at a future day. 
 Mr. Calhoun objected to that suggestion, saying that they were 
 reposing on a volcano ; and that his resolutions presented the 
 only ground on which the country could stand. " The assaults 
 
CALHOUN'S RESOLUTIONS. 393 
 
 daily made," he said, " on the institutions of nearly one half 
 of the States of the Union by the other will and must, if con 
 tinued, make two people of one by destroying every sympathy 
 between the two great sections." 
 
 It was proposed by Mr. Preston of South Carolina to discard 
 the words " immoral and sinful " ; but Mr. Calhoun would not 
 consent to do so, declaring abolitionism to be " nothing else 
 than religious fanaticism." " The Abolitionists," he said, " as 
 sail slavery because it is wicked and sinful, and I wish to meet 
 them distinctly on that point." Mr. Buchanan was in favor of 
 referring the resolutions to a select committee. He, too, de 
 clared that the Abolitionists had postponed the cause of eman 
 cipation in three or four of the States for half a century. He 
 opposed emancipation in the District, and said if it were free 
 it would become a city of refuge to the Abolitionists a secure 
 asylum, where they could scatter " arrows, firebrands, and 
 death." 
 
 Mr. Davis of Massachusetts remarked that the worst that 
 could be said of the Abolitionists by their bitterest enemies is 
 what is actually said : that they are deluded, misguided philan 
 thropists, fanatics, heated with an unbecoming zeal. Oppro 
 brious epithets had been applied to them ; but no one affirmed 
 that they aimed at disunion, or imputed to them corrupt pur 
 poses. He said the slave interest held the destinies of the 
 Republic in its hands ; that it ruled, guided, and adapted pub 
 lic policy to its own views. Mr. Niles of Connecticut affirmed, 
 if the abolition party should prevail, and abolition principles 
 should triumph, there would follow reproaches, criminations 
 and recriminations, agitation, alarm, and confusion, and real 
 or supposed aggressions would be offered and repelled; but 
 the Union would stand. 
 
 Mr. Bayard of Delaware thought he saw disunion in the 
 resolutions, and he moved to strike out " the several States," 
 and insert " the people of the United States." Mr. Pierce 
 of New Hampshire said there were indications in New Eng 
 land of a change of public sentiment, and he feared the 
 elements of still greater changes were in active operation. 
 The Abolitionists proper were not gaming ground ; but politics 
 
 50 
 
394 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 were beginning to mingle with that question. The Abolition 
 ists were making it a test ; and he saw with profound regret, 
 that individuals of both parties were submitting to their cate 
 chism. Mr. Crittenden pronounced the resolutions " vague 
 and general abstractions, more calculated to produce agitation 
 than to do good." 
 
 Mr. Clay had little confidence in the healing virtues of the 
 resolutions. They had been offered to revive and rally the 
 States Rights party; but he thought the slaveholding States 
 ought not to place their interests in the exclusive keeping 
 of any one party. He submitted a series of resolutions as 
 an amendment. So much of Mr. Clay's resolutions as re 
 ferred to the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia 
 was adopted, in lieu of Mr. Calhoun's. They did not deny 
 the constitutional power of Congress to abolish slavery in 
 the District, or prohibit it in the Territories, but based all 
 opposition thereto on the expediency of such legislation at 
 that time. It was during this debate, which excited at that 
 time little attention, but the importance of which was afterward 
 seen, that Mr. Calhoun admitted that he had been, in 1820, in 
 favor of the Missouri Compromise, and had censured Mr. Ran 
 dolph for his opposition. But he had been taught his error, 
 he said, and he took pleasure in acknowledging it. 
 
 Although the domestic slave-trade was actively prosecuted 
 in the District of Columbia, and scenes continued to be enacted 
 there dishonoring a Christian people and outraging alike their 
 sense of justice and their national pride, still the inexorable 
 Slave Power persistently demanded that their prayers should 
 remain unheeded, and that the voices of their representatives 
 should not be heard. 
 
 The second session of the XXYth Congress commenced in 
 December, 1838. A caucus of the Democratic party was im 
 mediately held to decide the course to be pursued upon the 
 vexed and threatening question. Resolutions were drawn up, 
 and Mr. Atherton of New Hampshire was selected to present 
 them to the House. Being presented, the previous question 
 on their adoption was ordered. A separate vote on each reso 
 lution being ordered, the first, declaring that Congress had no 
 
ATHERTON'S RESOLUTIONS. 
 
 395 
 
 power over slavery in the States, was adopted by a vote of one 
 hundred and ninety-four to six. In this small minority was 
 Mr. Adams, who held that in case of war the government 
 would have power to abolish slavery, in order that the nation 
 might be saved ; a doctrine abundantly verified and illustrated 
 by recent events. 
 
 The second resolution, declaring that petitions for the aboli 
 tion of slavery in the District were intended indirectly to 
 destroy it in the States, was agreed to. The last resolution, 
 requiring that " every petition, memorial, resolution, proposi 
 tion, or paper touching or relating, in any way, or to any 
 extent whatever, to slavery or the abolition thereof, shall, on 
 presentation, without any further action thereon, be laid upon 
 the table, without being debated, printed, or referred," was 
 adopted by a vote of one hundred and thirty-six to seventy- 
 three. This resolution was known as the " Atherton gag " ; 
 though it was suspected that the New Hampshire senator was 
 but the hand, while Mr. Calhoun was the brain. 
 
 The members who had voted against this suppression of the 
 freedom of debate and the right of petition being nearly all 
 of them Northern Whigs, their action enabled the Southern 
 Democrats to question the fidelity of the Southern Whigs to 
 slavery. Consequently, many Southern Whigs were anxious 
 to have it appear that they were more devoted to that interest 
 than their Democratic rivals. Henry A. Wise, then in full 
 fellowship with the Whig party, made most earnest efforts to 
 reassure its Southern wing of the fidelity of the national party. 
 Among other extreme propositions made by him were those 
 declaring that petitions for the abolition of slavery in the Dis 
 trict or in the Territories " were in violation of the Federal 
 Constitution " ; and that slaveholding citizens had the right to 
 take their slaves voluntarily to and through non-slaveholding 
 States, and to " sojourn and remain with them temporarily in 
 any of the States." An unsuccessful effort was made by Mr. 
 Slade of Vermont to introduce a series of resolutions rescind 
 ing a portion of those introduced by Mr. Atherton. 
 
 During this session, a Maryland slaveholder, mounted on 
 horseback, armed with pistols, and bearing the plantation 
 
396 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 whip, marched by the Capitol about thirty men, in double 
 files, each fastened by the wrist to a long chain passing be 
 tween them from front to rear. Several women followed in 
 the same order, but without the chain. This sad and mourn 
 ful procession, illustrating the revolting barbarism of the slave 
 traffic in the nation's capital, was shielded by the Democratic 
 party and the Southern Whigs, not only from unfriendly legis 
 lation, but also from the criticisms of the humane and the 
 just. Mr. Slade submitted a resolution, reciting the facts of 
 the disgraceful spectacle, and proposing a committee to report 
 what legislation might be necessary to prevent the recurrence 
 of such scenes. But the Speaker promptly decided that the 
 resolution came within the restrictions of the " Atherton gag." 
 While a scene of this character could not be discussed or even 
 inquired into, a petition of the mayor of Washington and 
 other individuals against the reception of antislavery petitions 
 was presented by Mr. Moore of New York, a representative of 
 what was then called the " subterranean Democracy," and he 
 was permitted to speak at length in denunciation of the Whigs 
 as Abolitionists. He characterized the Whig party as the 
 Federal party ; saying that it had joined the Abolitionists for 
 the purpose of conferring on the black laborer nominal free 
 dom, and on the white laborer virtual bondage. 
 
 Early in 1839 Mr. Clay presented petitions from citizens of 
 the District of Columbia, praying Congress to suppress all 
 agitation in that body touching slavery and the slave-trade in 
 the District. Appealing to the Searcher of all hearts that 
 every pulsation of his heart beat high in the cause of civil 
 liberty, Mr. Clay denied that Congress had the authority to 
 prohibit the removal of slaves from one slave State to an 
 other. He emphatically declared that " that is property which 
 the law declares to be property," that " two hundred years 
 of legislation have sanctioned and sanctified negro slaves 
 as property." Mr. Clay was the acknowledged leader of 
 the Whig party, an aspirant for the presidency, with hosts 
 of devoted friends anxious for his elevation to that exalted 
 position. During the first years of his political life he had 
 been in favor of making Kentucky a free State ; and though 
 
 
RESOLUTIONS OF THE VERMONT LEGISLATURE. 397 
 
 he had rendered great service to the slaveholding class, it was 
 thought by ardent friends that these early views and his broad 
 and national spirit would be a source of weakness in the then 
 excited state of Southern sentiment and feeling. Whether 
 Mr. Clay acted from his own impulses or by the advice of 
 friends in throwing the weight of his acknowledged influence 
 into the scale in favor of slavery and the Slave Power, he not 
 only did wrong, but he clearly committed a great political 
 blunder. His speech, highly complimented by Mr. Calhoun, 
 gave great offence io antislavery men, and was deeply regret 
 ted by the Quakers and thousands of the Whig party, in whose 
 bosoms still lingered the hope, even in those days of its su 
 premacy, that the Slave Power would yet be broken and its 
 paralyzing and perilous influence pass away. 
 
 Two days afterward, Mr. Morris, a Democratic senator from 
 Ohio, on presenting memorials against slavery and the slave- 
 trade, defended the Abolitionists from the criticisms of Mr. 
 Clay, and denounced the treatment their petitions for the exer 
 cise of a clear constitutional power had received in the Senate. 
 He made an elaborate speech, closing with the declaration that 
 " the negro will yet be set free." He reminded the Senate 
 that he had been condemned at home for his opposition to 
 slavery ; but he hoped, on returning to that home, to join his 
 friends in rekindling the beacon-fires of liberty on every hill. 
 
 In the same body Mr. Prentiss of Vermont presented the 
 resolutions of the legislature of that State in favor of abolish 
 ing slavery and the slave-trade in the District of Columbia and 
 in the Territories ; and also in opposition to the annexation 
 of Texas. On making the usual motion to print them, Mr. 
 Calhoun declared his astonishment that the people of Vermont 
 did not see that their action struck at the very foundation of 
 the Union. Other senators assailing the action of the State, 
 the Senate, on the motion of Mr. Lumpkin of Georgia, laid 
 the motion to print the resolutions on the table ; and this 
 insult was designedly offered to Vermont for her early and 
 unequivocal declarations for freedom. 
 
 The XXVIth Congress met in December, 1839. The organ 
 ization of the House was delayed for several days, but was at 
 
398 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 length effected by the election of Robert M. T. Hunter of Vir 
 ginia for Speaker. He was a follower of Mr. Calhoun, though 
 elected by the Whig party. On the 30th of December Mr. 
 Wise introduced a resolution declaring that any petition for 
 the abolition of slavery should be considered as objected to, 
 and the question of its reception should be laid upon the table 
 without debate. The motion to suspend the rules to receive 
 the resolution failing, notice was given by Mr. Wise that he 
 should object to the reception of petitions, and move to lay 
 the question of reception on the table. Mr. Rice Garland of 
 Louisiana moved to suspend the rules, to allow him to present 
 resolutions declaring that the abolition of slavery in the Dis 
 trict would be a. violation of the plighted faith of the nation, 
 and that abolition petitions should not be considered ; but his 
 motion was not sustained by the House. Mr. Wise the next 
 day made another unavailing eifort to introduce his resolutions, 
 and like efforts were made by other members, but without 
 success. 
 
 In January, 1840, Mr. Thompson of South Carolina intro 
 duced a resolution that all papers touching slavery should be 
 laid on the table without being read or debated. He closed his 
 speech in its behalf by moving the previous question. Francis 
 Granger of New York expressed his admiration of the chivalry 
 of the gentleman who would thus cut off all reply. The mo 
 tion for the previous question being withdrawn, Mr. Granger 
 vindicated the right of petition, and warned Southern mem 
 bers that, if they continued to deny that right, they would find 
 enlisted under the banner of abolitionism gallant spirits of 
 the North, who would never yield. Mr. Gentry of Tennessee 
 said he would vote against Mr. Thompson's resolution, and for 
 the resolution of Mr. Chinn of Louisiana for a select commit 
 tee. The next day, Mr. Cooper of Georgia said that his State 
 would act for herself, and resort to measures within her own 
 power to put an end to abolition petitions. Mr. Botts of Vir 
 ginia, a new member and a Whig of enlarged and national 
 views, advocated the reception and reference of abolition peti 
 tions. Mr. Slade defined and vindicated the principles of the 
 opponents of slavery ; and Mr. Butler of South Carolina ex- 
 
LETTER OF THE WORLD'S CONVENTION. 399 
 
 pressed the belief that slavery was defensible from Scripture, 
 and that it was a blessing. 
 
 It was then moved by Mr. Adams, as an amendment of the 
 twenty-first rule of the House, that every petition presented be 
 received, unless objection to it be made for a special reason ; 
 and that, whenever objection should be made, the name of the 
 member making it and the reasons therefor be entered on the 
 journal, so that the question would then be : " Shall the peti 
 tion be rejected ? " Mr. Adams spoke earnestly in favor of 
 the reception of the antislavery petitions, although he did not 
 believe, he said, that there were ten members who would vote 
 for the abolition of slavery in the District. He declared that 
 he was not himself prepared to vote for it, and had so stated 
 at a previous session. The debate was continued several days, 
 when William Cost Johnson, a Whig member from Maryland, 
 moved to amend Mr. Adams's amendment, so that no paper 
 praying for the abolition of slavery in the District, or in the 
 Territories, or for the inhibition of the slave-trade, should be 
 entertained by the House in any way whatever. This was 
 agreed to, and the amendment as then amended was adopted. 
 
 The general unrest and excitement of the Southern mind at 
 this time were increased by other causes than the proceedings 
 of Northern agitators. The course of England had largely 
 contributed to this result. Her West India emancipation, her 
 refusal to pay for slaves who had found refuge in some of her 
 ports, the activity of her abolition societies and presses, and 
 their outspoken sympathy with those of this country, the un 
 reserved admission by some of her leading statesmen of their 
 desire for universal abolition, excited Southern fears and in 
 dignation. 
 
 These feelings were intensified by the reception in 1840 
 of a circular letter to the governors of the slaveholding States 
 from the World's Convention, assembled in London for the 
 avowed purpose of promoting the universal abolition of slav 
 ery and the slave-trade. It was signed by the venerable 
 and illustrious Thomas Clarkson. Setting forth the evils of 
 slavery and the slave-trade, it expressed the conviction that 
 the only way to extinguish the former was to abolish the latter. 
 
400 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 It appealed to the governors of the slaveholding States " to 
 employ all that influence and power with which Divine Provi 
 dence had intrusted them to secure immediate liberty to the 
 slave." Recognizing the brotherhood of man, and the bind 
 ing obligations of Christianity, it addressed its appeals to the 
 reason, heart, and conscience. By request, Seth M. Gates, 
 then a member of the House of Representatives at Washing 
 ton, forwarded these circulars, under his own frank, to the 
 governors thus addressed. Governor Pennington of New 
 Jersey, Speaker of the House at the opening of the Rebellion, 
 to whom the circular had been sent, slavery not being then quite 
 extinct in his State, acknowledged, in a letter to Mr. Gates, 
 the importance of the principles therein enunciated, and ex 
 pressed his earnest desire that the country, at the earliest day, 
 should join hand in hand with the humane on the other side 
 of the water " in washing out the stain upon her national 
 character." 
 
 But the governors of the Southern States professed to be 
 greatly exasperated. Some of them made communications to 
 their legislatures, denouncing the circular as incendiary and 
 calculated to excite slaves to insurrection. Among those who 
 denounced the circular, and especially the action of Mr. Gates, 
 was James K. Polk, Governor of Tennessee, and four years 
 afterward elected President of the United States. He was ac 
 customed to carry the envelope with him at the hustings, and 
 to exhibit the frank of the " treasonable " member of Congress, 
 who was endeavoring, he averred, to excite slaves to insurrec 
 tion. He declared, too, that the contents 'of the circular were 
 too wicked to be read in public. For franking this circular 
 Mr. Gates was roundly denounced, and a reward of five hun 
 dred dollars was offered by a wealthy Georgia slaveholder 
 for his delivery at Savannah. Such were the feelings which 
 then swayed the Southern people, colored all their opinions, and 
 gave direction to all their conduct. This was specially mani 
 fest in the debates on the Quintuple and Ashburton treaties. 
 
 From the year 1806 England had sought the active co-opera 
 tion of the United States for the suppression of the slave-trade ; 
 but these efforts were unavailing. The American government 
 
THE ASHBURTON TREATY. 401 
 
 kept in the African waters only the inadequate force of two or 
 three small vessels. It also steadily refused to consent to any 
 arrangement for the right of mutual visitation and search ; 
 and the American flag, even by the acknowledgment of Mr. 
 Stevenson, minister to the Court of St. James, was prostituted 
 by the slave pirates of all nationalities to cover their nefarious 
 trade. 
 
 The leading European powers seeking the entire extirpation 
 of the infamous traffic, a treaty was formed on the 20th of 
 December, 1841, between Great Britain, Austria, France, Prus 
 sia, and Russia, for the complete suppression of the African 
 slave-trade. It was called the Quintuple Treaty. It provided 
 that certain cruisers belonging to those countries should be in 
 structed to visit and detain within certain specified limits mer 
 chant vessels of the other contracting parties, suspected of 
 being engaged in the unlawful commerce, and to co-operate 
 with each other for its complete suppression. This treaty ex 
 cited much interest in the United States, on whose government, 
 it was believed, the high contracting parties would exert their 
 moral power in an attempt to persuade it to join the effort. 
 
 But there was existing in this country a traditional distrust 
 of England and dislike of her policy in regard to the right of 
 search, which had been intensified by the war of 1812, and 
 in which the whole country largely shared. The slaveholders, 
 irritated, if not alarmed, by the position of England on the 
 question of slavery, shrewdly seized upon this American jeal 
 ousy as a potent agency in their attempts to defeat the treaty. 
 General Cass, then minister to France, protested, and prepared 
 a pamphlet against its ratification. Nor is there much doubt 
 that his influence and efforts aided the Anti-British party, which 
 was then large and active, in securing its defeat. 
 
 On the 9th of August, 1842, what is known as the Ashbur- 
 ton Treaty was signed at Washington. Among its provisions 
 was one that the United States should keep a force of eighty 
 guns, requiring about a thousand men, on the coast of Africa, 
 for the suppression of the slave-trade. This provision was 
 bitterly assailed in Congress, and strenuous efforts were made to 
 defeat it. Mr. Benton took the lead in this attempt, mingling 
 
 51 
 
402 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 argument, denunciation, and sarcasm in his opposition. He 
 spoke of it as madness and folly, "a roaming philanthropy " 
 that had taken the negroes of Africa for objects of protection. 
 He characterized the President's message accompanying the 
 treaty as " a mass of ambiguities and obscurities." The meas 
 ure, he said, appeared to be an American proposition, but he 
 denounced it as certainly a British proposition ; " it is certainly 
 a British proposition " that yokes America with England on 
 the coast of Africa. He afterward avowed his purpose to de 
 feat all appropriations for the African squadron ; for it was, he 
 said, a tribute in men, money, and ships to England for five 
 years' exemption from British search. The speech was a bitter 
 and malignant assault upon England, and little creditable to 
 its author either on the score of statesmanship or good feeling, 
 its insinuations having been proved to be unfounded, and its 
 prophecies remaining unfulfilled. 
 
 Mr. Buchanan also joined in the opposition, and if his de 
 nunciations were less extravagant, they were equally decided 
 and unequivocal. Concerning the article providing for a naval 
 force on the African coast, he complained that they were com 
 pelled to grope their way, and that " all was obscurity, all was 
 darkness." " Did the British government," he inquired, " de 
 mand this sacrifice at our hands ? Was it necessary to appease 
 the wounded pride of England at the disappointment she ex 
 perienced when France, our ancient and faithful ally, refused 
 to ratify the Quintuple Treaty and identified herself with us 
 in resisting the right of visitation and search ? " He said the 
 ratification of the treaty would be to ratify the unjust claim 
 of the British government to be " the supreme protector of 
 the rights of humanity." 
 
 The treaty was also bitterly assailed by Mr. Conrad of 
 Louisiana, afterward a member of Mr. Fillmore's cabinet, and 
 an actor in the slaveholders' rebellion. The executive com 
 mittee of the American Antislavery Society, fearing that one 
 of the provisions of the treaty would endanger the safety of 
 the colored people of Canada, many of whom were fugitives 
 from slavery, appointed a committee to wait upon Lord Ash- 
 burton to confer with him upon the subject. He assured them 
 
 

 THE ASHBURTON TREATY. 403 
 
 that he had taken every precaution in behalf of the people of 
 color ; and that, if he had been willing to introduce an arti 
 cle providing for the payment of escaping slaves, it would not 
 have been ratified at home, as his government was especially 
 solicitous to guard all such rights against infringement. Mr. 
 Conrad referred to this conference as evidence of a connection 
 between the Abolitionists of Great Britain and of this country. 
 Nor did he think that peace could be permanent so long as these 
 agitating questions remained unsettled. He thought, indeed, 
 that the forbearance of this government would increase the in 
 tolerance of Great Britain. " She will," he said, " unfurl the 
 banner of abolition still more conspicuously before the eyes of 
 your slaves ; she will accustom them to consider her as their 
 benefactor, the champion of their rights, the avenger of their 
 wrongs. And when war does come, as come it will, she may 
 then hope to realize her threat of being welcomed by them as 
 their deliverer, and her flag, when it appears, becoming the 
 signal of a servile insurrection." Other members of Congress 
 and a portion of the press joined in denouncing this provision 
 of the treaty as a surrender of American rights, an annual 
 tribute, " a prostration of the interests and rights of American 
 citizens, and a dishonor to the American name." The treaty, 
 however, notwithstanding this violent opposition, was ratified, 
 receiving the strong vote of thirty-nine to nine. 
 
 Nor was failure all. The men and presses who stood forth 
 so prominent and so violent in opposition gained little credit 
 by their factious course. Many saw their true character, but 
 none more fitly described them than Rufus Choate, who spoke 
 of them as " restless, selfish, reckless, ' the cankers of a calm 
 world and a long peace,' pining with thirst of notoriety, slaves 
 to their hatred of England, to whom the treaty is distasteful ; 
 to whom any treaty and all things but the glare and clamor, 
 the vain pomp and hollow circumstance, the toil and agony 
 and inadequate results of war, all but those would be distaste 
 ful and dreary." 
 
CHAPTER XXIX. 
 
 DISSENSION AMONG THE ABOLITIONISTS. DISRUPTION OF THE 
 AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 
 
 Increase of the Abolitionists. Dissensions. New York Abolitionists vote foi 
 Seward. Opposition of Mr. Goodell. New Party proposed by Mr. Smith. 
 
 Action of the Massachusetts Antislavery Society. Young Men's Antislav- 
 ery State Convention at Worcester. Resolution. Political Action. The 
 Woman Question. Pastoral Letter. New England Convention. Protest 
 of Mr. Torrey. Memorial to the Churches. Action of the Rhode Island 
 Consociation. Churches and Ministers. The Abolitionists. Controversy 
 between the Massachusetts and National Antislavery Societies. Opinion of 
 Mr. Birney. Sixth Anniversary. The Woman Question. New England 
 Antislavery Convention. Massachusetts Abolition Society. Address of the 
 Society. Bitter Controversy. Financial Action. Proposition to dissolve 
 the American Antislavery Society. Sale of the "Emancipator." Seventh 
 Anniversary of the American Antislavery Society. Rights of Woman con 
 ceded. Disruption. American and Foreign Antislavery Society organized. 
 
 Both Societies appeal to the Public. 
 
 THE imperious demands of the South, summoning the peo 
 ple of the North to surrender the moral right of discussing 
 slavery and the issues growing out of its existence ; the threats 
 to imbrue their hands in the blood of all Abolitionists who 
 should set their feet on Southern soil ; the violent denuncia 
 tions of Northern meetings, bringing upon antislavery men not 
 only words of sternest condemnation but acts of personal vio 
 lence ; the denial of the right of petition and of freedom of 
 debate in Congress, did not quench the zeal nor silence the 
 voice of the men who had consecrated themselves to the work 
 of emancipation. There was no faltering in their ranks. 
 These devoted men calmly and firmly met the issues imposed 
 upon them. They realized, as the storms of denunciation beat 
 upon their heads, that slavery was a crime never to be toler 
 ated in silence. 
 
DISSENSION AMONG THE ABOLITIONISTS. 405 
 
 In the third annual report of the American Antislavery So 
 ciety, in May, 1836, they proclaimed to the country that the 
 field before them was one of certain conquest. Admitting 
 that every inch of the way was to be fought through odium 
 and proscription, that they might suffer far more reproach 
 and violence than they had yet experienced, that even death 
 itself might come to them, they proclaimed the strength of 
 their cause to be in the blessing of that God who hath chosen 
 the weak things of this world to confound the mighty. 
 
 Nor were they less hopeful and confident at the fourth and 
 fifth anniversary meetings of the national society. Their fifth 
 annual report, of May, 1838, closes with the declaration that 
 in the prosecution of the cause of human liberty by truth and 
 brotherly love they could never tire nor doubt of success. 
 " Our victory," they say, " is no less sure than the laws of 
 seed-time and harvest ; and, though tears may mingle with the 
 seed which is now scattered amidst the frosts and snows of 
 retiring winter, the sheaves shall yet be brought home with 
 shouts of unmingled joy and the sunshine of unclouded 
 peace." 
 
 At this anniversary meeting Edmund Quincy proclaimed 
 their warfare to be no wild crusade, but a holy war, a sacred 
 strife ; waged not with arms forged by human hands or tem 
 pered in earthly fire, " but with weapons fresh from the armory 
 of God. In this contest the green hills of our land are 
 crowned with no mimic volcanoes, sending up from their sum 
 mits smoke and flame toward heaven, and pouring down their 
 slopes lava-streams of hideous death. The kingdom for which 
 we struggle and where we strive is an invisible kingdom, its 
 foundations are laid in the hearts and souls of men. It is an 
 empire whose limits reach beyond the flaming walls of the 
 universe, its heights reach up to heaven, its depths descend to 
 hell, its origin is derived from God, its destiny is infinite, its 
 duration eternal. And what are the weapons which we wield 
 in this heavenly conflict? Prayer, which takes heaven by 
 storm ; faith, which grasps the palm of victory ere the battle 
 is begun ; the Word of God, which makes straight the way to 
 triumph, which fills up the valleys and brings low the moun- 
 
406 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 tains which obstruct our march. Clothed in this panoply, let 
 us press onward to the rescue of our captive brethren, cheer 
 ful in the certainty of success, invincible in the justice of our 
 cause, strong in the presence of the Lord. And at last may 
 our voices help to swell the triumphant shout, bursting from 
 millions of hearts on earth, and answered from the battle 
 ments of heaven, which shall proclaim that the victory is won, 
 that the slave is free ! " 
 
 In these glowing expressions of trust in God, faith in moral 
 power, and confidence in a peaceful triumph, Mr. Quincy but 
 echoed the sentiments of the noble men and women assembled 
 at that anniversary, and of the leaders of the antislavery cause 
 throughout the land. Little did he or they foresee, when he 
 gave utterance to these hopes of a peaceful triumph for their 
 sacred cause, that the heart of the nation would be so hard 
 ened and its passions so inflamed by slavery, in its struggle for 
 dominion, that, a quarter of a century afterward, the green 
 hills of the land would be crowned by flaming batteries and 
 her fields drenched in the blood of embattled hosts, and that 
 the liberty of the slave would be proclaimed amid the darken 
 ing storms of civil war. 
 
 But in spite of the stern and relentless opposition encoun 
 tered by the Abolitionists, they increased in numbers, in 
 fluence, and power. In consequence, however, of that in 
 crease, diversities of opinion began to appear. These became 
 more and more marked and defined, dissensions arose, and 
 divisions speedily followed. 
 
 Nor were these dissensions and divisions a matter of sur 
 prise. When the New England Antislavery Society was organ 
 ized, its members united in declaring themselves in favor of 
 using all means sanctioned by law, humanity, and religion, to 
 effect the abolition of slavery. The National Antislavery So 
 ciety began its existence by proclaiming that the highest obli 
 gation rested upon Abolitionists to remove slavery by moral 
 and political action. Few in numbers, with their eyes intently 
 fixed on the crime and wrongs of slavery, and the pressing 
 necessity of immediate abolition, they were fora time united in 
 sentiment, feeling, and purpose. As their numbers increased 
 
DISSENSION AMONG THE ABOLITIONISTS. 407 
 
 and they began to consider the problem of emancipation as 
 a practical measure, more difficulties revealed themselves. 
 These difficulties, while they intensified feeling and inspired 
 zeal and courage, were little calculated to secure unity of 
 thought or harmony of action. Men who, under these un 
 toward circumstances, accepted the unpopular doctrine of 
 immediate abolition, and entered upon the self-sacrificing work 
 it imposed, were not generally the men to yield to the dictates 
 of committees or the decrees of conventions. The very ele 
 ments of character which made them reformers rendered them 
 positive, sometimes dogmatic and impracticable. Generally 
 with strong conscientious convictions, marked individuality, 
 and not infrequent idiosyncrasies of character, they did not 
 always wisely discriminate between the essentials and non- 
 essentials of the conflict. Some looked chiefly to moral, 
 others to political action ; some to ecclesiastical, and others to 
 governmental agencies. Meeting opposition where they had 
 too confidently anticipated aid, some left churches and par 
 ties, and strove to found those of a purer and more legitimate 
 character ; while others disowned them altogether, adopting 
 loose and disorganizing opinions concerning all governments 
 and ecclesiastical institutions. Others still a few, indeed 
 entertained the wildest vagaries and the most fantastic no 
 tions, and burdened the cause by giving occasion to those who 
 were glad to find it an opportunity to associate their extrava 
 gances with the true issue. 
 
 Many things conspired to develop these dissensions and dif 
 ferences, which began to manifest themselves in 1838 with 
 painful distinctness. Chief among these was the question of 
 exercising the right of suffrage. In the annual report of the 
 American Antislavery Society for that year, signed by James 
 G. Birney, Elizur Wright, Jr., and Henry B. Stan ton, corre 
 sponding secretaries, the declaration was made that Abolition 
 ists should inquire into the sentiments of candidates for office, 
 and that he was unworthy the name of an Abolitionist who 
 did not put the antislavery qualification above all others in 
 selecting candidates to receive his vote. This duty was em 
 phatically declared to be vital to the cause. In the autumn of 
 
408 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the same year, many Abolitionists in Central and Western 
 New York gave their votes for William H. Seward for gover 
 nor. These antislavery men had been trained in the Whig 
 party. They were not ignorant of Mr. Seward's real feelings 
 and sentiments, although his answers to their questionings had 
 not been on all points satisfactory. Entertaining the idea that 
 his election over Governor Marcy, whose adverse opinions had 
 been clearly pronounced and unequivocal, and whose action 
 had been exceedingly offensive, would contribute largely, as it 
 certainly did, to the development of opposition to the Slave 
 Power, they cast their suffrages for him. But this action was 
 deeply regretted by many Abolitionists, and stoutly opposed 
 by some of the leading antislavery men in that section, espe 
 cially by William Goodell, editor of the " Friend of Man," at 
 Utica, and by Gerrit Smith. 
 
 Not a little discouraged by this demonstration, Mr. Smith 
 proposed a new antislavery organization, whose constitution 
 and laws should require antislavery men not to vote for those 
 men who refuse to avow their belief in the duty of immediate 
 deliverance from the yoke of slavery. He thought that, if 
 such an organization was formed, the old antislavery societies, 
 like the wine-tolerating temperance societies, would speedily 
 fall, and that it would be understood that a member of an 
 antislavery society would, under no circumstances, " vote for a 
 slaveholder, or a slaveholder's apologist." He thought, too, 
 that members of the new society, unlike the old ones, would 
 act in concert with each other. These suggestions were ac 
 cepted by many who saw that the antislavery cause demanded 
 political action, and who were dissatisfied with the existing 
 society. 
 
 But the great body of Abolitionists regretted and resisted 
 that movement. The Massachusetts Antislavery Society de 
 nied the competency of any antislavery organization, either by 
 its votes or through its organs, to arraign the political or re 
 ligious views of its members. It denied their right to insist 
 that it was the duty of any Abolitionist to go to the ballot-box 
 or unite with any church. It admitted that there were con 
 flicting opinions entertained by Abolitionists on these points, 
 
DISSENSION AMONG THE ABOLITIONISTS.. 409 
 
 but strenuously maintained that " all that a society or its organs 
 may rightfully do is to entreat its members to abide by their 
 principles, whether in the church or out of it, at the polls or 
 elsewhere ; to vote for no man who is not in favor of immedi 
 ate emancipation ; to listen to no preacher who apologizes for 
 slavery." Believing that such an organization would present 
 no new motive for action, and advance no new principles ; that 
 it would wear a political, rather than a moral aspect ; and that 
 existing antislavery societies were slowly but surely effecting 
 great and salutary changes both in Church and State, it 
 announced its opposition to the adoption " of a doubtful and 
 untried experiment." 
 
 Early in October of that year, while this division of senti 
 ment and action was in progress in Central and Western New 
 York, a Young Men's Antislavery Convention, consisting of 
 more than four hundred delegates, met in the city of Worces 
 ter, Massachusetts. The convention was called to order by 
 Oliver Johnson, and was presided over by George T. Davis, 
 then a young lawyer and rising politician of Franklin County, 
 who early accepted antislavery sentiments, but whose adher 
 ence did not long withstand the claims of his political associa 
 tions. This body, of which nearly all the leading Abolitionists 
 were members, adopted a series of resolutions drawn by Wil 
 liam Goodell. It unanimously declared by a rising vote that 
 by the grace of God no motive of political expediency or par 
 tisan interest, of personal friendship or any other considera 
 tion, should tempt them to vote for slavery by voting for a 
 member of the national or State legislatures who would not go 
 to the utmost verge of constitutional power for its abolition. 
 This body pledged all who held it proper in any case to exer 
 cise the right of suffrage never to neglect any opportunity to 
 record their vote against slavery. This decided action of the 
 Worcester convention, the action in Western New York, the 
 proposition of Gerrit Smith for the reorganization of antislav 
 ery societies, and the address of the Massachusetts Antislavery 
 Society revealed the unquestionable fact that the largest por 
 tion of the Abolitionists believed in political action in some 
 form. 
 
 52 
 
410 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Nevertheless, a small but active portion of the Abolitionists, 
 mostly in New England, more or less tinctured with the non- 
 resistant theories, were opposed to the exercise of the right of 
 suffrage. Abjuring all resort to force, on which governments 
 necessarily rest, they, by logical sequence, declined the use of 
 the ballot. Though undoubtedly conscientious in their course, 
 they not only yielded up an element of power, potent in a gov 
 ernment resting on the will and votes of the people, which 
 they had no right to relinquish, but by so doing they weakened 
 their own effective influence upon the people, however truthful, 
 earnest, and vivid were their delineations of slavery and their 
 arraignments of the Slave Power. 
 
 Another question on which the Abolitionists divided was 
 what is familiarly called the " woman question." Women 
 early espoused the antislavery cause. They were not at first 
 either officers or members of the national or State societies ; 
 but, organizing associations of their own, they entered upon 
 their work with zeal and effectiveness. Several ladies who had 
 spoken at meetings of their own sex with much acceptance, 
 afterward addressed promiscuous assemblies. Some earnest 
 antislavery men, however, doubted its propriety ; while pro- 
 slavery individuals and presses condemned it. This voice of 
 remonstrance found expressive utterance in the Pastoral Let 
 ter of the Massachusetts Association of Congregational Minis 
 ters, in the year 1837. In this letter very special mention was 
 made of the Misses Grimke', Quaker ladies from South Caro 
 lina, who had been slaveholders, had emancipated their slaves, 
 and, having warmly espoused the cause of emancipation, were 
 addressing delighted auditories in the Northern States. 
 
 At the annual meeting of the New England Antislavery Con 
 vention in 1838, which was attended by delegates from eleven 
 States, it was voted that all persons present, whether men or 
 women, who agreed with the convention on the subject of slav 
 ery should be invited to become members, and participate in its 
 proceedings. A motion to rescind this vote, after a long and 
 animated discussion, failed by a large majority. Eight clergy 
 men immediately arose and desired that their names should be 
 stricken from the roll of the convention. A protest was drawn 
 
DISSENSION AMONG THE ABOLITIONISTS. 411 
 
 up and signed by Charles T. Torrey, Amos A. Phelps, and five 
 others, against this action of the convention. They pronounced 
 it injurious to the cause of the slave, by connecting with it a 
 subject foreign to it ; by establishing the precedent of connect 
 ing with it other and irrelevant topics ; and by being an inno 
 vation on former usages. They therefore disclaimed all re 
 sponsibility for it. This decision of the convention excited 
 much interest and caused no little ill feeling. 
 
 Three persons were appointed by the convention one of 
 them Miss Abby Kelley, a member of the Society of Friends 
 as a committee to prepare a memorial to the ecclesiastical 
 associations of New England, beseeching them to testify against 
 the slave system. This memorial was drawn with great care, 
 was respectful in form, and in no way infringed upon the rights 
 and privileges of any ecclesiastical association. It earnestly 
 called upon the ecclesiastical bodies of New England in the 
 name of God to remember them in bonds as bound with them, 
 and entreated them to act as the great interests of humanity 
 and Christ's kingdom demanded. 
 
 When this memorial was presented to the Rhode Island 
 Congregational Consociation, and it became known that a 
 woman was a member of the committee that drafted it, a scene 
 of intense excitement arose. Members hastened to quote 
 Scripture against this action of women ; others, who were will 
 ing at first to receive the memorial and act upon it, on learn 
 ing that a woman was upon the committee that drafted it, 
 "united," said the editor of the " Christian Mirror," who was 
 present, " at once in turning the illegitimate product from the 
 house, and in obliterating from the record all traces of its 
 entrance/' 
 
 This action of an association of New England clergymen 
 seems, in the light of subsequent events and change of public 
 sentiment, narrow and bigoted, trivial and weak. But there 
 can be no question that this controversy in the antislavery 
 ranks influenced to a considerable extent a large number of 
 clergymen. The " Emancipator," the organ of the American 
 Antislavery Society, referring to the fact that a few months 
 previous it seemed as if the mass of the clergy were ready to 
 
412 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 drop their hostility to the antislavery cause and come in to its 
 support, expressed the fear that many of the ministers of the 
 gospel were " settling down into a fixed hatred of the princi 
 ples of liberty, and fixed determination, at any hazard, to 
 maintain the lawfulness of slavery, and the criminality of 
 efforts for its removal. They are evincing a readiness to 
 abandon any principle, to impugn any doctrine, to violate any 
 obligation, to outrage any feeling, to sacrifice any interest, here 
 tofore held dear or sacred, if it be found to afford countenance 
 or strength to antislavery." 
 
 The " Liberator " had been established by Mr. Garrison, was 
 under his exclusive control, and, of course, expressed his views. 
 In the exercise of his prerogative he uttered and admitted sen 
 timents to which a large number of Abolitionists did not sub 
 scribe. While he did not claim that these views were any part 
 of the antislavery creed, and did not insist that antislavery 
 men should accept them as such, still the public mind did, 
 more or less, associate the sentiments enunciated in his journal 
 with the cause of abolition. Many antislavery men, too, deem 
 ing them injurious not only to interests they regarded impor 
 tant and sacred, but also to the cause itself, desired the estab 
 lishment of a new journal. The " Abolitionist," under the 
 editorial charge of Elizur Wright, Jr., was therefore established, 
 in the spring of 1839, in the city of Boston. 
 
 A controversy had arisen between the managers of the 
 American and Massachusetts antislavery societies. Owing to 
 the financial distress of the country, the failure of the Tap- 
 pans, who had been large contributors themselves, and who 
 had been greatly instrumental in securing contributions from 
 others, and the growing distrust, dissensions, and divisions 
 among Abolitionists, the receipts of the national and associate 
 societies did not keep pace with their necessities. Objection 
 was made by the State associations to the sen ding of collecting 
 agents into their respective limits by the national society. An 
 arrangement had been entered into between the national and 
 Massachusetts societies by which ten thousand dollars were to 
 be paid into the treasury of the former by the latter. The 
 Massachusetts Society, however, failed to redeem its pledge. 
 
DISRUPTION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 413 
 
 This failure intensified somewhat the feeling of distrust which 
 had already unfortunately begun to manifest itself. The ex 
 ecutive committee at New York notified the Massachusetts 
 Society that it should send collecting agents into that State. 
 This decision excited much feeling, and Mr. Chapman, the 
 treasurer of the State society, was sent to protest against that 
 action, and secure, if possible, some amicable arrangement. 
 
 At the quarterly meeting, held in March, 1837, the action 
 of the board of managers was triumphantly sustained. Mr. 
 Birney, Lewis Tappan, and Mr. Stan ton were present and vin 
 dicated the action of the national committee. An excited and 
 somewhat angry debate arose. Mr. Birney declared with em 
 phasis, that, " if one whose conscientious scruples led him to 
 repudiate the elective franchise were to consult him about join 
 ing the American Antislavery Society, he should be bound to 
 tell him he had not the qualifications prescribed by the consti 
 tution, and, therefore, ought not to subscribe." This declara 
 tion, which would exclude the come-outers and non-resistants 
 from membership in the American Antislavery Society, created 
 the deepest feeling in the bosoms of those who had adopted 
 those theories, and it sensibly increased the alienation already 
 existing. A division of the Massachusetts Antislavery Society 
 was recommended by Lewis Tappan, who did not hesitate to 
 express the opinion that the separation of men who had so 
 little unity of opinion would not only be promotive of peace, 
 but of greater efficiency. At the close of the meeting an ap 
 peal was made to the public by the board of managers of the 
 Massachusetts Society, and by extraordinary exertions their 
 pledge was redeemed within a few weeks. 
 
 The sixth annual meeting of the American Antislavery So 
 ciety took place early in May, in the city of New York. A 
 large number were in attendance. At the opening of the 
 meeting a motion was made for the appointment of a commit 
 tee to make out a roll of delegates. James C. Fuller, a dele 
 gate from New York, an Englishman by birth, and a member 
 of the Society of Friends, remarked that there were some be 
 loved sisters present, and he wished to know whether there was 
 strength enough in the meeting to admit them. Nathaniel 
 
414 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Colver, a Baptist clergyman, then moved that the roll be made 
 out in the usual manner, of such men as were delegates 
 or members. It was then moved by Oliver Johnson to 
 strike out the word " men " and insert that of persons. This 
 amendment led to a very long, animated, and excited debate, 
 in which a large number of the leading members of the con 
 vention participated. Intimations were thrown ut that, if the 
 amendment was sustained, a division of the society might be 
 the consequence. Mr. Johnson's amendment was then de 
 clared adopted ; but, the ayes and noes having been demanded 
 by Lewis Tappan, it was adopted, as modified by an amend 
 ment of Ellis Gray Loring, by a large majority. A protest, 
 signed by one hundred and twenty-three delegates, was then 
 presented and ordered to be printed with the records. 
 
 The Sixth New England Antislavery Convention met a few 
 days afterward, in Boston. At the opening of the convention 
 it was moved that all persons present favorable to the cause 
 of immediate emancipation be invited to take part in the pro 
 ceedings. An amendment was moved by Mr. Phelps, inviting 
 all gentlemen present to take seats. But this amendment was 
 rejected by a very large majority. Many delegates then retired 
 from the convention, and then united in forming the Massa 
 chusetts Abolition Society. Thus was consummated a separa 
 tion which had long been foreshadowed by growing divisions 
 of sentiment and increasing alienation of feeling. It was of 
 course inevitable, but nevertheless to be deprecated. Before 
 the giant evil they would overthrow, if united, they were less 
 than the stripling youth of Israel ; in the presence of the hos 
 tile multitude they were at best but a lean minority. But the 
 bond of union was broken, and much of the power and prow 
 ess which should have borne only on the common foe was 
 wasted on each other. 
 
 The executive committee of the new society issued an ad 
 dress to the people in explanation and vindication of their 
 action. They expressed their unspeakable grief at " the per 
 version, in this State, of our association to purposes and ob 
 jects not contemplated in our bond of union, foreign to our 
 original objects, not necessary to their attainment, and, in the 
 
DISRUPTION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 415 
 
 view of the reflecting, fatal to our prospects of ultimate suc 
 cess." They charged that the old Antislavery Society had 
 become identified with the sectarian views of a few of its lead 
 ing members ; and that the theories of Mr. Garrison about 
 religion and government, which had been sanctioned by it, 
 took from it " the staff of accomplishment." They charged 
 that the society " had thrown away its principles, and with 
 them the staff of its power." They declared the difference 
 between the old and new antislavery organizations to be that 
 " the new organization proposes to overthrow slavery by the 
 use of means, the old by simple truth." 
 
 Leading advocates of the new organization arraigned the 
 old society with great plainness of speech. Amos A. Phelps, 
 one of the earliest and ablest of the writers, orators, and 
 organizers of the antislavery movement, in resigning his mem 
 bership of its board of managers, said : " The society is no 
 longer an antislavery society simply, but in its principles and 
 modes of action has become a woman's-rights, non-govern 
 ment, antislavery society." He avowed his readiness, when 
 ever it should return to its original principles and policy, to 
 co-operate with it again. Rev. Orange Scott, an early Aboli 
 tionist, said that Mr. Garrison and the members of the Massa 
 chusetts Antislavery Society had, during the past two years, 
 done little but press their notions of perfectionism, their 
 opposition to all human governments and institutions, and 
 crowd forward the women into all public stations. He af 
 firmed that the principles and measures of himself and those 
 with whom he acted were the same as they were when they 
 joined that society, " We have not left our brethren ; they 
 have left us." Rev. Alanson St. Clair referred to the mem 
 bers of the old organization as " our women's-rights, no-govern 
 ment, antislavery opponents " ; and Rev. Charles T. Torrey 
 averred that they had toiled with the members of that society 
 as long as honor and conscience would permit, and they had 
 separated from them that they might " continue to assert all 
 our original principles and urge all our original measures with 
 new zeal and greater energy." 
 
 To these accusations and others of like import the Massa- 
 
416 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 chusetts Antislavery Society, its officers and members, by reso 
 lutions, reports, addresses, speeches, and presses, interposed a 
 peremptory and emphatic denial. To the charge that it had 
 become subservient to the principles of non-resistance it de 
 clared that it was not competent for the society to determine 
 whether they were right or wrong. It denied the right of any 
 member to commit it to his peculiar political or religious views ; 
 but he, by consenting to become a member, did not surrender 
 his right to proselytize to the extent of his ability, apart from 
 abolitionism, as a man or a Christian, either as a member of any 
 sect or party, or as one who stands aloof from all sects or par 
 ties. They denied that the Massachusetts Antislavery Society 
 had ever departed from its original platform, and they avowed 
 that it continued to maintain that duty to God and humanity 
 required of its members fidelity to their antislavery principles 
 in whatever sphere they might be called to act, u in the church 
 or out of it, at the ballot-box or away from it." They main 
 tained, too, that the society had been careful to abstain from 
 all interference with the disputed question of woman's sphere 
 and capacity ; that they did not seek the question, but that it 
 had forced itself upon them, and they had only sought to deal 
 with the question of the rights of its female members " in a 
 practical, inoffensive, and common-sense way." In a word, 
 they maintained that on their platform all human beings were 
 allowed to meet on equal terms, and were required to " agree 
 in nothing but the inherent sinfulness of slaveholding and the 
 immediate duty of letting the oppressed go free." 
 
 The action of the American Antislavery Society at its an 
 nual meeting in 1839 had greatly impaired its unity and 
 influence. Women had been permitted to take part in its 
 proceedings, though more than one third of its members had 
 entered their protest against it. A resolution had been re 
 ported by the business committee, affirming that the society 
 held, as it had done from the beginning, that the employment 
 of the political franchise so as to promote the abolition of 
 slavery was a duty Abolitionists owed to their enslaved fellow- 
 countrymen groaning under legal oppression. An amendment 
 was offered by Charles C. Burleigh, to the effect that the 
 
DISRUPTION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 417 
 
 Abolitionist who regards it his duty to use the elective fran 
 chise, and who used it against or neglected to use it for the 
 promotion of the cause of emancipation, was false to his own 
 principles and clearly failed to do his duty. The original 
 resolution was sustained by only a majority of seven. This 
 action of the society, in regard to woman's rights and the 
 use of the ballot, clearly revealed the fact that radical differ 
 ences of opinion were entertained by its members, and that 
 unity was, if not impossible, in the highest degree improbable. 
 But the heaviest blow struck against the efficiency of the so 
 ciety was its action on the financial question. Its finance com 
 mittee reported in favor of raising thirty-two thousand dollars 
 for the current expenses of the year ; but no action whatever 
 was taken. A resolution, however, was adopted, earnestly 
 inviting the executive committee not to send agents into a 
 State where a State society existed, without its consent. As 
 the State societies had opposed the employment of such agents, 
 the national executive committee was left with limited means 
 to carry forward the work it had hitherto prosecuted with so 
 much vigor and success. 
 
 The effect of this action was soon made manifest. The 
 executive committee was greatly embarrassed. In November 
 it was compelled to notify its agents that the society could no 
 longer be responsible for their compensation. A special meet 
 ing was held in New York, in January, 1840 ; but the attend 
 ance was small. The object of the meeting was to obtain the 
 removal of the restrictions upon the executive committee and 
 to supply it with funds. The convention sat for three days 
 without any marked results. 
 
 Under circumstances so discouraging some members of the 
 executive committee avowed themselves in favor of reorganiz 
 ing or dissolving the society. Lewis Tappan wrote to several 
 leading Abolitionists that, as the executive committee was vir 
 tually excluded from all parts of the country for the collection 
 of funds, he despaired of accomplishing anything for the ad 
 vancement of the cause, and was in favor of abandoning the 
 organization, and of the appointment of a central board or 
 committee, to work with such means as might be placed in 
 
 53 
 
418 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 their hands. Similar views were entertained by others. A 
 communication was published in the " Emancipator " main 
 taining that the American Antislavery Society was no longer 
 necessary for the advancement of the antislavery cause, that 
 it was a hindrance, and that therefore it was a question for 
 serious consideration whether it ought not to be formally 
 withdrawn. It was proposed by the Rev. David Root that 
 the national society and all its auxiliaries should be dis 
 solved, and that a board of commissioners, with powers simi 
 lar to those of the " American Board of Commissioners for 
 Foreign Missions," should take its place. But this was pro 
 nounced essentially defective and inadequate to the object 
 they had in view. 
 
 John G. Whittier, then editor of the " Pennsylvania Free 
 man," suggested that the society should be dissolved, and a 
 central committee, representing no society or association, but 
 simply acting on its own responsibility, with such means as the 
 confidence of the public might intrust to it, should be substi 
 tuted for it. The reason assigned for this proposition was that 
 the great object for which the machinery of the society was 
 created had been measurably lost because it had failed to 
 secure " concert of action." Dr. Bailey, editor of the " Phi 
 lanthropist," concurred in these views, and proposed that at 
 the next anniversary the national society quietly dissolve it 
 self, so that the executive committee could be left to labor 
 when and where it pleased, and with such means as might 
 be placed in its hands by uncompromising Abolitionism. A 
 special report, signed by Mr. Birney and Lewis Tappan, James 
 S. Gibbons dissenting, recommended to the executive com 
 mittee that the society, at its next annual meeting, should 
 either resume its whole power as to funds or be formally dis 
 solved. The executive committee, declaring its inability to 
 continue the publication of the " Emancipator," authorized the 
 publishing agent to sell it to the executive committee of the 
 New York City Antislavery Society, on condition that it 
 should supply papers to its " advanced " subscribers and con 
 tinue its publication one year, under the charge of Mr. Leavitt. 
 
 The deepest interest was felt and expressed by Abolitionists 
 
DISRUPTION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 419 
 
 in all parts of the country, especially in New England, in the 
 results of the seventh annual meeting, to be held in New 
 York. The board of managers of the Massachusetts Antislav- 
 ery Society issued an address appealing to the Abolitionists 
 everywhere, in whatever part of the country they resided, to 
 rally at that meeting as one man. They were called upon to 
 " frown indignantly on each and every attempt to dissolve our 
 noble organization into its original elements, for the purpose 
 of obstructing spiritual freedom and human progress, of grati 
 fying personal envy or ambition, of fostering the great and re 
 lentless enemy of humanity, sectarianism." " If you would not 
 see," they said, " our broad platform in any degree narrowed, 
 if you would preserve it from the spirit which is seeking to dash 
 it in fragments, if you would still rally under an antisectarian 
 banner, and unite with the wise and good of every name for 
 the salvation of your country and the deliverance of the op 
 pressed, then you will throng to the anniversary of the parent 
 society on the 12th of May next." 
 
 On that day the delegates assembled in great numbers in the 
 city of New York. Arthur Tappan, president of the society, 
 not being present, Francis Jackson of Boston, one of the vice- 
 presidents, took the chair. Mrs. Lydia Maria Child was 
 placed upon the business committee. Not being present, Lewis 
 Tappan suggested that her place be supplied by her husband, 
 David Lee Child. But Miss Abby Kelley being appointed in 
 place of Mrs. Child, Mr. Tappan, Charles W. Denison, and 
 Amos A. Phelps asked to be excused from serving on the com 
 mittee. After a brief debate the sense of the meeting was 
 taken, and the appointment of Miss Kelley was sustained by 
 more than a hundred majority in favor of the rights of women 
 to take part in the proceedings of the society. 
 
 In the evening a meeting was held at the house of Lewis 
 Tappan, and it was unanimously agreed that a division was 
 inevitable, and that a new society should be immediately or 
 ganized. A committee was appointed of one from each State, 
 of which Rev. David Thurston of Maine was chairman, to 
 draft a constitution. During the forenoon of the next day, by 
 the permission of the presiding officer of the society, then in 
 
420 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 session, notice was given that a meeting of those opposed to 
 its proceedings would be held in the afternoon in the basement 
 of the church to consider the expediency of forming a new so 
 ciety. When this meeting assembled, Mr. Tappan was made 
 chairman. The proceedings of the preliminary meeting were 
 stated, and a resolution was adopted declaring it expedient to 
 form such a society. During the next two days a constitution 
 was adopted, and a society of nearly three hundred members, 
 from eleven States, was organized. It adopted as its name, 
 The American and Foreign Antislavery Society. Arthur Tap- 
 pan was chosen president, James G. Birney and Henry B. 
 Stanton secretaries, and Lewis Tappan treasurer. A large ex 
 ecutive committee was appointed, of which the Tappans, Mr. 
 Birney, Mr. Stanton, William Jackson, Whittier, Gerrit Smith, 
 Judge Jay, Joshua Leavitt, Thomas Morris, William H. Bris 
 bane, Edward Beecher, and many other prominent Abolition 
 ists, were members. 
 
 An address was soon afterward issued by the president of the 
 new society, in which the disturbing elements in the old organ 
 ization were referred to, and the causes of separation were dis 
 tinctly stated. Among the reasons assigned for the separation 
 were the action of the society concerning the admission of 
 women to take part in its proceedings, and the non-resistant 
 and no-government views of a portion of its members. The 
 former it declared to be an innovation that seemed " repugnant 
 to the constitution of the society," " a firebrand in antislavery 
 meetings," which was " contrary to the usages of the civilized 
 world," and which " tended to destroy the efficiency of female 
 antislavery action." Concerning the latter, it maintained that, 
 though at its formation " the lawfulness of human government 
 was recognized, and it was a fundamental principle that politi 
 cal action was both expedient and proper," the same persons 
 who were contending for the civil and political equality of 
 women with men " deny the obligation of forming, supporting, 
 or yielding obedience to civil government, and refuse to affirm 
 the duty of political action." Avowing that the members of 
 the new society recognized the'" rightfulness of government," 
 and " urge political action as a duty," it affirmed that it would 
 
DISKUPTION OF THE AMERICAN ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY. 421 
 
 not denounce those " as recreants " who might differ from them 
 in regard to the " best modes of action " ; and that, so far as 
 their conduct could influence the future, the two divisions of 
 antislavery men would henceforth plead the cause of the slave 
 without criminating or recriminating each other. It declared 
 that the purpose of the convention which originated the Ameri 
 can and Foreign Antislavery Society was not to enforce uni 
 formity of action, subject the widespread antislavery host to 
 the decrees of one central power, follow the footsteps of any 
 earthly leader, or glorify any man of like passions with them 
 selves, but to labor for the speedy and peaceful triumph of lib 
 erty, and to give God all the glory. Commencing its career with 
 these avowals of its spirit and purposes, and embracing within 
 its ranks many men of large capacity and experience, it labored 
 several years, and rendered service to the cause. 
 
 Lindley Coates of Pennsylvania was chosen president of the 
 old society. The vacancies made by the retiring members 
 were filled by men in harmony with the views of the major 
 ity. The ** Antislavery Standard," with its motto, " Without 
 concealment, without compromise," was established as its 
 organ in the city of New York, under the editorial charge of 
 Nathaniel P. Rogers of New Hampshire, one of their most 
 brilliant and vigorous writers. The executive committee soon 
 issued an address in reply to the address of the new society, 
 in which the course of the old organization was vigorously de 
 fended, and the action of those who had seceded was sharply 
 criticised. This society continued to advocate the cause of 
 immediate emancipation, and to enunciate the distinctive doc 
 trines of that section of Abolitionists which sustained the 
 views of Mr. Garrison until slavery was abolished by the 
 adoption of an amendment to the Constitution of the United 
 States. 
 
 The disruption of the American Antislavery Society, and the 
 formation of the American and Foreign Antislavery Society, 
 excited much feeling among Abolitionists in certain localities, 
 especially in the New England States. Mr. Goodell says of it : 
 " While these divisions produced a strong sensation in New 
 England and in the seaboard cities, the sound of them going 
 
422 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 across the Atlantic and awakening kindred responses pro and 
 con among the Abolitionists of Great Britain, the blast died 
 away like a Massachusetts northeaster as it travelled westward, 
 spending its strength before it had reached the Valley of the 
 Mohawk, and was scarcely felt beyond the waters of Lake 
 Erie.'' 
 
 At the time of the separation there were probably two thou 
 sand societies in the country, containing, it was estimated, 
 some two hundred thousand members. They had, however, 
 already attained their maximum of numbers and influence, and 
 had accomplished the largest share of their peculiar work. 
 Afterward their numbers and distinctive labors were dimin 
 ished, rather than increased. Various causes contributed to 
 produce that result. Such societies had lost the charm of 
 novelty which at first had attracted some to join their ranks. 
 Many, too, had become disheartened by the growing magnitude 
 of the evil and the increasing difficulties which revealed them 
 selves in the way of its overthrow. Besides, antislavery ideas 
 and principles were finding for themselves other modes of ex 
 pression and action. While, therefore, these distinctive socie 
 ties were declining in numbers and efficiency, the cause for 
 which they were originally organized was making progress. 
 
 Nevertheless these organizations, with all their divisions, dis 
 sensions, and mistakes, rendered essential service. They were 
 the pioneers in the great work of emancipation. They were 
 the forerunners of this modern evangel of Liberty. They 
 sounded the alarm which awoke the slumbering nation to its 
 dangers and its duties. They kindled and kept alive those 
 fires of freedom that revealed more distinctly the darkening 
 shadows which slavery was casting over the land. During 
 the first few years of their active and arduous labors they 
 did much to direct attention to the wrongs of the slave, the 
 crimes of the slave system, and the dangers those wrongs and 
 crimes involved. Though other and subsequent agencies were 
 employed to render more available and practicable the princi 
 ples of the great conflict, the honor of their first and brave 
 proclamation will ever belong to them. 
 
CHAPTER XXX. 
 
 ABOLITION PETITIONS. ARRAIGNMENT OP MR. ADAMS. EIGHT OP 
 PETITION WON. MR. ADAMS'S POSITION. 
 
 The Election of 1840. Death of President Harrison. President Tyler. Mr. 
 Adams's Motion to repeal the 21st Rule adopted. The South warned against 
 the Abolitionists. President Tyler's Letter. Thomas F. Marshall, Henry 
 A. Wise, and Joshua R. Giddings. Vote on 21st Rule reconsidered. Dis 
 cussion. Petition presented by Mr. Adams. ' Resolution of Censure. 
 Caucus. Mr. Weld and Mr. Leavitt. Marshall's Resolutions. Speech. 
 Mr. Adams's Defence. Remarks of Wise. Adams's Reply. Liberal 
 Action of Underwood, Arnold, and Botts. Resolution laid on the Table. 
 Debate in XXVIIIth Congress. Remarks of Hale and Hamlin. Rule 
 abrogated and Right of Petition secured. Position of Mr. Adams. Criti 
 cisms of Garrison, Birney, and Goodell. 
 
 THE great political struggle of 1840 resulted in the triumph 
 of the Whig party. It secured the Executive and majorities in 
 both houses of Congress. But freedom gained little by the 
 change. The Slave Power still controlled the general gov 
 ernment. The new administration soon became quite as obse 
 quious as the one it had displaced. 
 
 Within thirty days after entering on the duties of his office, 
 
 President Harrison died. Vice-President Tyler a Whig in 
 
 name rather than in sentiment and opinion succeeded him. 
 
 General Harrison had been reared in Virginia, and educated 
 
 inder the malign influences of slavery. As governor of the 
 
 ^erritory of Indiana he had striven to secure for it a tempo- 
 
 ry suspension of the ordinance of 1787. In Congress he had 
 generally complied with the requirements of the slave-masters. 
 In his Inaugural Address he had prepared a paragraph which 
 would have been highly offensive to the members of his party 
 who had advocated the right of petition and the freedom of 
 debate ; but, at the suggestion of Mr. Clay, it was so modified 
 
424 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 as to mean little or nothing. While antislavery men had little 
 to hope from President Harrison, they had everything to fear 
 from President Tyler. He was an ultra slaveholder, and in 
 feeling, sentiment, and opinion he was narrow, bigoted, and 
 sectional. 
 
 On the 31st of May an extra session of Congress was con 
 vened. On the first day Mr. Wise moved that the rules of 
 the last House be adopted for ten days, and that a committee 
 of nine be appointed for their revision. Mr. Adams moved to 
 amend the motion by inserting, " except the twenty-first rule, 
 which is hereby rescinded." This rule excluded antislavery 
 petitions. In support of his motion Mr. Adams gave the his 
 tory of that rule, adopted when " a majority of the House 
 were anxious above all things not to be thought Abolitionists." 
 " It was," he said, " a Democratic measure, a measure of 
 Northern men with Southern principles, a sectional measure." 
 Mr. Adams's amendment was agreed to by a vote of one hun 
 dred and twelve to one hundred and four. 
 
 Mr. Charles J. Ingersoll, a Democratic politician of Pennsyl 
 vania, moved a reconsideration of that vote. Alluding to the 
 remark of Mr. Adams that he was a Northern man, he an 
 nounced himself to be a middle man. He proceeded to warn 
 the slaveholders that the signs of the times behooved them to 
 be more on the alert than they had ever yet been in guarding 
 their rights against abolition ; and that they had never yet 
 taken ground as high as he would take. He said there were 
 more than two thousand abolition societies ; and he advised 
 the South to combine and move in solid phalanx in defence of 
 its endangered interests. In the course of the debate Mr. 
 Adams had expressed the opinion that, if the free people of 
 the North had nothing to do with the people of the South, 
 they should not be called upon to aid in suppressing servile 
 insurrections. He had also stated that, in the event of such 
 insurrections, Congress would have the constitutional power 
 to interfere with slavery, and would dispose of it according to 
 the dictates of justice and humanity. Mr. Ingersoll expressed 
 horror at the position of Mr. Adams, and proclaimed his readi 
 ness to march at any moment to suppress an insurrection of 
 
ABOLITION PETITIONS. 425 
 
 the slaves. Mr. Johnson of Maryland said he had seen a let 
 ter from President Tyler recommending the members of the 
 House to support the twenty-first rule. The reading of the let 
 ter was called for by Mr. Adams ; to which Mr. Johnson replied 
 that it was not an official letter, but the President's individual 
 opinion. 
 
 Mr. Thomas F. Marshall, a new Whig member from Ken 
 tucky, made a brilliant and characteristic speech. " I shall 
 vote," said he, " against reconsideration. In other words, I 
 shall vote in favor of receiving all the petitions stowed away 
 in his abolition drawer. Why ? Because I do not want this 
 subject coming up year after year and, it may be, century after 
 century. I want the question settled now. I shall move that 
 they be committed to a committee of Northern gentlemen, and 
 the gentleman of Massachusetts placed at its head. I want 
 to try it as a question of history. There is something poeti 
 cal in the idea that the son of the man whose stalwart arms 
 and brawny shoulders had aided in laying the corner-stone of 
 this temple of our liberties should be the incendiary who 
 should light the flame for its destruction." 
 
 Mr. Wise, in the course of this debate, sharply censured the 
 Speaker, John White of Kentucky, for appointing Mr. Gid- 
 dings chairman of the Committee on Claims, and Mr. Adams 
 chairman of Committee on Foreign Affairs. He denounced 
 the Abolitionists as " a few dangerous fanatics, unsupported, 
 unbacked, and discountenanced by the virtue, intelligence, and 
 patriotism of the North." He insisted that the House could 
 not be organized until the " hydra of abolition " is crushed. 
 This he declared to be a vital question, far surpassing all the 
 financial and currency questions of the day. Mr. King of 
 Georgia announced that if abolition petitions should be re 
 ceived, and discussion be tolerated, the Southern members 
 would be obliged to leave their seats. 
 
 Kenneth Rayner, a Whig member from North Carolina, asked 
 Mr. Adams if he would present a petition from Fanny Wright 
 and her followers, praying Congress to abolish the institution of 
 marriage. Mr. Adams replied : " Why, the most damning sin 
 of slavery is that it does abolish the institution of marriage. 
 
 54 
 
426 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 How, then, could I have any more objection to receiving such 
 petitions than I should have to the perpetuation of slavery, 
 which destroys the sacred institution of marriage ? " Cries of 
 order were raised, and Mr. Adams took his seat, remarking, " If 
 the gentleman is afraid to receive answers, he should take care 
 to ask no questions." Mr. Giddings, who afterward so signal 
 ized himself for his advocacy of the cause of equal rights, par 
 ticipated in the debate. Alluding to his silence, which he 
 explained to be the result of no want of interest in the sub 
 ject, but because he came there for the purpose of attending 
 to the business for which the session was called, he declared 
 that they were fully organized and ready to proceed to busi 
 ness when the motion for reconsideration was made, and they 
 were called upon to reject all the rules they had adopted be 
 cause they had rejected one. He rejoiced that Northern mem 
 bers had remained silent, thus giving evidence of their desire 
 to attend to the public business, though many things had been 
 said to which they desired to reply. Mr. Ingersoll's motion to 
 reconsider was lost. Mr. Wise moved to reconsider the vote 
 by which the House adopted the rules, with the exception of 
 the twenty-first, and his motion prevailed by a majority of two. 
 Mr. Rayner then moved that the rules of the last House 
 be adopted, but his motion was lost by nine majority. He 
 spoke for three hours. In his speech he complimented very 
 highly Northern Democrats who had voted against the right 
 of petition. He admitted that slavery was " a misfortune 
 to any people among whom it exists " ; and yet he violently 
 denounced those who would subvert it. " Before you accom 
 plish ytiur purpose," he said, " you must march over heca 
 tombs of bodies ; you must convert every one of our smil 
 ing fields into a camp ; you must beat every one of your 
 ploughshares into swords. Long, long before you reach the 
 banks of the Roanoke, every stream will run red with your blood, 
 every hill will whiten with your bones. Attempt this wild 
 project when you will, and if there be any truth in heathen 
 story, the banks of the Styx will be lined with your shivering 
 ghosts for a hundred years to come. We will trample you 
 under our feet, and trail your crown and sceptre in the dust." 
 
PETITION FOE THE DISSOLUTION OF THE UNION. 427 
 
 Mr. Stuart, a Whig member from Virginia, presented a 
 resolution that the rules of the last House not suspended by 
 any rule or resolution adopted at that session be adopted as 
 the rules of the House. On this motion he moved the previous 
 question, but withdrew it at the request of Mr. Nisbet of 
 Georgia, who wished to address the House. Referring in un 
 equivocal and bitter words to Mr. Adams, he said : " I have 
 listened with strong and burning indignation to the language 
 that has been indulged in by the hoary-headed member from 
 Massachusetts. I have been compelled to think of the Man- 
 tuan bard : 
 
 ' Tantsene in animis cselestibus irae ? ' 
 
 As I looked at him, throwing forth such sentiments and lan 
 guage, I was forcibly reminded of Vesuvius, which, while its 
 summit was clothed in white, vomited a fiery stream, which 
 spread desolation and ruin whence it came." Mr. Nisbet 
 renewed the motion for the previous question, which was 
 agreed to, and Mr. Stuart's motion was adopted. 
 
 At the regular session of the XXVIIth Congress the contest 
 for the right of petition and freedom of debate was renewed, 
 [r. Adams standing forth as their inflexible champion. This 
 iction of Mr. Adams excited the bitterest animosity of mem- 
 >ers from the slaveholding States of both parties, and of 
 Northern members sympathizing with them. The represen- 
 itives of slavery affected to despise and put under the ban of 
 >cial ostracism Slade, Giddings, and Gates. But the com- 
 landing ability, the historic position, and reputation of Mr. 
 .dams, while they shielded him from their contempt, real or 
 Lffected, aroused their bitterest hostility and hate. 
 
 On the 14th of January, 1842, Mr. Adams, having the floor 
 for the presentation of petitions, said : " I hold in my hand 
 the petition of Benjamin Emerson and forty-five other citizens 
 )f Haverhill, Massachusetts, praying Congress to adopt imme 
 diate measures for the peaceful dissolution of the union of 
 these States." Hardly had these words fallen from his lips 
 when several slaveholding members, many of them then 
 known and since proved to be disunionists, clamorously de 
 manded leave to speak. But Mr, Adams, having the floor, 
 
428 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 moved the reference of this petition to a select committee of 
 nine members, with instructions to report an answer to the 
 petitioners showing the reason why their prayer could not be 
 granted. From all parts of the House came vehement and 
 passionate demands for the floor, which was given to Mr. Hop 
 kins of Virginia. He inquired of the Speaker if it would be 
 in order to burn the petition in the presence of the House. 
 Mr. Wise inquired if it would be in order to present a resolu 
 tion censuring Mr. Adams ; and such a resolution was intro 
 duced by Mr. Gilmer of the same State. Mr. Adams expressed 
 the hope that the resolution would be received and debated, and 
 that he might have an opportunity of defending his action. 
 
 The House adjourned, and notice was given that the mem 
 bers from the slave States would hold a meeting that even 
 ing for consultation. The meeting was held ; and Thomas 
 F. Marshall, a Whig from Kentucky, a brilliant speaker, of 
 whose future career high expectations were entertained, was 
 selected as the leader in the work of censure. While this 
 conclave was preparing for the trial, a few members of the 
 House assembled at the room of Mr. Giddings. Joshua 
 Leavitt and Theodore D. Weld, among the ablest and most 
 effective advocates of emancipation, were present, and were 
 commissioned to call on Mr. Adams and tender him any assist 
 ance in the power of the persons then assembled to render. 
 The venerable statesman expressed his most profound grati 
 tude for this offer of friendly aid, and requested them to 
 examine certain points in the authorities, a list of which he 
 gave them. These gentlemen performed their task with alac 
 rity and success, so that, on the assembling of the House next 
 day, the desk of Mr. Adams was covered with volumes ready 
 for immediate use. 
 
 Immediately after the reading of the journal, Mr. Marshall 
 submitted three resolutions, as an amendment to that offered 
 by Mr. Gilmer, in which it was set forth that the act of Mr. 
 Adams might be held to merit expulsion ; that the House 
 deemed it an act of mercy and grace when they only inflicted 
 upon him the severest censure for conduct so unworthy of his 
 past relations to the State and his present position, and that 
 
ARRAIGNMENT OF MR. ADAMS. 429 
 
 this they did for the maintenance of their purity and dignity ; 
 and for the rest they turned him over to his own conscience 
 and the indignation of all American citizens. Mr. Marshall 
 evidently entered upon his work with heart and hope. He 
 was an orator of rare power, though ambitious, egotistical, and 
 of unbalanced judgment. Like too many men of rare gifts 
 and high promise, he became the victim of intemperance ; 
 and though, through the persuasive influence of the late Gov 
 ernor Briggs of Massachusetts, then a member, he reformed 
 for a few months, he soon relapsed, and became an utter 
 wreck. When he rose to speak on this occasion the galleries 
 were thronged and the House filled with privileged persons. 
 He spoke with so much eloquence and force that the enemies 
 of Mr. Adams were very much elated and his friends not a 
 little depressed. 
 
 When Mr. Marshall closed, the venerable statesman, rising, 
 asked the Clerk to read the first paragraph of the Declaration 
 of Independence, which declares when any form of government 
 becomes destructive of the ends of establishment it is the right 
 or the duty of the people to alter or abolish it, and reorganize 
 its powers in such form as to them shall appear best to secure 
 their interest and happiness. He then proceeded to maintain 
 that the people had a right to reform abuses of the govern 
 ment, and bring it back to the performance of duties for which 
 it was instituted ; that they had a right to ask Congress to do 
 what they thought they ought to do, and it was the duty of 
 Congress to state the reason why their prayer should not be 
 granted. He charged that the people were oppressed by the 
 denial of the right of petition, and of the freedom of debate, 
 
 id that the South was endeavoring to destroy the right of 
 
 labeas corpus and trial by jury, and to force slavery on the 
 free States. He said emphatically, that, if the rights of the 
 
 >eople were to be taken away by a coalition between Southern 
 slaveholders and Northern Democrats, it was time for the peo 
 ple to arise and assert their rights. He asked for more time in 
 which to prepare his defence ; and Mr. Horace Everett of Ver- 
 
 lont moved a postponement of two weeks for that purpose. 
 Henry A. Wise then took the floor and spoke at great length, 
 
430 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 charging Mr. Adams with conspiring with British Abolitionists 
 to destroy the Union. He bitterly denounced Mr. Adams for 
 saying that, in case of insurrection, the President might, if 
 necessary to restore peace, emancipate the slaves. Having 
 supported Mr. Tyler against the great body of Whigs in and 
 out of Congress, he called upon the Democratic party to put 
 down Abolitionism ; for, if slavery were destroyed, he said, 
 the great democratic principle of equality among men would 
 become obsolete. 
 
 Mr. Adams replied to the bitter and violent assault of Mr. 
 Wise with terrible severity. Alluding to his connection, as a 
 second to Mr. Graves, with the duel in which Mr. Cilley was 
 killed, he said that Mr. Wise had come into that hall a few 
 years since " with his hands dripping with human gore, a blotch 
 of human blood upon his face." Turning from Mr. Wise, Mr. 
 Adams replied to the speech of Mr. Marshall, who had charged 
 him with high treason. He thanked God that the Constitution 
 of the United States had defined treason, and that it was not 
 left for the " puny mind " of the gentleman of Kentucky to 
 define that crime. He said that, were he Mr. Marshall's father, 
 he would " advise him to return to Kentucky, and take his 
 place in some law school, and commence the study of that pro 
 fession he has disgraced." Mr. Adams proceeded to arraign 
 the slaveholders, and to open an aggressive war upon the cham 
 pions of slavery. 
 
 The resolution of censure was opposed by Mr. Underwood, a 
 Whig member from Kentucky, who announced his opposition 
 to all rules denominated " gag laws." Mr. Arnold, a Whig 
 member from Tennessee, sustained Mr. Adams and denounced 
 the twenty-first rule as a violation of the Constitution. Mr. 
 Botts bravely lent his support, and referred to the fact that, 
 a few years before, Mr. Rhett of South Carolina had drawn up 
 resolutions for the dissolution of the Union, and had sought 
 for an opportunity to present them. Mr. Gilmer offered to 
 withdraw his resolution of censure if Mr. Adams would with 
 draw the petition. But this he sternly refused to do, declaring 
 that he would not violate his sense of duty to obtain the favor 
 or forbearance of the House. 
 
DEBATE IN THE TWENTY-EIGHTH CONGRESS. 
 
 431 
 
 Mr. Marshall again addressed the House, and then called for 
 the previous question. But Mr. Adams demanded the floor, 
 obtained it, and proceeded in his defence. Taking the aggres 
 sive, he assailed with great effect slavery and the Slave Power. 
 Mr. Saunders of North Carolina called him to order, but the 
 Speaker allowed him to proceed. From this decision Mr. 
 Saunders appealed, but the House sustained the Speaker. 
 
 The next day Mr. Merriwether of Georgia stated that ten or 
 twelve days had been taken up in the trial, and he wished to 
 know how much more time Mr. Adams expected to occupy in 
 his defence. Mr. Adams replied that he was not responsible 
 for the time occupied ; that when Warren Hastings was tried 
 Burke occupied some months in a single speech ; and he 
 thought he could " close in ninety days." On motion of Mr. 
 Botts the resolutions of censure were laid upon the table by a 
 majority of thirteen. The friends of Mr. Adams were proud 
 of the gallant fight their champion had made, and greatly 
 elated at the signal victory which crowned it. On the other 
 hand, his enemies, baffled, defeated, and humiliated, felt that 
 for once, at least, slavery had lost and freedom had won. 
 
 The Whigs had a majority of nearly forty in that Congress. 
 Though the Northern Whigs and a few of their Southern 
 associates were against the twenty-first rule, that arbitrary and 
 obnoxious measure remained during that Congress without 
 modification. 
 
 In the XXVIIIth Congress the Democrats had a large ma 
 jority. Early in the session Mr. Adams moved the appoint 
 ment of a committee to report rules for the government of the 
 House. This committee, of which he was chairman, made a 
 iport omitting the twenty-first rule. This report was dis 
 cussed for several weeks, in the morning hour. In this de 
 bate Mr. Adams was severely, if not wantonly, assailed by the 
 representatives of the Slave Power. During this long discus 
 sion Mr. Dillett of Alabama, in assailing Mr. Adams, quoted 
 these words from a speech delivered by him to the colored peo 
 ple of Pittsburg : " We know that the day of your redemp 
 tion must come. The time and manner of its coming we 
 know not. It may come in peace, or it may come in blood ; 
 
432 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 but whether in peace or in blood, let it come." Mr. Adams 
 said with emphasis : " I say now, let it come." To this re 
 mark of Mr. Adams Mr. Dillett replied : " Yes, the gentleman 
 now says let it come, though it costs the blood of thousands 
 of white men." Mr. Adams quickly responded : " Though it 
 costs the blood of millions of white men, let it come ! " Of 
 course the slaveholders were terribly shocked at these words 
 of the venerable statesman. 
 
 During the debate several Northern Democrats avowed their 
 opposition to this continued suppression of the right of petition. 
 John P. Hale of New Hampshire, and Hannibal Hamlin of 
 Maine, members of the Democratic party, then first came into 
 Congress, and both of them were in favor of abrogating that 
 arbitrary, unconstitutional, and indefensible rule. Mr. Hamlin 
 took an early occasion to express his opposition to it, and to 
 advocate the right of the people to petition for the redress 
 of grievances. When he closed, Mr. Adams, who had lis 
 tened to him with marked attention, crossed the hall and 
 offered him his hand, with the remark : " Light breaketh in 
 the East." 
 
 But all efforts were unavailing. The report was laid upon 
 the table by a small majority, and the obnoxious rule was re 
 tained. Early, however, in the second session, Mr. Adams 
 again moved to rescind it, and now with more cheering pros 
 pects of success. For ten years, amid calumny and abuse, he 
 had struggled to secure for the people the simple right of peti 
 tion, but always against an unyielding majority. The time had 
 come when that majority was broken, and the rule, by twenty- 
 eight majority, was stricken out. Fourteen members only from 
 the free States, a small remnant of the host Mr. Adams was 
 wont to characterize as " the Swiss guards of slavery fighting 
 for pay," rallied in the last struggle to keep the " gag" alike 
 upon the lips of the people and of their representatives. It 
 was, however, for many years, practically a barren victory, for 
 not only did the petitioners fail in securing a favorable response 
 to their prayers, but with slaveholding cunning the Speakers 
 of the House so constituted the committee to which such peti 
 tions were referred that they were never reported upon, and 
 
ME. ADAMS'S POSITION. 433 
 
 were sent at the close of the session " to the tomb of the Cap- 
 ulets." 
 
 That Mr. Adams never identified himself with the antislav- 
 ery men and associations of his day, and that he distrusted 
 both the immediate objects of their effort and their modes of 
 procedure to obtain those objects, are well known. As late as 
 1840 he not only declared that he had never given the slight 
 est encouragement to petitions for the immediate and uncom- 
 pensated abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia or 
 elsewhere, but indulged in the somewhat caustic remark, that, 
 if the total abolition of slavery was the purpose of Divine 
 Providence, other agents and other means would be employed 
 than either the American Colonization or Abolition Societies ; 
 " or if these societies, or either of them, are to be made instru 
 mental in the accomplishment of the great work, they must en 
 tirely change their modes of operation, and come down from 
 the empyrean of their fancy to the vapory atmosphere of this 
 nether world." 
 
 In his letter of acceptance of the nomination for Congress, 
 in the autumn of 1838, he said : " The abolition of slavery in 
 the District of Columbia, or in the Territory of Florida ; the 
 prohibition of the internal piracy between the States ; the re 
 fusal to admit another contaminated State into the Union, 
 are all partial, ineffective plasters for the great elemental evil. 
 
 " ' They will but skin and film the ulcerous part, 
 While rank corruption mining all within 
 Infects unseen.' " 
 
 In the April following, in letters addressed to the citizens of 
 the United States whose petitions he had been presenting to 
 Congress, after informing the petitioners that their petitions 
 " had received very little notice from the House," he did not hesi 
 tate to inform them that he could not vote for the immediate 
 abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia or in the Ter 
 ritory of Florida, nor for a refusal to admit that Territory as a 
 slaveholdirig State into the Union. His main reasons were that 
 it was impracticable and would be improper. That it was im 
 practicable he argued, " because public opinion throughout the 
 Union is against it." It would be improper mainly " because 
 
 55 
 
434 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 it would operate exclusively upon the people of the District in 
 compliance with the petitions of those not affected themselves 
 by the law " ; and this would be " contrary to the first princi 
 ples of our institutions," especially that principle of the Dec 
 laration " that derives all the just power of government from 
 the consent of the governed." 
 
 But while Mr. Adams failed to accept and approve the dis 
 tinctive measures of the Abolitionists, there were none who 
 seemed to comprehend more fully than he the magnitude, 
 guilt, inveteracy, and danger to the land of American slavery, 
 and its pervasive and perilous ascendency in every department 
 of the nation's social and civil life. In his letter to his con 
 stituents, he had said that " the Union will fall before slavery, 
 or it will fall before the Union. }i In a letter to the Rhode 
 Island Antislavery Society, written in December, 1838, he used 
 this unequivocal language : " No one attentive to the progress 
 of our history as an independent nation can fail to see that in 
 the silent lapse of time slavery has been winding its cobweb- 
 thread around all our free institutions. This was not the cove 
 nant to which we pledged our faith in the Declaration of Inde 
 pendence." The fathers believed and meant slavery to be 
 temporary ; emancipation was the end in view, only the " time 
 and mode " were uncertain. " George Washington was an 
 Abolitionist ; so was Thomas Jefferson. But were they alive, 
 and should dare to show their faces and to utter the self-evi 
 dent truth of the Declaration within the State of South Caro 
 lina, they would be hanged." 
 
 " It is not," he said, " an occasional ebullition of popular 
 passion and feeling which marks the contrast between the sen 
 timents of the fathers and the slaveholding doctrines " of their 
 posterity. " It is the perversion of intellect, the depravation 
 of moral feeling, the degradation of man to the standard of the 
 brute, which marks the American school of servile philosophy." 
 But he had faith in the power of truth and of well-directed 
 effort ; nor was he hopeless of good results therefrom. In this 
 Rhode Island letter he says : " The fire of liberty burns yet, 
 though with a flickering flame, in New England. It will yet 
 kindle and consume to ashes the dastardly sophisms with which 
 
MR. ADAMS'S POSITION. 435 
 
 slavery would pollute our souls. I may not live to see the day, 
 but I wait for it only to say with Simeon, ' Lord, now lettest 
 thou thy servant depart in peace.' ' In a letter to Edmund 
 Quincy, written a few months before, declining an invitation to 
 attend an antislavery meeting on account of age and infirmi 
 ties, he wrote : " I rejoice that the cause of human freedom is 
 falling into younger and more vigorous hands. That in three 
 score years from the day of the Declaration of Independence 
 its self-evident truths should be yet struggling for existence 
 against the degeneracy of an age pampered with prosperity and 
 languishing into servitude, is a melancholy truth from which I 
 should in vain attempt to shut my eyes. But the summons has 
 gone forth ; the youthful champions of the rights of human na 
 ture have buckled and are buckling on their armor, and the 
 scourging overseer, the lynching lawyer, and the servile sophist, 
 and the faithless scribe, and the priestly parasite will vanish 
 before them like Satan touched by the spear of Ithuriel. I live 
 in the faith and hope of the progressive advancement of Chris 
 tian liberty, and expect to abide by the same in death." 
 
 Mr. Adams's public disavowal of all sympathy with the 
 immediate purposes and policy of the Abolitionists, and the 
 somewhat cavalier manner in which he characterized their 
 associations and modes of effort, evoked earnest responses. 
 In February, 1839, Mr. Garrison addressed to him a letter, in 
 which he gave utterance to the feelings and sentiments which 
 his general course and some recent speeches in Congress had 
 produced in many minds. He first quoted some striking ex 
 pressions from these speeches, setting forth his strong abhor 
 rence of slavery. Mr. Adams had said : " The moral principle 
 which had interdicted the African slave-trade pronounced at 
 once the sentence of condemnation upon slavery." He had 
 also said : " Unyielding opposition against slavery is inter 
 woven with every pulsation of my heart. Resistance against 
 it, feeble and inefficient as the last accents of a failing voice 
 may be, shall still be heard while the power of utterance shall 
 remain, and shall never cease till the pitcher shall be broken 
 at the fountain, the dust return to the earth as it was, and 
 the spirit unto God who gave it." 
 
436 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 In view of these and similar utterances Mr. Garrison wrote : 
 " There are two parties in this country who are equally puzzled 
 to reconcile your abhorrence of slavery with your determina 
 tion not to vote for its abolition in the District of Columbia, 
 the slaveholders of the South and the Abolitionists of the 
 North. In your theory of human rights the latter understand 
 that you agree in principle with those who by the help of God 
 are resolved upon subverting a foul and bloody system. In 
 your unwillingness to carry that theory into practice, the 
 former perceive that you are acting in concert with all that 
 is despotic and inhuman in the land. You are claimed and 
 rejected by both at the same moment." On one occasion Mr. 
 Adams had used this expression : " I say it here openly, that 
 the Abolitionists and Antislavery Societies may take in regard 
 to me what course they please." To this Mr. Garrison re 
 plied : " If you had been as explicit in your declarations at 
 the time your election was pending as you now are, a majority 
 of your constituents would have cast their votes for some other 
 candidate." 
 
 Mr. Birney, as late as 1843, expressed himself concerning 
 Mr. Adams's course in language equally unequivocal. u His 
 course," he said, " in my judgment has been eccentric, whim 
 sical, inconsistent, and, taken as a whole, thus far is unworthy 
 of a statesman of large views and a right temper in a great 
 national conjuncture." " He has given the Abolitionists words, 
 words, WORDS, and to their adversaries everything that is sub 
 stantial." 
 
 A most elaborate and able reply to Mr. Adams's letters was 
 made by William Goodell. His long connection with the anti- 
 slavery reform, his large acquaintance with the subject, and 
 his unquestioned ability, enabled him to present with clearness 
 the views of the school he represented. He began by bestow 
 ing upon the services of Mr. Adams in the cause of the right 
 of petition the most unstinted praise, declaring that he " could 
 not fail to be written down as the people's champion of the 
 people's right of petition." His first criticism was that Mr. 
 Adams's letter breathed too much the air of despondency. 
 He had said that if the South continued to maintain its 
 
MR. ADAMS'S POSITION. 437 
 
 position it was impossible for the Union long to continue, and 
 that he hung his " head in despondency at the prospect for the 
 rights of man," as " if the grand crisis had arrived and lib 
 erty appeared to be breathing its last gasp." But, added Mr. 
 Goodell, with a confidence that now seems surprising, con 
 sidering the rough usage and the kind and extent of opposi 
 tion the few antislavery men of that day were compelled to 
 encounter, " I cannot, I dare not, I will not permit myself to 
 yield to such feelings. No ; I am an Abolitionist, and there 
 fore I will not yet despair of the republic As an Aboli 
 tionist I cannot despair so long as there is a press left in the 
 country unfettered, or while a tongue moves among our thir 
 teen millions ungagged ; or so long as there remains a scrip of 
 unsoiled paper, or quill of an uncaged eagle by which an un- 
 bought and unmanacled hand can write ABOLITION and Free 
 dom." 
 
 In defence of the doctrine that in immediate abolition lay 
 the only hope of the nation, Mr. Goodell urged that there was 
 no hope in the colonization scheme, of which Mr. Adams him 
 self had said, " the search of the philosopher's stone and the 
 casting of nativities by the course of the stars were rational 
 and sensible amusements in the comparison." He urged also 
 Mr. Adams's unavailing attempt to introduce a scheme of grad 
 ual emancipation into the House, and his admission that he 
 " had no expectation that it would be received." As to the 
 impracticability of abolishing slavery in the District of Colum 
 bia he said that it could only be said to be " unpractised, 
 not impracticable." To Mr. Adams's expressed disinclina 
 tion to make these opinions " articles of a religious creed," or 
 to " exercise force or constraint for the liberation of a slave," 
 he replied : " The thunders of Sinai you would have hushed. 
 The weapons of the ballot-box in this warfare you would take 
 
 from the hands of freemen Why should not the South 
 
 be at peace with you ? What Abolitionists in our ranks could 
 not make peace on the same terms ? " 
 
 Now that slavery is destroyed and the conflicting views of 
 the different schools are among the dead issues of the past, 
 comparatively small importance inheres in the detailed argu- 
 
438 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ments that were then urged in their support. But the main 
 points of those differences and their discussions must ever be 
 matters of special interest to those who would clearly compre 
 hend the nature and progress of that struggle. These dis 
 crepancies of thought and feeling, often expressed with some 
 degree of acerbity, were entertained by men of unquestioned 
 ability, profound convictions, and inflexible integrity ; by men 
 who were alike hostile to slavery, impatient at its domination, 
 and anxious for its overthrow. Why then did they exist 
 among those whose names are so honorably associated with 
 the conflict itself? Among the elements of any satisfactory 
 answer stands pre-eminently the character of the question 
 which confronted them. Its magnitude and immense diffi 
 culties they could not, as events have shown, fully compre 
 hend. Therefore they could not clearly discern just what 
 -duty and true policy required. In the darkness of the hour 
 and amid the perplexing difficulties of the situation they could 
 not but grope their way, and it is little cause of wonder that 
 they did not always strike the same path. With strong indi 
 viduality and positiveness of character, their very earnestness, 
 honesty, and anxiety to adopt the best methods of action very 
 likely increased the danger of disagreement, and sometimes, 
 no doubt, made them uncharitable toward each other. The 
 question had so many bearings and involved so many issues 
 that little short of Divine wisdom was sufficient to point out 
 the path of a safe deliverance. These Difficulties were greatly 
 increased, too, by the general demoralization of the people and 
 their indifference to any action. The " perversion of intellect 
 and depravation of moral feeling " of which Mr. Adams com 
 plained always exerted their paralyzing influences on all modes 
 of action, however wisely devised or discreetly pursued. 
 
CHAPTER XXXI. 
 
 COASTWISE SLAVE-TRADE. DEMANDS UPON THE BRITISH GOV 
 ERNMENT. CENSURE OF MR. GIDDINGS. 
 
 Coastwise Slave-trade. American Vessels wrecked. Slaves liberated by Brit 
 ish Authorities. Representations of the Case by the American Minister to 
 England. The Action of the British Government denounced. Resolutions 
 of Mr. Calhoun. Debate on the Resolutions. Remarks of Mr. Porter. 
 Passage of the Resolutions. Exasperation of the Slaveholders. The "Cre 
 ole " seized by the Slaves and carried into Nassau. Refusal to surrender the 
 Slaves. Excitement in the South. Excited Debate in the Senate. Mr. 
 Calhoun's Resolutions relating to the "Creole." Mr. Webster's Despatch to 
 Mr. Everett. Approved by Mr. Calhoun. Action of England. Resolution 
 of Mr. Giddings. Exciting Scene. Resolution of Censure by Mr. Botts. 
 Resolution adopted by Mr. Weller. Resolution of Censure passed. Mr. 
 Giddings sustained by his Constituents. 
 
 THE coastwise slave-trade, legalized by the same act that 
 prohibited the African slave-trade, increased with the increas 
 ing domestic slave-traffic. In the year 1830 the schooner 
 " Comet " sailed from Alexandria with a cargo of slaves 
 destined for the New Orleans market. She was wrecked on 
 the False Keys of the Bahama Islands, and her passengers, 
 slaves included, were carried by the wreckers to Nassau, 
 where the freedom of the slaves was fully recognized. Four 
 years afterward the " Encomium " sailed from Charleston, 
 with a number of slaves on board, destined for Louisiana. 
 She was stranded near the same place, and carried in the 
 same manner into Nassau, where her slaves became free. In 
 1835 the " Enterprise " sailed from the District of Columbia 
 with a cargo of slaves for Charleston, and was forced to put 
 into Port Hamilton, Bermuda, through stress of weather ; and 
 her slaves too became free under the protection of British 
 power. 
 
440 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Of course, the owners of these chattels, thus by accident 
 transformed into men, protested against the loss and de 
 manded redress of their government. Negotiations were 
 commenced by President Jackson, and the American min 
 ister was instructed to press their claims upon the British 
 government. Andrew Stevenson of Virginia was at that time 
 the minister of the United States at the Court of St. James. 
 Bred and educated among those who deemed the support of 
 slavery to be one of the highest duties of the government, he 
 entered upon this duty with zeal and alacrity. Claiming that 
 under the Constitution of the United States slaves were prop 
 erty, that there was no distinction between property in persons 
 and property in things, he asserted that the government of the 
 United States had " in the most solemn manner determined 
 that slaves killed in the service of the United States, even in 
 time of war, were to be regarded as property, and paid for as 
 such." This statement was untrue in fact, and Mr. Stevenson 
 could not but have known it to be so. He had been Speaker 
 of the House of Representatives in 1828, when the case of D' 
 Autrieve was debated at great length, and with learning and 
 ability. In that case the doctrine that slaves were property 
 was denied in the most emphatic manner. 
 
 Mr. Van Buren continued to press these claims upon the 
 British government ; and it paid, during his administration, 
 for the slaves of the " Comet" and the "Encomium," stranded 
 prior to West Indian emancipation. But England refused 
 to pay for the slaves on board the " Enterprise," which put 
 into Port Hamilton in 1835, after the abolition of slavery in 
 her colonies. This action was based upon the ideas that by 
 the law of nations the ship on entering Port Hamilton became 
 subject to British laws ; that there was no law of slavery 
 there ; and that the authorities could not recognize the right 
 of the slave-dealers to hold their slaves as property when they 
 demanded their liberty. 
 
 Of course this decision, involving a question of such practi 
 cal importance to the slaveholders of the United States, was 
 wholly unsatisfactory to their representatives. Mr. Calhoun 
 brought the matter before the Senate in resolutions which 
 
THE COASTWISE SLAVE-TRADE. 441 
 
 asserted that a ship on the high seas in time of peace, en 
 gaged in a lawful voyage, is, according to the law of nations, 
 under the exclusive jurisdiction of the State to which her flag 
 belongs ; that, if such ship should be forced by stress of 
 weather or other unavoidable cause into the port of a friendly 
 power, she and her cargo, and the persons on board, with their 
 property, and all the rights belonging to their personal rela 
 tions as established by the laws of the State to which they 
 belong, would be placed under the protection which the laws 
 of the nation extend to the unfortunate under such circum 
 stances ; that the brig " Enterprise " came within those pro 
 visions, and that the detention of the negroes on board 
 by the local authorities of the island was an act in violation 
 of the laws of nations and highly unjust to the citizens to 
 whom they belonged. In his argument in support of these 
 resolutions he admitted that if the slaves had been taken vol 
 untarily into the British port the action of that government 
 would have been correct ; but he maintained that the law of 
 nations interposed in case of this enforced entrance into Eng 
 land's jurisdiction. He said it was not a mere abstract question 
 as to the possession of the slaves ; that the island of Bermuda 
 was but a short distance from the United States ; that the 
 channel between the coast of Florida and the Bahamas is two 
 hundred miles long and not more than fifty wide ; that through 
 that long, narrow, and difficult channel the immense trade, 
 which at no distant period would constitute more than half of 
 the trade of the Union, would pass. " The principle set up by 
 the British government," he said, " if carried out to its fullest 
 extent, would do much to close this all-important channel, by 
 rendering it too hazardous for use. She has only to give an 
 indefinite extent to the principle applied to the case of the 
 ' Enterprise ' and the work would be done ; and why has she 
 not as good a right to apply this principle to a cargo of sugar 
 and cotton as to the slaves that produce it ? " 
 
 Mr. Calhoun was sustained in this point by Mr. King of 
 Alabama and by Mr. Grundy of Tennessee. The resolutions 
 were then referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations, 
 and promptly reported back by Mr. Buchanan, with slight 
 
 56 
 
442 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 modifications. They were advocated by Mr. Clay and Mr. 
 Benton, and opposed only by Mr. Porter, a new senator from 
 Michigan. Seeing that eminent senators around him inter 
 posed no objection to the passage of the resolutions, he, obey 
 ing the dictates of his own judgment and conscience, says 
 Mr. Giddings, " heroically met the overwhelming influence 
 arrayed against him, and showed the most cogent reasons for 
 rejecting the resolutions, by exhibiting the absurdity of the 
 attempt to change the law of nations by senatorial resolution, 
 and the yet greater absurdity of the attempt to induce the 
 British government to acknowledge the laws of slavery and 
 the slave-trade to exist and be enforced within her ports." 
 He closed by moving to lay the resolutions on the table, and 
 demanded the yeas and nays on his motion ; and, on the roll 
 being called, thirty-three senators voted for them, and he alone 
 voted against them. Several senators among them Web 
 ster and Davis of Massachusetts, Wright of New York, South 
 ard of New Jersey, and Smith of Indiana declined to vote. 
 The resolutions were then passed, thirty-three senators voting 
 for them and none against them. By the passage of these 
 resolutions the Senate of the United States, under the lead of 
 Southern senators, sought to compel the British government to 
 acknowledge the laws and forcibly protect the interest of the 
 slaveholding States. And England, who had just emancipated 
 her own bondmen, was required at this bidding to ignore the 
 claims of justice and humanity in the persons of these slaves, 
 and perform the ignoble service of recapturing those whom 
 the more merciful elements had set free. 
 
 The " Hermosa," another slave-ship that sailed from Rich 
 mond in 1840 for New Orleans, was wrecked on a British island 
 and taken into Nassau, where the slaves claimed their right to 
 liberty and obtained it. A New Orleans insurance company 
 that had taken risks on the cargo was called on for indemnifi 
 cation for the slaves. A petition was presented to Congress by 
 Mr. Barrow of Louisiana, praying that measures might be 
 taken to obtain from the British government compensation for 
 the slaves thus escaping. On the presentation of this petition 
 he declared that the case might present a question of peace or 
 
THE COASTWISE SLAVE-TRADE. 443 
 
 war with England, and that the people of the Southern States 
 were the last to submit to the principles of international law 
 as construed by the authorities of that country. 
 
 In four instances the slaves on board American ships, engaged 
 in the coastwise slave-trade, had found freedom in the Brit 
 ish islands. The slaveholders were much exasperated ; and, 
 although they demanded redress with great vehemence and 
 pertinacity, their feelings were not soothed by success. An 
 other case arose in the autumn of 1841, under circumstances 
 calculated to intensify excitement and imbitter still more their 
 feelings. The brig " Creole," of Richmond, with one hun 
 dred and thirty-five slaves on board, sailed for New Orleans 
 in the latter part of October. On the evening of the 7th of 
 November, near the Bahama Islands, nineteen of the slaves, 
 under the lead of Madison Washington, who is said to have 
 escaped to Canada, and to have returned South with the reso 
 lution to obtain his wife or perish in the attempt, rose and 
 obtained possession of the brig, and directed her to be taken 
 into Nassau, where she arrived two days afterward. In the 
 struggle John R. Howell, a slave-vender, was killed, and Cap 
 tain Gilford, the first mate, and ten of the crew, were wounded. 
 These self-emancipated freemen had it in their power to take 
 the lives of one and all the white persons on board. But they 
 rose superior to revenge and retaliation. Even the wounded 
 captain and crew testified that u the mutineers said that all 
 they had done was for their own freedom." They proved their 
 object was not to take life, but to secure liberty. The British au 
 thorities placed a guard on board the vessel and investigated the 
 circumstances of the case. " The nineteen " of the slaves were 
 held for the purpose of obtaining instructions from the home 
 government, arid the others were allowed to go free. The on> 
 cers of the brig demanded that the mutineers should be left on 
 board, to be taken into some port of the United States and 
 tried for mutiny and murder ; but the authorities positively re 
 fused to give them up. " This was tantamount," says Colonel 
 Benton, in his " Thirty Years' View," " to an acquittal, and 
 even to a justification of all they had done ; as, according to 
 British decisions, a slave has a right to kill his master to 
 obtain his freedom."' 
 
* 
 444 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 This affair greatly inflamed the Southern mind. Southern 
 leaders stormed and Southern presses blustered. They de 
 clared, if Great Britain would not listen to the voice of reason, 
 resort must be had to some other mode of bringing her to her 
 senses and to a just perception of the law of nations ; that the 
 government of the United States would not tamely acquiesce 
 in such gross and oft-repeated invasions of its national rights, 
 and that no man of any party in the South would have patience 
 with " executive, secretary, or minister who should trifle with 
 their impatience or compromise their rights." 
 
 On the 23d of December Mr. Barrow of Louisiana presented 
 a memorial from an insurance company in New Orleans which 
 had taken the risk on these slaves. Mr. Barrow said that Con 
 gress should act, and set forth to the country and the world 
 the principles of international law which were recognized by 
 her and which would be maintained at all hazards. He wished 
 to trust this matter to other agents than the President and the 
 Secretary of State and the Secretary of the British Queen. 
 " The property of the South," he said, " is unsafe ; and, if it is 
 to be subjected to the plundering propensities of British offi 
 cials, they might be compelled to fit out armaments and de 
 stroy Nassau and other nests of incendiaries and plunderers 
 adjacent to our coast." 
 
 Mr. Calhoun regarded the case of the " Creole " as one of 
 the most " atrocious and insulting outrages " ever perpetrated 
 by one civilized government upon another. He proceeded to 
 denounce it as " a case of naked piracy," and called upon the 
 government to demand " the pirates " for punishment ; and he 
 looked to every man who had " an American heart to raise his 
 voice and his arm against such tyrannical insolence and op 
 pression." His colleague, Mr. Preston, said that the law of 
 nations was " clear and imperative " on the question in dispute 
 between the two governments, and he thought Great Britain, 
 whose government was in the hands of an enlightened and 
 liberal-minded statesman, would hardly come in conflict with 
 " this government on such an untenable position." 
 
 Mr. King of Alabama was exceedingly belligerent. He 
 thought these lawless attempts of Great Britain, that grasping 
 
THE COASTWISE SLAVE-TRADE. 445 
 
 at universal dominion, would " render war inevitable," un 
 less she retraced her steps. The memorial was then referred 
 to the Committee on Foreign Relations. On the llth of Feb 
 ruary another debate arose on a resolution, introduced by 
 Mr. Calhoun, requesting the President to communicate to the 
 Senate any authenticated accounts he had received of mur 
 der on the brig " Creole," and the wounding of the captain 
 and mate, by slaves on board, and the occurrences which took 
 place at Nassau after the arrival of the vessel at that port ; 
 what steps had been taken by the Executive for the punish 
 ment of the guilty, the redress of the wrong done to Southern 
 citizens, and the insult offered to the American flag. Mi\ Clay 
 avowed that he had read the narration of the transaction with 
 " the most thrilling and appalling feelings " ; that the " Creole " 
 had been thrown on the Bahama Islands by " an act of mutiny 
 and murder " ; and, if the British authorities sanctioned " the 
 enormity," Americans would be virtually denied the benefits 
 of the coastwise trade around their own country, for their ves 
 sels could not proceed in safety from one port to another with 
 slaves on board. 
 
 Mr. King seized the occasion to denounce Northern Aboli 
 tionists as a set of miserable fanatics and contemptible wretches, 
 who were attempting by every means in their power to disturb 
 the harmony of the government and violate the rights of the 
 South. He said it was settled at an early period of the gov 
 ernment that the citizens of the South were to have secured to 
 them " the right to hold slaves against the world," and he 
 thought " the days of this government were numbered if any 
 respectable part of the United States were disposed to side with 
 Great Britain on the question at issue ; for the South had 
 rights, and they would maintain them at all hazard, whether 
 invaded at home or violated abroad." 
 
 The resolution was adopted, and the President promptly re 
 sponded through Mr. Webster, Secretary of State, showing that 
 the facts in the case had been received by the government, and 
 that the Secretary had received instructions to prepare a de 
 spatch to Mr. Everett, the minister at the Court of St. James, 
 and that it would be done without delay. On moving the refer- 
 
446 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ence of the message to the Committee on Foreign Relations, Mr. 
 Calhoun expressed his regret that it was not satisfactory. He 
 had supposed that prompt measures would have been adopted, 
 and that a vessel would have been despatched to demand, 
 through our minister at London, that the criminals should be 
 given up for trial. But he had been mistaken. He said that the 
 outrage of the British government could not have been greater, 
 nor more clearly contrary to the law of nations, if, instead of 
 taking the persons engaged in " mutiny and murder " from the 
 " Creole," they had entered the territory of the United States 
 and taken them " from our jails." 
 
 Mr. Webster's despatch to Mr. Everett was speedily prepared, 
 at once called for, communicated to the Senate, and published. 
 It gave great satisfaction to the slaveholders. As soon as it 
 was read in the Senate, Mr. Calhoun rose and said : " The let 
 ter which has been read was drawn up with great ability, and 
 covered the ground which has been assumed by all parties in 
 the Senate. I hope that it will have a beneficial effect upon 
 the United States; but upon Great Britain, coming from the 
 quarter it does, this document will do more good than in com 
 ing from any other quarter." 
 
 The British government was assured by Mr. Webster that 
 the case was one " calling loudly for redress " ; that the 
 " Creole " was passing from one port to another of the United 
 States, on a voyage " perfectly lawful," with persons bound to 
 service belonging to American citizens, and recognized as prop 
 erty by thje Constitution of the United States and in those States 
 in which slavery existed ; that the slaves rose, murdered one 
 man, and that the " mutineers and murderers " took the vessel 
 into a British port. He declared that it was the plain and ob 
 vious duty of the authorities of Nassau to assist in restoring to 
 the master and crew their vessel, and in enabling them to re 
 sume their voyage and to take with them the mutineers and 
 murderers to their own country to answer for their crimes. 
 This extraordinary position and claim were laid before the Brit 
 ish government ; but all efforts to secure compensation for the 
 slaves, or the surrender of the men who had asserted and main 
 tained their own liberty, were unavailing. England declined 
 
CENSURE OF MR. GIDDINGS. 447 
 
 to act the ignoble part of a slave-catcher for the slave-traffickers 
 of the United States. 
 
 Mr. Giddings, then a member of the House of Representa 
 tives, was so impressed with the positions of the President and 
 Senate, that he deemed it to be a duty he owed to his country 
 to combat them. He drew up a series of resolutions, setting 
 forth that prior to the adoption of the Constitution each State 
 exercised full and perfect jurisdiction over slaves in its own 
 territory ; that by the adoption of the Constitution no part of 
 that jurisdiction was delegated to the Federal government ; 
 that by the Constitution each State surrendered to the Federal 
 government complete jurisdiction over commerce and naviga 
 tion ; that slavery, being an abridgment of the natural rights 
 of men, could exist only by positive municipal law ; that, 
 when a ship belonging to a citizen of any State left the waters 
 of the United States and entered upon the high seas, the 
 persons on board became amenable to the laws of the United 
 States ; that when the brig u Creole " left Virginia the slavery 
 laws of that State ceased to have jurisdiction over the persons 
 on board ; that in resuming their natural rights they violated 
 no law of the United States, nor incurred any legal penalties ; 
 that all attempts to gain possession of or to re-enslave these 
 persons were unauthorized by the Constitution and laws of the 
 United States ; that all attempts to exert the influence of the 
 nation in favor of the coastwise slave-trade was subversive 
 of the rights of the people of the free States, unauthorized 
 by the Constitution, and prejudicial to the national charac 
 ter. 
 
 These resolutions were submitted to the consideration of 
 Mr. Adams. He avowed his readiness to support them, ex 
 cepting the one denying the right of the Federal government 
 to abolish slavery in the States. He held that the national 
 government, in case of insurrection or war, might, under the 
 war-power, abolish slavery, and, with statesmanlike sagacity 
 and a wise forecast of possible contingencies, which subse 
 quent events proved to be near at hand, he did not wish to 
 give a vote that would be quoted by the friends of slavery as a 
 denial of that power ; " but," he added, " I will cheerfully 
 
448 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 sustain all but that which denies this right to the Federal 
 government." 
 
 When, on the 21st of March, the State of Ohio was called, 
 Mr. Giddings introduced these resolutions, and gave notice 
 that he would call them up for consideration the next day. 
 The reading of the resolutions attracted profound attention, 
 and created much excitement. Mr. Ward, a Democratic 
 member from New York, proposed to bring the House to an 
 immediate vote by demanding the previous question. Re 
 marking that the resolutions were too important to be adopted 
 or rejected without consideration, Mr. Everett of Vermont 
 moved to lay them on the table ; but his motion was defeated 
 by a large majority. Mr. Holmes of South Carolina, rising 
 under great excitement, remarked : " There are certain topics, 
 like certain places, of which it might be said, l Fools rush in 
 where angels fear to tread.' ' The House, by the large vote 
 of one hundred and twenty-two to sixty-one, sustained the pre 
 vious question. Mr. Everett asked to be excused from voting. 
 As the subject was very important, and would probably come 
 before the Committee on Foreign Relations, of which he was a 
 member, he did not desire to express an opinion until he had 
 examined it. He was a gentleman of high character, ripe age, 
 large experience, and of much influence with his party and in 
 the House. Usually moderate and cautious, on this occasion 
 he seemed to be influenced by the excitement around him, and 
 expressed his " utter abhorrence of the firebrand course of the 
 gentleman from Ohio." Mr. Fessenden, then a young and 
 rising member of the House from Maine, thought the resolu 
 tions were too important to be voted upon without greater de 
 liberation. Mr. Gushing, then understood to be a special friend 
 of the President and an exponent of his views, after read 
 ing the resolutions at the clerk's table, said : " They appear to 
 be a British argument on a great question between the British 
 and American governments, and constitute an approximation 
 to treason on which I intend to vote ' No.' ' 
 
 At the request of Mr. Fessenden, Mr. Giddings withdrew 
 the resolutions, remarking that they would be published, and 
 gentlemen would have time to examine them with care, and he 
 
CENSURE OF MR. GIDDINGS. 449 
 
 would present them the next day, when the resolutions would 
 be in order. Mr. Botts then rose and, remarking that the with 
 drawal of the resolutions did not excuse their presentation, sub 
 mitted a preamble and resolution ; the first setting forth that 
 Mr. Giddings had presented a series of resolutions touching 
 the most important interest connected with a large portion of 
 the Union, then a subject of negotiation with the government 
 of Great Britain of the most delicate nature, the result of 
 which " might involve those nations and perhaps the civil 
 ized world in war," in which mutiny and murder were justi 
 fied and approved in terms shocking all sense of law, order, 
 and humanity ; and the latter declaring that this House holds 
 that " the conduct of the said member is altogether incon 
 sistent and unwarranted, and deserving the severest condem 
 nation of the people of this country, and of this body in par 
 ticular." Objection being made to the consideration of the 
 resolution, Mr. Botts moved a suspension of the rules, but 
 was not sustained by a vote of the House. 
 
 As Ohio was still under the call for resolutions, under the 
 rule, Mr. Weller, a Democratic member from that State, 
 adopted Mr. Botts's resolution as his own, offered it, and 
 called for the previous question. Several members questioned 
 the propriety of ordering the previous question ; but Mr. 
 Weller, who was a Democrat of the most intense proslavery 
 type, persisted in demanding it. The Speaker, Mr. White of 
 Kentucky, decided that on a question of privilege the previous 
 question could not cut off a member from his defence. Mr. 
 Fillmore appealed from the decision ; and the House overruled 
 the Speaker by a large majority, and adjourned. 
 
 Thus arraigned for a conscientious discharge of public duty, 
 Mr. Giddings spent the entire night and the forenoon of the 
 next day in preparing for his defence. Calling at the resi 
 dence of Mr. Adams, for the purpose of consultation, he found, 
 he says, u the aged patriot laboring under great distress." He 
 expressed to Mr. Giddings the fear that no defence would be 
 permitted ; that the question would be taken without debate, 
 and the vote of censure passed. Mr. Giddings anticipated the 
 vote of censure ; but he suggested that the reflections of the 
 
 57 
 
450 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 night would convince members of " the impropriety of con 
 demning a man unheard." To this suggestion Mr. Adams 
 made the discriminating and suggestive reply : " You are not 
 as familiar with the slaveholding character as I am. Slave 
 holders act from impulse, not from reflection. They act 
 together from interest, and have no dread of the displeasure 
 of their constituents when they act for slavery." 
 
 On the assembling of the House, the Speaker remarked that 
 the first business was on seconding the demand for the pre 
 vious question. Mr. Weller said he would withdraw his de 
 mand for the previous question if Mr. Giddings would proceed 
 with his defence, with the understanding that it should be 
 called when he closed. But, Mr. Giddings refusing to make 
 any terms to secure what he deemed to be his constitutional 
 right, the previous question was ordered by seven majority. 
 Mr. Weller then moved the suspension of the rules, to allow 
 Mr. Giddings to make his defence ; but the Speaker pro 
 nounced the motion out of order. To the suggestion of Mr. 
 Adams that while the previous question cut off other members 
 it ought not to apply to the member accused, the Speaker re 
 plied that the House had decided that the previous question 
 applied to cases of privilege, and the privilege of one was the 
 privilege of all. 
 
 The motion was made to hear Mr. Giddings by unani 
 mous consent, and it was announced that such consent had 
 been given. Mr. Giddings then said : " Mr. Speaker, I stand 
 before the House in a peculiar position." Mr. Cooper of 
 Georgia then objected to his proceeding, and he took his 
 seat. Members gathered around Mr. Cooper, and persuaded 
 him to withdraw his objection ; but it was renewed by Mr. 
 Calhoun of Massachusetts, who declared that he would not 
 see a member of the House speak under such circumstances. 
 
 Mr. Giddings states that when he rose to speak he had 
 intended to say : " It is proposed to pass a vote of censure 
 upon me, substantially for the reason that I differ in opinion 
 from a majority of the members. The vote is about to be 
 taken without giving me an opportunity to be heard. It were 
 idle for me to say I am ignorant of the disposition of a major- 
 
CENSURE OF MR. GIDDINGS. 451 
 
 ity of the members to pass a vote of censure. I have been 
 violently assailed in a personal manner, but have had no 
 opportunity of being heard in reply. Nor do I ask for any 
 favor at the hands of gentlemen ; but, in the name of an 
 insulted constituency, in behalf of one of the States of this 
 Union, in behalf of the people of these States and of our Fed 
 eral Constitution, I demand a hearing in the ordinary mode 
 of proceeding. I accept no other privilege. I will receive no 
 other courtesy." 
 
 The House, by a vote of one hundred and twenty-five to 
 sixty-nine, adopted the vote of censure. Mr. Giddings then 
 rose and, taking formal leave of the Speaker and officers of 
 the House, retired from the hall. As he reached the front 
 door he met Mr. Clay and Mr. Crittenden. Mr. Giddings 
 states that " as Mr. Clay extended to me his hand he 
 thanked me for the firmness with which I had met the outrage 
 perpetrated upon me, and declared that no man would ever 
 doubt my perfect right to state my own views, particularly 
 while the Executive and the Senate were expressing theirs." 
 Mr. Giddings immediately resigned, returned to Ohio, issued an 
 address to the people of his district, was re-elected by a largely 
 increased majority, and in five weeks took his seat in the 
 House, " clothed with instructions from the people of his 
 district to re-present his resolutions, and maintain to the 
 extent of his power the doctrine which they asserted." He 
 received a warm greeting from the friends of the freedom of 
 debate, who had bravely stood by him in his time of trial. 
 
 The action of the House of Representatives, thus signally 
 rebuked by Mr. Giddings's constituents, was also condemned 
 by public meetings, whose proceedings were presented to Con 
 gress. Even some Democratic papers, among them the New 
 York " Evening Post," asserted the right of Mr. Giddings to 
 present his resolutions. And William C. Bryant, its accom 
 plished editor, declared that if he was a resident of Mr. Gid 
 dings's district he would use every honorable means to secure 
 his re-election. This action of the people produced most 
 marked effects upon Congress. The majority who censured 
 Mr. Giddings, fearing if the resolutions were again intro- 
 
452 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 duced they would be compelled to vote upon the principles em 
 bodied in them, voted, during the remainder of the session, 
 when by the rules resolutions might be presented, to proceed to 
 other business. Finding he could not present the resolutions, 
 he reasserted and vindicated the principles embodied in them 
 in an able and effective speech, which was listened to without 
 interruption. Indeed, notwithstanding all their bluster and 
 arrogant pretension, there seemed from that time a marked 
 falling-oif in their zeal, and a manifest disposition to desist 
 from claims they had just declared their purpose to press even 
 to and beyond the very verge of war. And this, notwithstand 
 ing the significant fact that the British ministry had not only 
 refused the indemnity so clamorously demanded, but declined 
 to deliver up Madison Washington and his compeers of the 
 u Creole's " brave " nineteen," stigmatized by members of 
 Congress as " murderers and mutineers." When Lord Ash- 
 burton was charged with the mission of settling all questions 
 of difference between the two nations, the British government 
 especially instructed him to hold no correspondence on points 
 pertaining to this controversy. 
 
 This sudden change of tactics of Southern members not 
 only appears in marked contrast with their previous violent 
 demonstrations, but provokes no very flattering estimate of 
 the course of those Northern senators who had not a single 
 vote to cast against the resolutions of Mr. Calhoun, which 
 defiantly demanded what even the South itself found it con 
 venient to forget. Indeed, that absence of a single negative, 
 that unbroken silence, spoke louder than words. Trumpet- 
 tongued it proclaimed the vassalage of the nation to the Slave 
 Power, and the ignoble and cruel bondage under which the 
 parties and public men of those days were held. It revealed 
 the humiliating fact that they were obliged to smother their 
 convictions and ignore the claims of truth, and were com 
 pelled to take the weightiest questions of government and 
 those of national importance from the high court of reason 
 and conscience into the secret conclave of party cabals, in 
 spired by the spirit of slavery and under the discipline of the 
 plantation. If the time ever comes when " things " shall be 
 
CENSURE OF MR. GIDDINGS. 453 
 
 " what they seem," and conscience and candor shall take the 
 place of mere policy and pretension, it will be regarded as 
 among the marvels of history that men acting from such mo 
 tives in 'their public capacity should ever exhibit anything hon 
 orable and hearty in their personal and social relations, or that 
 a representation acquiescing and participating in such an ad 
 ministration of public affairs could be anything but demoral 
 ized and debauched in the personnel of which it was composed. 
 
 Mr. Giddings had been appointed, by the Speaker, chairman 
 of the Committee on Claims, a position he held at the time of 
 his resignation, when another was appointed for the remainder 
 of the session. At the beginning of the next session, an un 
 availing effort was made by Southern members to induce the 
 Speaker not to reappoint Mr. Giddings to this important post. 
 Mr. White, a personal friend of Mr. Clay, and among the most 
 liberal of Southern statesmen, had pronounced the vote of cen 
 sure an outrage, and without hesitation made Mr. Giddings 
 chairman again of the committee. Consisting of nine mem 
 bers, it was composed of four Northern and two Southern 
 Whigs, one Southern and two Northern Democrats. The 
 three Democrats and two Southern Whigs had given their 
 votes for the censure, and they deemed it a humiliation to sit 
 with him as chairman. They accordingly determined to re 
 vive an old rule of the House, which had practically become 
 obsolete, authorizing the committees to choose their own chair 
 men. A member of the committee apprised Mr. Giddings of 
 this purpose, and advised him to resign. Having, however, 
 acted according to the dictates of his conscience, he chose to 
 abide the result. Mr. Arnold, a slaveholding Whig of Tennes 
 see, refusing to support a scheme which he styled an outrage on 
 a member because he was opposed to slavery, the project fell 
 through and Mr. Giddings was permitted to retain his position. 
 
 But Mr. Giddings's earnest and outspoken fidelity to princi 
 ple and to the cause of human rights often involved him in 
 conflicts and exposed him to personal dangers, which well 
 illustrated at once the coarse brutality and domineering vio 
 lence of the slave-masters and the rough road they were called 
 to travel who dared to question their supremacy and oppose 
 
454 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 their policy. A somewhat marked example occurred near the 
 close of the session in 1845. For the purpose of exhibiting 
 the rascality of slaveholding demands, and the guilty sub 
 serviency and complicity of the government in yielding to 
 those demands, he referred to the treaty of Indian Spring, by 
 which, after paying the slaveholders of Georgia the sum of 
 $ 109,000 for slaves who had escaped to Florida, it added the 
 sum of $ 141,000 as compensation demanded for " the off 
 spring which the females would have borne to their masters had 
 they remained in bondage." And, said Mr. Giddings, Con 
 gress actually paid that sum " for children who were never 
 born, but who might have been if their parents had remained 
 faithful slaves." 
 
 Mr. Giddings's characterization of these outrageous and inde 
 cent demands and of this utterly indefensible policy greatly 
 nettled the Southern members. Mr. Black of Georgia, in a 
 towering passion, poured forth a torrent of coarse invectives 
 and insinuations. He charged that Mr. Giddings had been 
 interested in the horses and wagon lost by Mr. Torrey in his 
 attempt to aid escaping fugitives ; that Torrey died in the peni 
 tentiary ; that the member of Ohio ought to be there ; and, if 
 Congress could decide the question, that would be his doom. 
 With low-minded impertinence, he advised him to return to 
 his constituents to " inquire if he had a character," asserting 
 that he had none in that hall. To this gross assault Mr. Gid 
 dings replied with becoming dignity and force. Alluding to 
 the policy which would throw around all executive and con 
 gressional action in behalf of slavery the shield " of perpetual 
 silence," he said he did not hold the member from Georgia so 
 much responsible as he did "the more respectable members" 
 who stood around him, for the display of that " brutal coarse 
 ness which nothing but the moral putridity of slavery could 
 encourage." What he had said, he contended, were historic 
 facts that could not be disproved. To the personal assault he 
 should make no other reply than that he stood there clothed 
 with the confidence of an intelligent constituency, while his 
 antagonist, alluding to Mr. Black's failure to secure a re-elec 
 tion, had been discarded. 
 
CENSUEE OF ME. GIDDINGS. 455 
 
 Of course, language so direct and severe did but fan to a 
 fiercer flame the fire that was already raging, and a collision 
 seemed inevitable. Mr. Black, approaching Mr. Giddings with 
 an uplifted cane, said : " If you repeat those words I will knock 
 you down." The latter repeating them, the former was seized 
 by his friends and borne from the hall. Mr. Dawson of Lou 
 isiana, who on a previous occasion had attempted to assault him, 
 approaching him and, cocking his pistol, profanely exclaimed : 
 " I '11 shoot him ; by G d I '11 shoot him ! " At the same mo 
 ment, Mr. Causin of Maryland placed himself in front of Mr. 
 Dawson, with his right hand upon his weapon concealed in his 
 bosom. At this juncture four members from the Democratic 
 side took their position by the side of the member from Louisi 
 ana, each man putting his hand in his pocket and apparently 
 grasping his weapon. At the same moment Mr. Rayner of 
 North Carolina, Mr. Hudson of Massachusetts, and Mr. Foot 
 of Vermont, came to Mr. Giddings's rescue, who, thus con 
 fronted and thus supported, continued his speech. Dawson 
 stood fronting him till its close, and Causin remained facing 
 the latter until he returned to the Democratic side. Thus de 
 moralized and imbruted seemed the men, even those high in 
 station, who assumed to be the champions of slavery and its 
 policy. Upon such men moral considerations were lost. The 
 only forces they ever respected were those of physical power. 
 
CHAPTER XXXII. 
 
 THE "AMISTAD" CAPTIVES. 
 
 Demands of Slavery. The "Amistad" captured by the Africans. Taken to 
 New London. Africans claimed as Slaves. Demands of the Spanish Min 
 ister. Africans before the District Court. Conduct of District Attorney. 
 Instructions of the Secretary of State. A Committee appointed to aid the 
 Africans. The Attorney- General of the United States. Africans held for 
 Trial. Decision of the Circuit Court. President. Declaration of the 
 Secretary of State. Appeal to the Supreme Court. Efforts of the Com 
 mittee. Mr. Adams employed. His Argument. Arraignment of the 
 President and his Cabinet. Discharge of the Prisoners. Labors of Lewis 
 Tappan. 
 
 THE year 1839 was signalized by an event which, with its 
 antecedent and attending circumstances and consequent re 
 sults, produced a deep and wide-spread feeling throughout the 
 country. Involving other nations and people, it afforded a 
 marked illustration of what had been made manifest by other 
 developments, that slavery, though a local system and con 
 fined to a particular section of the country, extended its in 
 fluence and urged its demands not only in other portions of 
 the land, but in other lands. Not content with dominant con 
 trol over that particular section cursed with its immediate pres 
 ence, it would subsidize and subvert every section, and make 
 every interest subservient to its exacting behests. Nor, reach 
 ing farther than its own territorial limits, did it hesitate to 
 embroil friendly nations with its inhuman demands and un 
 righteous claims. 
 
 By the laws of Spain the slave-trade was prohibited ; and 
 Africans introduced by slavers, in contravention of such laws, 
 were declared to be free. In violation of those laws, however, 
 in June, 1839, a slaver, under Portuguese colors, landed a cargo 
 of kidnapped Africans near Havana. A few days after, Ruiz 
 
THE "AMISTAD" CAPTIVES. 457 
 
 and Montes, Spanish slave-dealers, purchasing a number of 
 them, obtained license from the government to transport fifty- 
 two of them as " legal slaves " from Havana to Principe, about 
 a hundred leagues distant. Of course, being confined in bar- 
 racoons, they had no one to represent their case to the govern 
 ment or captain-general, and to vindicate their rightful claim 
 to freedom. But failing to secure their liberty by legal process 
 they took the matter into their own hands. Embarked on 
 board the " Amistad," five days out, they rose upon the cap 
 tain and crew, under the lead of Cinque, one of their number, 
 and made an attempt to regain their liberty. In the struggle 
 which ensued they killed the captain and cook, but spared the 
 lives of the crew and passengers, including the slave-dealers 
 themselves. They then ordered the vessel to be steered for 
 their native land ; but, unacquainted with navigation, they 
 were deceived by those who profited by their ignorance, and 
 the " Amistad " was taken into American waters. Nor did 
 they discover their mistake until they reached Long Island 
 Sound, and their vessel was taken into New London, Con 
 necticut, by Lieutenant Gedney, of the United States brig 
 " Washington." Here they were seized and committed to 
 prison on the charge of murder, by a warrant issued by the 
 district judge of the United States Court. Ruiz and Montes 
 claimed the ship, cargo, and Africans, though the latter repre 
 sented that they were free men. Lieutenant Gedney and 
 some of the inhabitants of Long Island, who had arrested a 
 number of the negroes going on shore for water, claimed sal 
 vage, as if they had been so many bales of merchandise, 
 showing that even Northern men, when they could profit by 
 ignoring the claims of humanity and the rights of man, were 
 only too ready to do it. 
 
 The Spanish minister at Washington, seemingly oblivious of 
 the infraction of the laws of his government involved in this 
 transaction, demanded the vessel and cargo under the treaty 
 of 1795, and also claimed that the negroes should be conveyed 
 to Havana under the pretence of their being tried by the Span 
 ish laws which they had violated. He pressed his claim on 
 the ground of the preservation of order and peace in Cuba. 
 
 58 
 
458 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 He even went so far as to maintain that, if they were to be 
 tried, convicted, and executed as pirates and assassins in Con 
 necticut, the effect would not be so salutary as if they were 
 tried, convicted, and executed in Cuba. 
 
 Mr. Holabird was at that time district attorney of Connec 
 ticut, and Mr, Judson was district judge. The latter had 
 made himself notorious, a few years before, by his opposition to 
 Miss Prudence CrandalPs colored school, and his zeal on that 
 occasion had, unquestionably, secured his appointment. The 
 district attorney hastened to write to the Secretary of State 
 that these Africans could not be tried for murder in the courts 
 of the United States. In his anxiety to procure their convic 
 tion, he inquired whether there were not treaty stipulations 
 with Spain that would authorize " our government " to deliver 
 them up to Spanish authorities ; and, if so, " whether it would 
 be done before our court sits." Of course, the Secretary of 
 State knew there was no such treaty, and that the Constitu 
 tion gave the President no power to supersede the criminal 
 warrants of the United States. But he instructed the district 
 attorney " to take care that no proceedings of your Circuit 
 Court, or any other judicial tribunal, place the vessel, cargo, 
 or slaves beyond the control of the Federal Executive." This 
 assumption by the Secretary of State that these Africans were 
 slaves afforded but another illustration of the influence of slav 
 ery over the government, as it indicated the stern control of 
 the Slave Power. 
 
 The demands of Mr. Calderon, the Spanish minister, for the 
 surrender of these Africans, who were held in slavery without 
 even the forms of law, and who had so heroically asserted 
 their freedom and struck brave blows to effect their return to 
 their native land, were strenuously advocated by the Southern 
 press and by the proslavery journals of the North. These 
 homeless strangers found, however, humane, generous, and 
 discreet friends. A committee, consisting of S. S. Jocelyn, 
 Joshua Leavitt, and Lewis Tappan, was appointed in New 
 York to solicit funds, employ counsel, and see that their inter 
 ests and rights were faithfully cared for. Seth P. Staples and 
 Theodore Sedgwick, Jr., who had been employed by this com- 
 
 
THE "AMISTAD" CAPTIVES. 459 
 
 mittee to act as their counsel, addressed a letter to President 
 Van Buren, denying that these Africans were slaves ; contend 
 ing that in rising they only obeyed the dictates of self-defence ; 
 and praying that their case should not be decided " in the 
 recesses of the Cabinet, where these unfriended men can have 
 no counsel and can produce no proof ; but in the halls of Jus 
 tice, with the safeguards she throws around the unfriended and 
 oppressed." This letter was submitted to Mr. Grundy, the 
 Attorney-General of the United States. He was a devotee of 
 slavery and a violent and bitter opponent of emancipation. 
 As a senator he had manifested his hatred of antislavery 
 men, and had shamelessly avowed his approval of lynching 
 Abolitionists. Of course, he looked with horror upon the 
 heroic conduct of these black men, and was in favor of surren 
 dering 'them to the Spanish authorities. He avowed that he 
 could not see any " legal principle upon which the government 
 would be justified in going into an investigation for the pur 
 pose of ascertaining the facts set forth in the papers clearing 
 the vessel from one Spanish port to another " as evidence 
 whether or not these negroes were slaves. 
 
 The lives and liberties of these Africans were in peril ; but 
 the first law officer of the United States government saw no 
 legal principle involved, on which the courts of the country 
 could inquire into the genuineness of papers believed to be 
 spurious by all persons not influenced by interest or passion. 
 He even went so far as to say that, as these negroes were 
 charged with violating Spanish laws, it was proper that they 
 should be surrendered to that government, so that, if they had 
 violated any of its laws, " they might not escape punishment." 
 Mr. Grundy had the reputation in Tennessee of being a skilful 
 criminal lawyer. But he went so far as even to avow it as his 
 opinion that the proper mode of executing the treaty would be 
 for the President to issue his order directing the marshal to de 
 liver the vessel and cargo to such persons as might be desig 
 nated by the Spanish minister. Thus, in his opinion, the 
 President was to constitute himself " court and jury." Was it 
 not strange indeed that he should have forgotten that the 
 President of the United States had no authority to surrender 
 
460 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 fugitives from justice to foreign governments unless authorised 
 to do so by treaty stipulations ? 
 
 The Circuit Court assembled at Hartford on the 17th of Sep 
 tember. The Africans were held in custody on the charge of 
 murder. An attachment was also issued from the District 
 Court against the " Amistad " and her cargo in behalf of Ruiz 
 and Montes, and of Lieutenant Gedney for salvage on vessel 
 and cargo. The district attorney, in behalf of the govern 
 ment, claimed possession of the vessel ; so that the negroes if 
 they were slaves could be returned to their Spanish owners, 
 and if they were free could be returned to Africa, according 
 to the provisions of the treaty of 1819. Justice Thompson, 
 of the Circuit Court, decided that the Africans could not be 
 held for trial for murder committed on the seas, on board of a 
 Spanish vessel ; but he refused to discharge them, on the 
 ground that they were held in custody by the District Court in 
 consequence of libels and attachments against them. 
 
 The new Spanish minister, De Argaiz, on the 26th of No 
 vember, in a communication to the Secretary of State, denied 
 the right of the courts of the United States to take cognizance 
 of the case, and complained that, in consequence of delay, pub 
 lic vengeance had not been satisfied ; " for, be it recollected," 
 he added, " that the legation of Spain does not demand the 
 delivery of slaves, but of assassins." In another communica 
 tion he states that the Secretary of State informed him that 
 the District Court, when it should meet on the 7th of January, 
 might order the restitution of the vessel, cargo, and negroes, 
 and that it would be necessary for the Spanish government to 
 take charge of them as soon as the court should pronounce its 
 sentence. Thus the Secretary of State not only anticipated 
 the action of the District Court, but warned the Spanish minis 
 ter to take charge of these negroes as soon as the decision of 
 the court should be known. 
 
 This minister also preferred the bold request that the Presi 
 dent should order the transportation of the negroes in a gov 
 ernment vessel to Cuba, immediately on their release. Nor 
 did the President refuse even this extraordinary demand, 
 but gave immediate orders that such a vessel should be in 
 
THE "AMISTAD" CAPTIVES. 461 
 
 readiness to receive and convey them to Cuba, with instruc 
 tions to deliver them to the captain-general of that island. 
 And that vessel was actually anchored off the harbor of New 
 Haven three days after the court assembled, to be in readiness, 
 as falsely alleged, to give these negroes an " opportunity to 
 prove their freedom," when it had been asserted by the minis 
 ter himself that they were " claimed as assassins, and not as 
 slaves." Before the court assembled Lieutenants Gedney and 
 Meade were ordered to hold themselves in readiness to go to 
 Cuba with the negroes.- They had captured the " Amistad " ; 
 and they were ordered to go to Cuba, at the expense of the 
 United States, " for the purpose," as alleged, " of affording 
 their testimony in any proceedings that may be ordered by the 
 authorities of Cuba in the matter." They were not sent to 
 Cuba to prove the freedom of the negroes ; but to establish the 
 fact that the vessel was in their possession, a fact that would 
 aid, not in giving them their freedom, but in sending them to 
 death. 
 
 The court, however, decided that the papers of Ruiz and 
 Montes were fraudulent ; that the negroes were native Africans 
 illegally imported ; that they were not slaves ; and that they 
 should be sent back to Africa, according to the treaty of 1819. 
 No sooner was the decision made than, by order of the Secre 
 tary of State, the district attorney took an appeal to the Circuit 
 Court. Indeed, every facility was afforded by the officials of 
 the government to the Spanish minister and to the pretended 
 owners of the negroes to carry out their inhuman and illegal 
 purpose. The district attorney had requested assistant coun 
 sel, and the sum of two hundred dollars was allowed for that 
 purpose ; and for that paltry amount Ralph I. Ingersoll, a 
 Democratic politician and lawyer, who afterward represented 
 the government at the Court of St. Petersburg, undertook the 
 task. 
 
 The district attorney, who seemed equally intent with the 
 Spanish minister and the administration to secure the return 
 to Cuba and to death of these victims of slaveholding and 
 piratical zeal, sent a messenger to Washington to correct a 
 clerical mistake in the President's warrant; so that they 
 
462 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 might be held, it was said, " should the pretended friends 
 of the negroes obtain a writ of habeas corpus" Mr. Forsyth 
 hastened to have the error corrected, and in returning it be 
 trayed the spirit and purpose of the President and his Cabinet 
 by this unmistakable declaration : " I have to state, by direc 
 tion of the President, that, if the decision of the court is such 
 as is anticipated, the order of the President is to be carried 
 into execution, unless an appeal shall actually have been inter 
 posed. You are not to take it for granted that it will be in 
 terposed." The meaning of this instruction was that, if the 
 counsel for the Africans did not instantly make an appeal, they 
 were to be hurried on board the " Grampus," a national vessel, 
 sent for the purpose, and carried to Cuba for trial. Indeed, so 
 much in earnest were the friends of the measure that on the 
 very day the court assembled the order had been sent by the 
 President to the marshal for that very purpose. And so fla 
 gitious and barefaced was deemed this order, that some of Mr. 
 Van Buren's friends afterward represented that it was issued 
 without his knowledge by his sanguine and not over-scrupulous 
 secretary, who seemed to have acted on the assumption of the 
 Spanish minister that the trial and conviction of the Africans 
 in Cuba would exert a more salutary influence than their trial 
 and conviction here. 
 
 An appeal had been taken to the Circuit Court which, through 
 Justice Thompson, affirmed the decision of the District Court. 
 An appeal was then taken to the Supreme Court. Conse 
 quently, when an effort was made by Mr. Baldwin, one of the 
 counsel for the Africans, at the September term, to have the 
 appeal dismissed, the judge decided that, as an appeal had been 
 taken, by the consent of both parties, to the Supreme Court, 
 that motion could only be made there. At the same time un 
 successful efforts were made by Mr. Tappan and others, through 
 Mr. Baldwin and Mr. Kimberly, to secure from the judge their 
 release from prison in order that they might be more comfort 
 ably cared for by their friends, and that proper attention might 
 be given to their education. 
 
 For this trial before the Supreme Court the most ample prep 
 arations were made. The committee, without stint of care 
 
THE "AMISTAD" CAPTIVES. 463 
 
 or money, had determined that no means within their reach 
 should be spared to make it worthy of the august tribunal, 
 and the more august cause. In addition to the four able 
 lawyers already engaged, they sought the aid of John Quincy 
 Adams, the venerable ex-president, the old man eloquent. He 
 promptly responded to the call ; and, without other fee than 
 the consciousness of doing good, brought his great learn 
 ing and forensic ability, his commanding position and well- 
 earned reputation, to the advocacy of the cause of these help 
 less men. 
 
 In his plea, of great ability, learning, and eloquence, of 
 some three hours' length, he presented the case not only with 
 a cogent argument in behalf of his pagan clients, but with stern 
 condemnation of the government and its obsequious officials, 
 from the President downward, who were exhibiting such un 
 seemly alacrity to do the bidding of the fleshmongers, and 
 who were, he showed, carrying out, in law and fact, the slave- 
 pirate's voyage that began on the coast of Africa. He main 
 tained that these Africans had been torn from their own coun 
 try, shipped against the laws of Spain, against the laws of the 
 United States, against the laws of nations ; that their passage 
 on the " Amistad " was, in law and in fact, a continuance of the 
 original voyage ; that sixteen had perished through the cruel 
 treatment they had received from Ruiz and Montes, and that 
 their ghosts must sit heavy on their souls through the closing 
 hours of life. He referred to the extraordinary order of the 
 Secretary of State to the district attorney of Connecticut to 
 take care lest the decisions of that court or any other court 
 should place these Africans beyond the control of the Presi 
 dent. He said it was in consequence of that order the case 
 had reached the Supreme Court. Instead .of the course he 
 had pursued, it was the duty of the Secretary of State to have 
 instantly answered the Spanish minister, and to have told him 
 that his demands were utterly inadmissible, and that the Presi 
 dent of the United States had no power to do the things he 
 required. He should have said that he could not deliver up 
 the ship to the owner, because that owner was dead ; that 
 the question depended upon the courts ; that a declaration to 
 
464 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the President that the courts of the United States had no 
 authority to try the case involved an offensive demand ; and 
 that delivering up the negroes by the President, as required, 
 and sending them beyond the seas for trial, thus making the 
 President a mere " constable, a catchpole," was also inadmis 
 sible, as the President had no power to arrest and deliver up 
 any person whatever. He said the Secretary of State should 
 have set the President right in this matter ; but that he had 
 never answered one of these demands, had never corrected one 
 of these representations, nor asserted the rights of the nation 
 against these extraordinary and unauthorized demands. 
 
 " He has degraded the country," said Mr. Adams, " in the 
 face of the whole civilized world, not only by allowing these 
 demands to remain unanswered, but by proceeding, I am 
 obliged to say, throughout the whole transaction, as if the 
 Executive were earnestly desirous to comply with every one 
 of these demands." Inquiring why the Spanish minister per 
 sisted in his pretensions, he answered his own question by 
 saying that it was because " he was not told instantly, without 
 the delay of an hour, that this government could never admit 
 such a claim, and would be offended if they were repeated, 
 or any portion of them." " Yet all these claims," he said, 
 " monstrous, absurd, and inadmissible as they are, have been 
 urged and repeated for eighteen months on our government, 
 and an American Secretary of State evades answering them, 
 evades it to such an extent that the Spanish minister 
 reproaches him for not answering his arguments." He also 
 referred to the singular conclusion to which Mr. Grundy, the 
 Attorney-General, arrived in advising that the President should 
 give an order for the delivery of the slaves, as he assumed 
 them to be, to the Spanish authorities. He said that the 
 American Secretary of State had told the Spanish minister 
 that the Cabinet had adopted that opinion ; and he asked why 
 the President and his Cabinet had not acted upon it, why 
 they had not delivered these men, being at that time in the 
 judicial custody of the courts of the United States, to the 
 Spanish government. " Why," he asked, " did not the Presi 
 dent send an order at once to the marshal to seize these men, 
 
THE "AMISTAD" CAPTIVES. 465 
 
 and ship them beyond the seas, or deliver them to the Spanish 
 minister ? I am ashamed I am ashamed of my country 
 that such an opinion should have been delivered by any public 
 officer, especially by the legal counsellor of the Executive. I 
 am ashamed to stand up before the nations of the earth with 
 such an opinion recorded before us as official ; and, still more, 
 adopted by the Cabinet, which did not dare to do the deed." 
 
 This terrible arraignment by Mr. Adams of the administra 
 tion and its official advisers will seem to be richly merited by 
 those who have read the correspondence. Mr. Forsyth was an 
 able man, both in the Senate and in the Cabinet, ready in 
 debate, and a leading man in his party. Deeply imbued with 
 its spirit, like the extreme men of his section, he was blindly 
 devoted to the slave system. This clouded his judgment, per 
 verted his conscience, and led him to indorse conduct and 
 defend positions which otherwise his training and experience 
 in public affairs must have shown him to be wholly untenable 
 and wrong. And yet, with all this explanation, none can 
 read the correspondence evoked by this case not merely of 
 Southern men like Forsyth and Grundy, but of a Northern 
 President and his officials in Connecticut without sharing 
 largely in the feeling of shame which Mr. Adams confessed in 
 his plea before the Supreme Court. 
 
 Mr. Adams closed with a tender allusion to the change in 
 the personnel and surroundings of the court since his admis 
 sion to practise before it, thirty-seven years before, which 
 greatly affected all present. The opinion of the court was 
 delivered by Justice Story. It held that the Africans were 
 kidnapped and unlawfully transported to Cuba ; that they 
 were purchased by Ruiz and Montes with a knowledge of the 
 fact ; that they were free ; that they did not become pirates 
 and robbers in taking possession of the " Amistad," and in 
 attempting to regain their native country; that there was 
 nothing in the treaty with Spain that justified the claim for 
 their surrender ; and that the United States was bound to 
 respect their rights, as much as those of Spanish subjects. 
 The decision was pronounced in these words : " Our opinion is, 
 that the decree of the Circuit Court affirming that of the Dis- 
 
 59 
 
466 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 trict Court, ought to be affirmed except so far as it directs the 
 negroes to be delivered to the President, to be transported to 
 Africa, in pursuance of the Act of the 3d of March, 1819 ; 
 and as to this it ought to be reversed, and that the said 
 negroes be declared to be free, and be dismissed from the cus 
 tody of the court and go without day." 
 
 As soon as the decision of the court was pronounced, Mr. 
 Adams addressed to Lewis Tappan this exultant note : " The 
 captives are free. The part of the decree of the District 
 Court which placed them at the disposal of the President 
 of the United States, to be sent to Africa, is removed. They 
 are to be discharged from the custody of the marshal FREE. 
 The rest of the decision of the court below is affirmed." 
 
 This result was very gratifying to the better portion of the 
 country ; but it must have been specially gratifying to Mr. 
 Tappan, to whom by common consent, more than to any other 
 man in America, were the Africans indebted for their deliver 
 ance and freedom. Mr. Leavitt, a member with Mr. Tappan 
 of the committee, well expressed the general sentiment of 
 those who knew : " His determined benevolence, his untiring 
 vigilance, his never-failing resources in times of difficulty, his 
 immovable decision of character, and his facility in the de 
 spatch of business, have often stood, humanly speaking, be 
 tween them and defeat There is not another man who 
 
 both could and would have done what he has done." Nor did 
 he cease his labors when they were rescued from the very jaws 
 of impending destruction. Leaving his large and exacting 
 business, he spent days, and weeks even, in visiting New Eng 
 land and other portions of the North in their behalf, coun 
 selling with friends, soliciting subscriptions, and perfecting 
 arrangements, which were afterward carried into effect, for 
 making their return to Africa the beginning of the Mendi Mis 
 sion, which has been sustained to the present time. 
 
 Though the claims of Ruiz and Montes, the demands of the 
 Spanish minister, and the machinations of the administration 
 had been baffled, and the captives restored to their native 
 land, additional efforts were made in behalf of the claimants. 
 In 1844, Charles J. Ingersoll of Pennsylvania, chairman of 
 
THE "AMISTAD" CAPTIVES. 467 
 
 the Committee on Foreign Affairs in the House of Represen 
 tatives, reported a bill to pay the sum of seventy thousand 
 dollars to the pretended owners of the " Amistad " captives. 
 The report was long and elaborate, and its author moved the 
 printing of ten thousand copies. Mr. Giddings at once as 
 sailed and demolished its baseless assumptions and fallacious 
 reasonings. A motion was made to lay it on the table ; but 
 its author recoiling from the well-directed blows of Mr. Gid 
 dings, learning that Mr. Adams was intending to follow, and 
 seeking to avert the still further damage he justly apprehended 
 from his learning, logic, and fervid eloquence, voted himself 
 for the motion. 
 
 Though Mr. Ingersoll's cowardly action prevented Mr. Adams 
 from making his speech in the House, it did not prevent its pub 
 lication in the papers as a speech intended to be made. Mas 
 ter of the subject, his feelings deeply interested by his former 
 connection with the case, and exasperated by the dastardly 
 and dishonorable proposition to pay these base and bloody men, 
 his speech was a merciless exposure of the falsehoods of the re 
 port, and a deserved excoriation of him who was willing to pros 
 titute the power and property of the government for ends so mer 
 cenary and mean. He fitly characterized the zeal manifested 
 by the committee in behalf of these infamous slave-traders ; 
 the unfair dealing of their report with the laws of the land, its 
 treaties, and the judges of its courts ; its sympathy with slav 
 ery and the slave-trade, betrayed in its assertion that the act 
 of Congress declaring the slave-trade piracy to be a " prepos 
 terous enactment " ; and that the article in the treaty of Ghent 
 for the entire abolition of the traffic was put in by Great 
 Britain, from sinister motives and for selfish purposes. 
 
 Referring to Mr. Giddings's speech, he said that it " had ex 
 posed to the scorn and contempt of the House some of the 
 false and spurious principles of international law thick sown 
 throughout the report " ; but " the putrid mass of personal 
 slander" poured upon the district attorney and judge, and 
 upon the judges of the Supreme Court of the United States, 
 has not been exposed as it deserves. Mr. Ingersoll had stated 
 that Lieutenant Gedney had taken possession of the " Amis- 
 
468 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 tad " on the 26th of August, 1840, instead of the 26th of 
 August, 1839 ; and on this mistake or misstatement he had 
 reared his argument and made his arraignment. With scath 
 ing denunciation and withering sarcasm Mr. Adams thus char 
 acterized this change of date : " The masterpiece," he said, 
 " of the whole report is the falsification, on its first page, of 
 the date of their seizure of the ' Amistad ' and the negroes 
 by Lieutenant Gedney. Upon that falsehood hinges all the 
 subsequent semblance of an argument to discredit the decis 
 ion of the courts that the negroes were persons just landed, 
 and not persons longer in the country and familiar with the 
 language, freemen, and not slaves. Restore the true date, 
 August 26, 1839, and the long train of subsequent argumen 
 tation to vilify the judges and shatter their righteous judg 
 ment loses even the brightness of ingenious sophistry. It is 
 coarse, glaring, stupid, shameless, unmitigated falsehood. Re 
 store the true date, 
 
 ' And all the demon starts up from the toad. ' " 
 
 Nor did Mr. Adams spare President Van Buren, or his Sec 
 retary of State, Mr. Forsyth, or his Attorney-General, Mr. 
 Grundy. Referring to the order of Mr. Van Buren, which he 
 characterized as the most extraordinary act of despotism ever 
 performed by a President of the United States, to the marshal 
 of Connecticut to deliver on board the schooner " Grampus " 
 the negroes of the " Amistad," he asked : " Was this order 
 given in a country where the rights of person are words with 
 out meaning ? in the Kingdom of Dahomey ? in the region 
 where the bowstring is the warrant of execution ? It was 
 given in the land of the Declaration of Independence, in the 
 land of the self-evident truths. It was given by the President 
 of the United States. It was, of course, null and void ; and 
 if before the decision of the court it had been delivered to the 
 marshal, and he had executed it, he would have staked not 
 only the lives of the negroes, but his own head, and that of 
 Martin Van Buren, the signer of the order, upon the event." 
 The report and bill were never acted upon, and the country 
 was spared the disgrace of paying a claim so preposterous and 
 wicked ; but not the disgrace of an administration and many 
 
THE "AMISTAD" CAPTIVES. 469 
 
 of the leading members of the government who favored it and 
 gave it their personal and official sanction. 
 
 In all the acts of slavery's grim tragedy there have been few- 
 scenes which presented more elements of interest than that of 
 the u Amistad " captives. With two continents and the wide 
 Atlantic for its theatre ; with the robber chiefs of Africa, the 
 slave-pirates of the ocean, the representatives of a European 
 monarchy, and an American republic for actors, seemingly en 
 gaged in a common cause and inspired by a common spirit ; it 
 presented through the whole, with dramatic variety and force, 
 the strangest contrasts and the most unlooked-for and contra 
 dictory combinations. It presented barbarism in its rudest and 
 most repulsive aspects, and Christianity in its most attractive 
 and lovely attitude. It began with the midnight hunt for cap 
 tives in the wilds of Africa ; it closed by Christian men and 
 women sending and accompanying these captives back to Africa, 
 to plant churches and schools among their benighted country 
 men. Through the whole, however, the one dark and hideous 
 fact stands out that slavery is essentially the same, its adher 
 ents substantially alike. A system of violence, impatient of 
 all restraints, whether of reason or of conscience, humanity 
 or religion, the laws of the heart or the laws of the State, it 
 seems mainly intent on compassing its own ends, by whatever 
 means and at whatever hazards. It was the same in Africa 
 and in America ; in the barracoon and in the middle passage ; 
 under a monarchy or in a republic ; in a Pagan, Catholic, or 
 Protestant country. 
 
CHAPTER XXXIII. 
 
 THE PRIGG CASE. THE USE OP ITS JAILS FORBIDDEN BY MASSA 
 CHUSETTS. AN AMENDMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION PROPOSED. 
 
 Various Interpretations of the Constitution. Margarette Morgan. Prigg 
 Case. Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. Supreme Court of the United 
 States. Decision. State Legislation not required. Taney. Daniel. 
 Jurisdiction of the Government. Supreme Court of Massachusetts. State 
 Laws repealed. Laws against the Use of Jails. Latimer's Arrest. Trial. 
 City Officers. Excitement. Public Meetings. Meeting in Faneuil Hall. 
 
 Edmund Quincy. Joshua Leavitt. Disturbance. Speech of Phillips. 
 Remonstrances. Latimer Journal. Popular Demonstrations. Grey paid by 
 Mr Colver. Convention. Petition to the Legislature. Meeting in Faneuil 
 Hall. Petition presented to Congress by John Quincy Adams. Proposed 
 Amendment of the Constitution. Petition. Resolutions of Massachusetts. 
 
 Singular Avowal of Mr. Wise. Mr. Holmes. Speech of Mr. Adams. 
 Report of Committee. Massachusetts Senators. Action of the Legislature. 
 
 A MARKED feature of the Constitution of the United States 
 is the equivocal language in which the provisions concerning 
 slavery are couched. At the North, one class of Abolitionists, 
 believing that it contained the fruits of a compromise with the 
 Slave Power, stigmatized it as a " covenant with death and an 
 agreement with hell " ; while another, pointing to the omis 
 sion of all reference to the name of slavery, pronounced it 
 " an antislavery document." At the South, where there was 
 no doubt that the Constitution recognized and protected slav 
 ery, there were differences, too, of opinion and of interpreta 
 tion concerning the clause referring to the rendition of fugi 
 tives from labor. Even the members of the Supreme Court 
 were not agreed among themselves. Some held that it in 
 vested the States with the power and responsibility of return 
 ing the fugitive, while others held that the duty rested with 
 the general government to carry into effect that unfortunate 
 provision. 
 
THE PRIGG CASE. 471 
 
 In the year 1826 the legislature of Pennsylvania, through 
 the zeal and activity of the Abolition Society of that State, 
 enacted a law punishing with severe penalties any person who 
 should take or carry away from the State any negro with the 
 intention of selling him as a slave, or of detaining or causing 
 to be detained such negro as a slave for life. The object of 
 this law was intended primarily to prevent kidnapping or sell 
 ing into slavery persons of color, a practice which had been 
 carried on to a large extent. Its provisions, however, extended 
 not only to colored persons resident within the State, but to 
 fugitive slaves that had sought refuge within its borders. 
 
 In 1832 Margarette Morgan, held as a slave for life by the 
 laws of Maryland, fled from that State into Pennsylvania. 
 Edward Prigg, being legally constituted the attorney for her 
 owner, caused her to be arrested in 1837, and, with her chil 
 dren, one of whom was born more than a year after she had 
 made her escape, taken out of the State and delivered to her 
 mistress. For this act he was arrested, tried, and convicted 
 in the court of York County. The case was then appealed 
 to the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, and the judgment of 
 the court below affirmed. From the Supreme Court of that 
 State an appeal was taken to the Supreme Court of the United 
 States. 
 
 The case excited the deepest interest throughout the coun 
 try. The question to be determined was whether the act of 
 Pennsylvania, under which Prigg had been convicted, was in 
 contravention of the provision of the Constitution of the 
 United States relating to persons held to service in one State 
 escaping into another. The decision of the court was pro 
 nounced by Judge Story. That decision was in substance 
 that Congress had exclusive power to legislate concerning 
 fugitive slaves ; that the States had no power to legislate upon 
 the subject, either in aid of or against the rendition of fugi 
 tives ; that the right of the owner to recapture his slave, 
 wherever he might be found, was given him by the Constitu 
 tion, without restriction or qualification ; that he might recap 
 ture him wherever he could find him, if he could do so without 
 illegal violence or breach of the peace ; that, if he could not 
 
472 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 do so, he might resort to the means specified in the act of 
 Congress for the rendition of fugitives ; and that the United 
 States could not oblige the States to enforce its laws by their 
 magistrates, but must depend upon its own courts and officers. 
 Of course, the act of Pennsylvania, in view of these opinions, 
 was pronounced unconstitutional and void. All the judges, 
 with the exception of Justice McLean and Justice Thompson, 
 held that the master might seize his slave and remove him out 
 of the State in utter disregard of its laws. Those two judges 
 held that after a seizure was made the master was bound to 
 prosecute his claim, according to the provisions of the Act of 
 1793, before he could remove such fugitive from the State into 
 which he had escaped. 
 
 By this decision the personal liberty of the inhabitants of 
 the free States was brought into constant peril, the right of 
 trial by jury was practically denied, and the writ of habeas 
 corpus was practically suspended. One portion of the decis 
 ion, however, proved to be in the interests of freedom. It was 
 decided that States could not legislate in aid of or against the 
 rights of the slaveholder ; that Congress had no power to 
 compel State officers to act under its laws ; and that any 
 action of State officers under the Act of 1793 was purely vol 
 untary. By this decision of the Court the States might pro 
 hibit their magistrates and other officers from any interference 
 in cases arising under the Act of 1793 for the rendition of 
 fugitives. Chief Justice Taney and Justice Daniel differed 
 from the judgment of the Court on this point. The chief jus 
 tice thought the States were not prohibited, but, on the con 
 trary, that it was enjoined upon them to aid and protect the 
 owner in his attempts to recover his slave found within their 
 territories. He thought, if the State authorities were ab 
 solved from all obligation to protect the owners in their 
 attempts to regain their slaves, that the Act of 1793 scarcely 
 deserved the name of a remedy. " It is only necessary," he 
 said, " to state the provision of this law in order to show how 
 ineffectual and delusive is the remedy provided by Congress 
 if State authority is forbidden to come to its aid." Jus 
 tice Daniel said, if the right of arrest and detention, with a 
 
THE PKIGG CASE. 473 
 
 view of restoration to the owner, belonged solely to the Fed 
 eral government, the master would be deprived of protection 
 and security, and would be defeated in his right of property. 
 
 By this decision of five judges out of nine the rendition of 
 fugitive slaves was declared to be exclusively within the juris 
 diction of the Federal government. This was the law of the 
 land. By it slavery was made a municipal institution, not 
 recognized beyond the State tolerating it, excepting the clause 
 in the Constitution relating to fugitives. The doctrine of the 
 Supreme Court of Massachusetts, that the authority of a mas 
 ter over his slaves did not extend to those taken by him into 
 a State where slavery is prohibited, but was strictly limited to 
 the case of fugitives who had escaped against his will, was in 
 cidentally affirmed. To his family and intimate personal 
 friends Judge Story pronounced this decision of the court as 
 " a triumph of freedom." Though this decision of the Su 
 preme Court seemed and was evidently designed to be strongly 
 favorable to the slaveholders, it became, by legitimate infer 
 ence and by its practical workings, often a real means of pro 
 tection and defence. Several of the States had enacted laws 
 in aid of the rendition of fugitive slaves, which had afforded 
 effective assistance for that purpose. But after this decision of 
 the Supreme Court, these laws in several of the States were 
 repealed, and in some States statutes were enacted forbid 
 ding either such co-operation by State officials or the use of 
 jails ; so that, from the time of this decision to the enact 
 ment of the Fugitive Slave Law of 1850, it had been found 
 much more difficult to secure the recapture and return of 
 the increasing number of fugitives fleeing from their mas 
 ters. 
 
 In May, 1837, a slave was found secreted on board the ship 
 " Boston," of Maine, homeward bound from Georgia ; who, 
 after landing, escaped to Canada. The captain was charged 
 with slave-stealing, and the governor of Georgia demanded him 
 as a fugitive from justice. But the governor of Maine refused 
 to comply with the requisition, as the laws of that State con 
 sidered slaves persons rather than property. In consequence 
 of this refusal to surrender the captain of the vessel, the legis- 
 
 60 
 
474 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 lature of Georgia adopted resolutions calling upon Congress to 
 amend the laws concerning fugitives from justice, so as to com 
 pel governors of States to deliver up persons charged with 
 slave-stealing. These resolutions were presented to the Sen 
 ate of the United States, warmly advocated by the Georgia 
 senators, and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary ; but 
 no action was taken. 
 
 Soon afterward a similar case occurred between Virginia and 
 New York, which excited still deeper interest, as it became the 
 subject of a protracted controversy between the two States. A 
 negro named Isaac, claimed to be the slave of John G. Colby 
 of Norfolk, was found in July, 1839, secreted on board the 
 schooner " Robert Carter " of New York. On her arrival at 
 the port of New York she was boarded, and Isaac was seized 
 and taken to Virginia without any legal examination, and in 
 defiance of the laws of the State against kidnapping. A de 
 mand was made by the executive of Virginia upon the gov 
 ernor of New York for the surrender of Peter Johnson, Ed 
 ward Smith, and Isaac Gansey, colored men, accused of aiding 
 and abetting Isaac's escape, or of slave-stealing. Governor 
 Seward refused to surrender these men, because no State could 
 demand the surrender of a fugitive from justice for an act 
 which was made criminal only by its own legislation, an act, 
 too, which was not only innocent in itself, but humane and 
 praiseworthy. 
 
 In 1840 the legislature of New York passed an act to extend 
 the right of trial by jury. It applied especially to persons 
 claimed as fugitive slaves. The refusal of the governor to sur 
 render these persons, and this legislation, provoked retalia 
 tory legislation on the part of Virginia. The legislature of 
 that State passed an act to prevent the citizens of New York 
 from carrying slaves out of that Commonwealth, requiring that 
 all vessels of that State should be inspected before leaving any 
 of its ports. It also authorized the governor of Virginia to sus 
 pend the act, whenever the governor of New York should comply 
 with the requisition of Virginia for the surrender of the alleged 
 fugitives from justice, and should repeal the act to extend the 
 right of trial by jury should be repealed. 
 
THE VIRGINIA AND NEW YORK CONTROVERSY. 475 
 
 This Virginia controversy caused much feeling in the coun 
 try, led to a long correspondence, and challenged the attention 
 of jurists and statesmen on account of the important questions 
 it involved. Governor Seward was sharply criticised and 
 severely censured by many ; but he firmly maintained his 
 position, and vindicated with signal ability the opinions he ad 
 vanced. The Democrats, securing majorities in both houses of 
 the legislature, in 1842, were prompt to condemn the governor 
 and espouse the cause of Virginia. They passed a resolution 
 setting forth the governor's refusal to surrender persons 
 charged with stealing a slave in Virginia with the reasons 
 assigned ; but affirming that, in their opinion, " the stealing 
 of a slave within the jurisdiction of Virginia was a crime with 
 in the meaning of the Constitution." 
 
 These Democratic legislators requested the governor to trans 
 mit these resolutions to the executive of Virginia. Governor 
 Seward declined to comply with the request. He assigned as 
 his reason that he could not do so without either silently ac 
 quiescing in its doctrine or accompanying it with his protest ; 
 that the former would be a palpable dereliction of constitu 
 tional duty, and the latter would not tend to enhance the credit 
 of the State. He assured the legislature that he remained of 
 " the opinion that beings possessed of the physical, moral, and 
 intellectual faculties common to the human race, cannot, by 
 the force of any constitution or laws, be goods or chattels, or a 
 thing ; and that nothing but goods, chattels, and things can be 
 the subject of larceny, stealing, or theft." He also affirmed 
 that the cherished principles of civil liberty forbade him to 
 recognize such a " natural inequality among men as the reso 
 lution of the legislature seems to me to assume, and from con 
 tributing in any way to perpetuate the inequalities of political 
 condition, from which results a large portion of the evils of 
 human life." 
 
 In 1842 a case occurred in Ohio which gained extensive no 
 toriety, not only from the rulings and decisions it called forth, 
 but from the length of time it was in the courts, and the emi 
 nent legal and forensic ability enlisted in its prosecution. Mr. 
 Van Zandt, a worthy Christian farmer of Hamilton County, 
 
476 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 returning from the Cincinnati market, took into his wagon nine 
 escaping Kentucky slaves. About sixteen miles from the city 
 he was stopped, in broad daylight, by persons in pursuit of the 
 fugitives. Seven of the nine were taken two escaping 
 without legal process back to Kentucky and lodged in the jail 
 at Covington. The kidnappers were indicted by the grand 
 jury of that county, defended by John B. Weller, late mem 
 ber of Congress, and Governor Corwin, and acquitted. 
 
 Mr. Van Zandt did not so escape. He was indicted, tried 
 before the Circuit Court of the United States, Justice McLean 
 presiding, and defended by Thomas Morris and Salmon P. 
 Chase. Mr. Morris in his opening plea boldly advanced and 
 ably defended the fundamental principles of human rights 
 and the paramount claims of justice, equity, and human 
 ity. Mr. Chase closed with an argument of three hours' 
 length. Of it Dr. Bailey, editor of the " Philanthropist/' 
 said : " Whether viewed as a legal argument or a specimen of 
 forensic eloquence, it has seldom been equalled. He closed 
 with one of the finest efforts of oratory we ever heard. The 
 blind Samson of Longfellow was brought upon the stage ; and 
 when we say that so far from impairing this noble allusion, as 
 used by the poet, he really added to its magnificence and power, 
 we say but the truth. Not a foot-fall was heard, not a move 
 ment made. Every form was a breathing statue, every eye 
 was fixed upon the blind Samson, standing between the massive 
 pillars, while the jeering multitude scoffed at his rights, mocked 
 his apparent helplessness, sported themselves with his bonds, 
 till, bowing himself in the greatness of his strength, in a mo 
 ment, in the twinkling of an eye, the temple was in rums and 
 the multitude buried beneath them." 
 
 Mr. Southgate of Kentucky closed in behalf of the prosecu 
 tion. Justice McLean charged the jury in accordance with 
 the principles enunciated in the Prigg case, and the jury 
 brought in a verdict of guilty ; and the good man, whose crime 
 was that of giving a few weary, foot-sore strangers a ride of a 
 few miles, was mulcted in a fine of twelve hundred dollars, 
 while the desperadoes who seized them without forms of law 
 and against every claim of right and humanity received for 
 
THE LATIMER CASE. 477 
 
 their base and brutal conduct a large reward. How could a 
 nation, not only permitting but clothing with the sanction of 
 its laws such cruel perversions of justice, hope to escape the 
 retribution due to such crimes ? The case was taken on ap 
 peal to the Supreme Court of the United States, and argued, 
 in 1846, by Mr. Seward and Mr. Chase. Justice Woodbury 
 delivered the opinion of the court, in which the constitutional 
 ity of the law of 1793 was maintained, and the exceptions 
 taken by the counsel of Van Zandt were overruled. 
 
 The decision in the Prigg case was also brought to a practi 
 cal test in Massachusetts in October, 1842. George Latimer, 
 a native of Virginia, was seized in the city of Boston, without 
 warrant, at the request of James B. Grey of Norfolk, of that 
 State, who claimed him as his slave. A writ of habeas corpus 
 was at once sued out in his favor by his counsel, Samuel E. 
 Sewall and Amos B. Merrill. After argument Chief Justice 
 Shaw decided that the statute of the United States authorized 
 the owner of the fugitive to arrest him in any State to which 
 he might have fled, and, upon proving his claim before a court 
 established by the United States, to carry him beyond the juris 
 diction of the State. The court decided, too, that the claimant 
 should have a reasonable time to obtain his proof, and the writ 
 was denied. 
 
 Elbridge Gerry Austin, attorney for the city of Boston, then 
 applied in behalf of the claimant, Grey, to Justice Story for a 
 certificate that Latimer was his slave'; and also for time to 
 procure evidence from Norfolk. This motion was strenuously 
 resisted ; but the judge ruled that it had always been the cus 
 tom to grant the time, and a written order was given that Lati 
 mer should remain in the custody of Grey until the time of 
 trial. The city attorney readily acted for the claimant, and 
 Nathaniel Coolidge, city jailer, consented to be Grey's agent 
 and slave-keeper. A writ of personal replevin, provided for 
 in the Act of 1837, securing trial by jury to persons charged 
 with being slaves, was sued out before Chief Justice Shaw. 
 The case was ably argued by Charles M. Ellis and Samuel E. 
 Sewall ; but the chief justice declared that by the decision of 
 the Supreme Court in the case of Prigg the remedy sought for 
 
478 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 was illegal, and Latimer was left in the custody of the claim 
 ant in Boston jail. 
 
 Great excitement pervaded the city and State. Public meet 
 ings were held in several cities and towns. A meeting was 
 held on Sabbath evening, 30th of October, in Faneuil Hall. 
 At an early hour the hall was thronged by an immense multi 
 tude. It was estimated that there were four thousand persons 
 present, most of whom came for the purpose of expressing 
 their condemnation of the arrest of Latimer, and of the pro 
 ceedings growing out of that arrest. The speakers were con 
 tinually interrupted by an organized band of ruffians, who 
 strove by hideous noises to break up the meeting, in which they 
 were partially successful. Samuel E. Sewell presided, and a 
 series of resolutions were presented by Joshua Leavitt, pro 
 testing " by all the glorious memories of the Revolutionary 
 struggle, in the names of justice, liberty, and right, in the 
 awful name of God, against the deliverance of George Latimer 
 into the hands of his pursuers." 
 
 These resolutions were seconded by Edmund Quincy. Lati 
 mer, he said, had not sought his deliverance from a system, the 
 vilest beneath the sun, by an appeal to arms, as did the men 
 who thronged that hall in early times to create the Revolution ; 
 but he had resorted to the simplest natural right, the right to 
 escape. " He turns," he said, " his face to the North Star, 
 which he had been falsely told hung over a land of liberty. 
 He threads the forest, he hurries by night across the green 
 swamps, he lies concealed by day in the tangled cane-brake, he 
 dares the treacherous morass, he fords rivers, he scales moun 
 tains ; but he shuns the face of Christian man as his deadliest 
 foe ! At last he reaches the Free States ; but he rests not from 
 his pilgrimage until he has taken sanctuary in the very birth 
 place of liberty. Here he places his feet on our hearthstone, 
 and demands hospitality and protection. And with what re 
 ception met this demand upon the humanity, the Christianity, 
 the love of liberty of Boston ? The signal for the chase is given ; 
 the immortal game is on foot ; a pack of bloodhounds in human 
 shape is put upon the scent ; they pursue, seize, and hold him 
 down, with the oppressor himself for the master of the hunt, 
 
THE LATTMER CASE. 479 
 
 and the second judicial magistrate in the nation for the whip- 
 per in ! Your police officers and jailers, under the compulsion 
 of no law, are the voluntary partakers of this hideous case ; 
 and your streets and your prisons form the hunting-ground on 
 which the quarry is run down and secured." 
 
 Joshua Leavitt read letters from John Quincy Adams, 
 George Bancroft, Samuel Hoar, William B. Calhoun, and 
 other distinguished persons, amid continued interruptions. 
 Charles Lenox Remond and Frederick Douglass sought to 
 address the meeting ; but the uproar was so great that they 
 could not be heard. Appeals were made by George S. Hillard 
 in behalf of free speech, but they were unheeded. Wendell 
 Phillips then, amid hisses and shouts and continued uproar, 
 addressed the noisy assemblage. He characterized, with his 
 terrible severity and point, their domineering conduct toward 
 the slave and his friends, and their craven subserviency to the 
 master and his minions. He branded them as cowards, that 
 shook the chains that bound them to the car of slavery, but 
 dared not break them. " When I look," he said, " upon these 
 crowded thousands, and see them trample on their conscien 
 ces and the rights of their fellow-men at the bidding of a piece 
 of parchment, I say, ' My curse be upon the Constitution of 
 these United States ! ' " 
 
 This conduct of the mob excited general indignation, and 
 strengthened the remonstrances of the city and State against 
 the disgraceful proceedings. A newspaper, conducted by 
 Dr Henry I. Bowditch and William F. Channing, called the 
 " Latimer Journal and North Star," scattered facts and argu 
 ments among the people, and intensified the excitement of the 
 public mind. 
 
 The alacrity evinced in this case by the city attorney, the 
 police officers, the jailer, and sheriff excited the deepest indig 
 nation. A petition signed by citizens of character and in 
 fluence was presented to the sheriff, demanding the dismission 
 of the jailer. Another petition was prepared, requesting 
 Governor Davis to dismiss the sheriff unless he removed the 
 jailer. This unexpected popular demonstration brought the 
 officials and claimant to terms. Grey and his advisers evinced 
 
480 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 their readiness to release Latimer for a consideration ; but the 
 persons who had taken an active part in the case, believing, 
 as matters then stood, that his release would be effected, re 
 fused to pay anything at all. But the Rev. Nathaniel Colver, 
 apprehensive that Latimer might be smuggled out of the State, 
 agreed to pay the sum of four hundred dollars, on the delivery 
 of free papers and the surrender of the power of attorney to 
 reclaim his wife. The offer was accepted, and Latimer stepped 
 forth from Leverett Street jail, amid the general rejoicings, a 
 freeman. 
 
 While these events were transpiring in Massachusetts the 
 press of Virginia teemed with denunciations. Inflammatory 
 appeals were made to the people of the South. Public meet 
 ings were held, and a demand for redress or retaliation was 
 made upon the legislature. The governor made a requisition 
 for Latimer as a fugitive from justice ; but Governor Davis 
 refused to comply with it. 
 
 The matter, however, did not end here. A convention was 
 held, and a form of petition to the legislature of Massachusetts 
 was adopted, praying that body to forbid all persons holding 
 office under the laws of the State from aiding in the arrest or de 
 tention of persons claimed as fugitives from slavery ; to forbid 
 the use of jails or other public property for their detention ; 
 and to propose amendments to the Federal Constitution that 
 should forever separate the people of that State from all connec 
 tion with slavery. Another petition was prepared for Congress, 
 praying for such laws and such proposed amendments to the 
 Constitution as would relieve the Commonwealth from all fur 
 ther participation in this crime of oppression. By the faithful 
 and well-directed labors, through conventions, meetings, and 
 other agencies, of Henry I. Bowditch, William F. Channing, 
 and Frederick S. Cabot, the committee chosen for that pur 
 pose, more than sixty-five thousand signatures were obtained 
 to a petition to the legislature, and fifty thousand to a petition 
 to Congress. At a meeting held in Faneuil Hall, over which 
 John Pierpont presided, John Quincy Adams was unani 
 mously selected to take charge of the petition to Congress, and 
 Charles Francis Adams to present the petition to the legisla- 
 
THE LATIMER CASE. 481 
 
 ture. The latter petition was presented to the House by Mr. 
 Adams ; then taken to the Senate, where it was presented and 
 referred to the appropriate committee. 
 
 Mr. Adams, from the joint committee to whom the Latimer 
 petition was referred, made a learned and elaborate report, in 
 which he showed how " the spirit of slavery, flying from one 
 paragraph of the Constitution to another, seeks to wrest out 
 of each in turn the necessary strength to maintain itself. " 
 He contended that the great object with Massachusetts was 
 to free herself from all responsibility, direct or indirect, for 
 the continuance and spread of slavery in the United States ; 
 and that while there were several passages in the Constitution 
 connecting the free States with slavery, the slave representa 
 tion was effecting " by slow but sure degrees the overthrow 
 of all the old but noble principles that were embodied in the 
 Federal Constitution. To that," he said, "let the public 
 attention be exclusively directed. If, in the process neces 
 sary to the procuring the removal of it from the instrument 
 of government, it should become advisable to consider the 
 points of minor consequence, this may be done then as easily 
 as now, and with more effect. The withdrawal from the Con 
 stitution of the slave representation would alone, in the opin 
 ion of your committee, be of force enough to carry with it the 
 remaining obstacles to that complete and effective separation 
 from all connection with slavery which the petitioners desire." 
 The committee reported a proposed amendment to the Con 
 stitution of the United States, restricting representation to 
 " free persons" alone. They also reported a bill to the legisla 
 ture requiring all State officials to refrain from rendering aid 
 in the recapture of fugitive slaves, and also forbidding the use 
 of its jails for their confinement. The resolution was adopted 
 and the bill was passed. 
 
 The petition to Congress, headed by George Latimer and 
 signed by fifty thousand of the citizens of Massachusetts, was 
 placed upon the desk of Mr. Adams. It produced a great 
 sensation. Several Southern representatives manifested deep 
 indignation. Even Mr. Botts, who had opposed the gag rule, 
 declared that it was " a hornet's nest, full of fifty thousand 
 
 61 
 
482 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 young hornets." He was willing to receive the petition of the 
 poorest and humblest citizen ; but he asserted that George 
 Latimer was " not a citizen of the United States." 
 
 It is stated, on the authority of David Lee Child, that to a 
 Virginian, who came to Mr. Adams's seat and asked who 
 George Latimer was, he replied : " He is the son of a very re 
 spectable gentleman of Norfolk, in Virginia, a member of one 
 of the most distinguished and respectable families in that State, 
 and a citizen of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts." Mr. 
 Adams moved to suspend the rules relating to petitions, and 
 at the end of the third day he obtained a vote upon his mo 
 tion, for which there were eighty to one hundred and six, every 
 Northern Whig voting for a suspension of the rules, and thirty- 
 five Northern Democrats voting against it. Failing to obtain 
 a suspension of the rules, Mr. Adams placed the petition in the 
 hands of the Clerk of the House under the standing rule. 
 
 The resolution of Massachusetts, proposing an amendment 
 to the Constitution of the United States, so as to base repre 
 sentation upon " free persons," was presented to the House by 
 Mr. Adams, on the 21st of December, 1843. He moved its 
 reference to a select committee of nine members. Mr. Wise 
 immediately arose, and, with great warmth of manner, said 
 he would now strike his flag. From that day forth he would 
 oppose nothing, and leave it to the gentleman from Massa 
 chusetts and others to take the responsibility. Lifting his 
 hands, amid great sensation among the members, who crowded 
 around him, he exclaimed : " I say solemnly before God, as a 
 Southern man, that we are worsted in this fight. From this 
 day forth and forever I withdraw from the fight. I say to my 
 constituents that, the way this battle has been fought, there is 
 no hope for your rights. Your interests are doomed to be 
 destroyed." He declared, in the name of God and of his 
 country, that he left the awful responsibility upon the North 
 to infringe the Constitution. He solemnly pledged himself, 
 however, to renew the battle, not on that floor, but before 
 his constituents and the people of the country. 
 
 Mr. Holmes of South Carolina said the gentleman from Vir 
 ginia might retire from the contest ; but he would renew the 
 
PROPOSED AMENDMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION. 483 
 
 battle, day after day, so long as the waves were rolling from the 
 North and threatening to overwhelm them. But, instead of 
 relinquishing the struggle on that floor, he would sound the 
 tocsin, and give battle at once with the gentleman from Mas 
 sachusetts, and those who were with him engaged in fierce 
 hostility against their countrymen, and who were then striving 
 to take from them their rights of representation. 
 
 Amid the excitement Mr. Adams remained calm. He re 
 minded members that these were the resolutions of the Demo 
 cratic legislature of Massachusetts, for in both branches the 
 Democrats were in the majority. He expressed his regret that 
 the gentlemen from Virginia and South Carolina, one of whom 
 renounced the u war" and the other renewed it, should in 
 dulge in such martial and belligerent figures of speech. That 
 hall, he said, was no fit place for battle of any kind. It was a 
 place for deliberation ; it was a place for the deliberation 
 of friends met to consult upon themes of common interest. 
 He said that Wise had never done a " wiser " thing than to 
 abandon a position no longer tenable ; and he advised Holmes 
 to strip off the glittering armor in which he had clad himself, 
 take off his epaulets and throw away his sword, and follow the 
 example of Wise, and retire from a position which, " thank 
 God Almighty," was no longer tenable. He said he was not, 
 and never had been, an Abolitionist in the sense of any aboli 
 tion society he was acquainted with ; but he believed, with Jef 
 ferson, that the God of nature had decreed the freedom of the 
 slaves, and the sooner it came the better. In the sense that 
 Thomas Jefferson was an Abolitionist he was one. He hoped 
 the day would come when slavery would be a word without a 
 meaning in the English language, when there should not be 
 found a slave on all the earth. That, he thought, would be the 
 consummation of the Christian religion ; the fulfilment of the 
 glorious promises and prophecies of the Old Testament, con 
 firmed by the gospel of the New. He said he had little com 
 panionship with antislavery associations. He held his opin 
 ions from God and from the Declaration of Independence, 
 which was permitted to hang in that hall, " however any por 
 tion of it may in practice have been turned out of doors." He 
 
484 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWEE IN AMERICA. 
 
 closed by expressing his devotion to the Union and to the Con 
 stitution, and with the emphatic denial of the power of the House 
 to refuse to receive a petition for the amendment of any of its 
 parts. 
 
 The resolutions were then referred to a select committee of 
 which Mr. Adams was made chairman. There were six reports. 
 The report. signed by Mr. Adams and Mr. Giddings, and writ 
 ten by Mr. Adams, was a terrible arraignment of the support 
 ers of slavery, especially for their denial of the right of peti 
 tion. It asserted that slavery was opposed to the teachings of 
 the gospel ; that the Declaration of Independence embodied the 
 essential doctrines of Christianity ; and that it constituted a 
 sacred pledge, in the name of God, to abolish slavery as soon 
 as practicable, and to substitute freedom in its stead. It vin 
 dicated the action of Massachusetts, in proposing the amend 
 ment for the purification of the common Constitution from that 
 unnatural and inconsistent element of a slave representation in 
 the government of a free people. The report proposed to refer 
 the question to the next session of Congress. While a major 
 ity of the committee could not concur in signing either of the 
 several reports prepared, they did agree in the opinion that the 
 amendment proposed by Massachusetts should not be recom 
 mended ; and the House adopted a resolution to that effect, 
 with only thirteen dissenting votes. 
 
 When the resolutions were presented to the Senate by Mr. 
 Bates, they were denounced in vituperative and violent lan 
 guage. Mr. King of Alabama characterized them as seditious, 
 incendiary, and revolutionary, deserving the condemnation and 
 execration of every well-wisher of the government. To this 
 assault upon Massachusetts and her people, and to these mis 
 representations of the proposed amendment, no reply was 
 made. Mr. Bates, avowing that he had no desire to excite 
 discussion, asked that the resolutions be laid on the table and 
 printed. But this modest request was denied by the chival- 
 ric defenders of State sovereignty ; and the Senate refused 
 to print them by a vote of more than two to one. To add to 
 this indignity, the resolutions of Georgia replying to those of 
 Massachusetts had been received and ordered to be printed. 
 
PROPOSED AMENDMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION. 485 
 
 Mr. Bates, though reminding the Senate that Georgia had 
 received a courtesy which had been denied to Massachusetts, 
 did not renew the motion to print, nor was there any South 
 ern senator sufficiently magnanimous to do it. Instead of 
 feeling any humiliation at such discourtesy, the slaveholding 
 members rather gloried in the deed as an evidence of their 
 power, and of the helplessness of those they held in a vassal 
 age hardly less degrading than that of their slaves. As Force 
 was the only divinity they worshipped, or whose claims they 
 heeded, the voices of justice, courtesy, and magnanimity fell 
 but lightly upon their ears. 
 
 This indignity put upon Massachusetts was, however, keenly 
 felt by her people. Nor were they satisfied with the action of 
 their senators. They thought that Mr. Bates and Mr. Choate 
 should have repelled the aspersions cast upon their State, de 
 nounced the discourtesy of the Senate, and vindicated the 
 action of the legislature. That feeling soon found utterance 
 in the legislature itself. 
 
 When the resolutions against the annexation of Texas were 
 pending in the Senate, Henry Wilson of Middlesex moved 
 an amendment requesting Massachusetts senators in Con 
 gress to prevent, if possible, the consummation of that slave- 
 holding scheme. The resolution implied a rebuke for their 
 timid action, and Mr. Wilson commented freely on what he 
 characterized as their want of spirit. He wished to call their 
 attention to the fact that upon the question of slavery the 
 legislature was in sober earnest ; that it wished " them to feel, 
 to think, and to act as Massachusetts men, who have been 
 reared under the institutions of the Pilgrim Fathers, should 
 think, feel, and act." 
 
 Mr. Wilson's amendment was unanimously adopted. The 
 resolution, however, was amended in the House by the inser 
 tion of the words " Representatives in Congress," which, of 
 course, destroyed its significance and thwarted its purpose. 
 But the Senate refused to concur in the amendment, and firmly 
 adhered to the original resolution. Charles Francis Adams 
 spoke strongly against receding. The people, he said, were 
 dissatisfied with the action of their senators, and it was due 
 
486 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 to them that they should know what the people expected of 
 them. The resolution said to them that Massachusetts would 
 forgive the past if they would make great exertions for the 
 future. There was a sharp debate in the House upon the 
 question of receding from its amendment. Mr. Boutwell, then 
 the leader of the Democratic party, spoke in favor of reced 
 ing ; and Mr. Richardson, a young Democratic member from 
 Woburn, advocated the same policy. " Our Representatives in 
 Congress," he said, " have behaved themselves like men. They 
 have stood like rocks, like beacons in the wide waste ; but our 
 Senators did not dare to rise when the fame, honor, and integ 
 rity of Massachusetts were attacked." The House, however, 
 refused, by a vote of one hundred and fifteen to one hundred 
 and twenty-eight, to recede from its amendment. A commit 
 tee of conference was appointed, and it was agreed to strike 
 out of the resolutions that which referred to the senators. 
 Mr. Saltonstall, chairman of the committee of conference, on 
 the part of the House, and who, perhaps, had done more than 
 any one to prevent the passage of the resolution in that body, 
 assured the senatorial members of the committee that the 
 object for which the resolution had been introduced had been 
 already attained, and that both of the senators felt very keenly 
 the criticisms which had been made in the legislature upon 
 their course. 
 
 Virginia went farther than any of her sister States in the 
 condemnation of the proposition of Massachusetts to amend 
 the Constitution. Her legislature not only denounced the 
 proposition, but requested the governor to return to the ex 
 ecutive of Massachusetts the resolutions that had been trans 
 mitted to him. This act of discourtesy not only showed how 
 deeply the proposed amendment incensed the Slave Power, but 
 also a lack of good breeding and comity of manners, to which 
 qualities the slave-masters ever laid large claim, but of which 
 this and similar acts revealed them to be sadly destitute. The 
 governor complied with the request. The action of Virginia 
 was transmitted by Governor Briggs to the legislature, and 
 referred to a special committee. Linus Child, its chairman, 
 reported that the action of Virginia was without precedent ; 
 
PROPOSED AMENDMENT OF THE CONSTITUTION. 487 
 
 in derogation of the rights of the States ; and in violation of 
 the courtesies which should characterize the proceedings of 
 sister States. The doctrines embodied in the original resolu 
 tions were restated and reaffirmed, and this report was unani 
 mously adopted in both houses. To aggravate the discourtesy 
 shown to Massachusetts, while it reveals and illustrates the 
 constant humiliations imposed upon the free States by the in 
 solent power that ruled, the resolutions of Virginia, in which 
 a deliberate insult had been offered to a sister State, were pre 
 sented in the Senate of the United States, and were courte 
 ously received by that body, which had, with studied disrespect, 
 refused to print the original resolution to which these were 
 the response. 
 
CHAPTER XXXIV. 
 
 INTERMARRIAGE LAW OP MASSACHUSETTS. CASTE. 
 
 The Law of Massachusetts. Petitions. Keport of Mr. Lincoln. Debate. 
 Mr. Davis's Report. Mr. Bradburn's Bill. General Howe's Bill. Sharp 
 Debate. Repeal of the Law. Colored Persons excluded from the Cars. 
 Scene on the Eastern Railroad. Action of the Legislature. Colored Schools. 
 Controversy in Nantucket. Petitions to the Legislature. Mr. Barrett's 
 Bill. Defeated. Mr. Wilson's Motion to reconsider. Earnest Debate. 
 Reconsidered. Bill passed. Action of Boston School Committee. 
 
 THE Divine declaration that what a man soweth that also 
 shall he reap is quite as true of nations as of individuals. 
 Nowhere has the retributive nature of sin appeared more 
 manifest than in the history of American slavery. For long 
 years after the guilty cause has disappeared have the wretched 
 effects remained. Even in Massachusetts, first among the old 
 thirteen States to discard slavery, did the consequences linger 
 in some of her laws, in the customs of society, and in preju 
 dices which in many minds, with unreasoning and unfeeling 
 pertinacity, set at naught the principles of justice and human 
 ity, to say nothing of the sublime principles of Christianity. 
 Like the vicious indulgences of youth, though discarded in 
 riper years, it left its enfeebling effects in the system. Though 
 early in form removed, it left many bitter legacies behind to 
 test the temper of the people and make work for after genera 
 tions. The law against the intermarriage of blacks with 
 whites, the rules in many cities and towns against colored 
 children attending the same schools with whites, and the regu 
 lations on some railroads excluding blacks from the cars of 
 whites, were examples. 
 
 These invidious discriminations and obnoxious regulations 
 were among the early objects of assault by the Abolitionists. 
 
THE INTERMARRIAGE LAW OF MASSACHUSETTS. 489 
 
 In the session of 1839 several petitions were presented, pray 
 ing for the repeal of the act against intermarriage. Some of 
 these petitions were from women, a fact which subjected them 
 to special reproach not only in the public press, but in the 
 legislature itself. The petitions were referred to the Commit 
 tee on the Judiciary, which reported that the petitioners have 
 leave to withdraw. This report was made by William Lincoln 
 of Worcester, brother of the ex-governor, Levi Lincoln. Its 
 spirit and purport may be gathered from a single paragraph: 
 " Lest future historians should form an erroneous estimate of 
 the manners and morals of the age, it is desirable to afford 
 these persons, styling themselves ladies, an opportunity to 
 reconsider their opinions on matrimonial and constitutional 
 rights, and to remove their names from the rolls on which 
 they are written." 
 
 The repeal of the law was vigorously resisted by Franklin 
 Dexter, an eminent lawyer of Boston. Minot Thayer, too, a 
 veteran member of the House, opposed any legislation in a 
 vituperative speech. Referring to a petition signed by a large 
 number of ladies in Dorchester, he had the bad taste to ex 
 press the opinion that there were not ten virtuous women 
 among them. 
 
 George Bradburn, then a representative from Nan tucket, 
 defended the petitioners, and advocated the principle embod 
 ied in their petition. He replied with merciless severity to 
 the arguments of Dexter and Thayer ; and in response to 
 their assertion that the repeal would encourage amalgamation, 
 he asserted that, on the contrary, it would most effectually 
 discourage it. 
 
 At the session of 1840, George T. Davis, then a representa 
 tive from Greenfield, reported in favor of repealing the law. 
 The report maintained that the act sprung from social preju 
 dices ; was based on the idea of social inequality ; was unequal 
 and invidious in its operations ; facilitated injustice and pro 
 moted licentiousness. " This law," it said, " is the last relic 
 of the old slave code of Massachusetts, and is the only legisla 
 tive recognition to be found in our statute-book of inequality 
 among the different races of our citizens. It stands in direct 
 
 62 
 
490 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA, 
 
 and odious contrast with all our principles and our practice in 
 other particulars. It gives the lie to the sentiments which we 
 have heretofore expressed to Congress and the world on the 
 subject of slavery ; for, by denying to our colored fellow-citi 
 zens the privileges and immunities of freemen, we virtually 
 assert their inequality, and justify that theory of negro slav 
 ery which represents it as a necessary state of tutelage and 
 guardianship. " 
 
 In the debate that followed, Mr. Bradburn maintained that 
 the law had not the word " white " in it originally, but pro 
 vided that no person of a Christian nation should marry a 
 negro or mulatto ; and that in 1786 Indians were included, 
 and the word " white " then inserted. He asserted that the 
 law was unconstitutional, authorized robbery, encouraged 
 amalgamation, and abrogated the law of God. Mr. Theophi- 
 lus Parsons, then a member from the city of Boston, admit 
 ted that he had been opposed to the passage of the bill ; but 
 his objections had been overcome, and he should then vote for 
 it. Thayer, Dexter, and Lincoln, who had so strenuously 
 opposed the repeal at the preceding session, continued their 
 opposition. If "they were less vituperative, they were no less 
 determined in their hostility. The bill passed the House by a 
 majority of one. It then passed the Senate ; but was defeated 
 in the House on its engrossment, 
 
 But the Abolitionists and the other friends of equal rights 
 were persistent. Petitions were presented in 1841 ; and Mr. 
 Bradburn, from a committee to which they were referred, 
 brought in a bill to repeal the obnoxious law, accompanied by 
 an elaborate report. It failed, however, in the House. A 
 similar bill was reported to the Senate by General Appleton 
 Howe. It passed that body by the casting vote of its presi 
 dent, Daniel P. King, afterward a representative in Congress. 
 It was, however, defeated in the House by a majority of thirty- 
 six. Not discouraged by this defeat, the antislavery men of 
 Massachusetts again appealed to the people and to the legisla 
 ture. At the next session a bill was reported in the Senate by 
 Seth Sprague, Jr., and passed that body by a vote of twenty- 
 four to nine. 
 
THE INTERMARRIAGE LAW OF MASSACHUSETTS. 491 
 
 In the House an earnest debate arose. Mr. Marcy, a Demo 
 cratic member from Greenwich, denounced the bill as an inno 
 vation, which would be speedily followed by another, allowing 
 the blacks to ride in the cars with the whites. Mr. Gibbens, 
 a merchant of Boston, declared that he would rather follow 
 his daughter to the tomb than that she should be married to a 
 black man. He denounced the measure as an experiment 
 fraught with the most disastrous consequences to the manners 
 and morals of the people. John C. Park of Boston vehe 
 mently opposed the passage of the bill, and maintained the con 
 stitutionality and expediency of the existing law. The legis 
 lature, he said, could pass laws for the preservation of hens 
 and fishes, and for the improvement of the breeds of cattle, 
 sheep, and pigs ; but when the question came of preserving 
 their own race from the deterioration which must inevitably 
 follow amalgamation, their constitutional scruples were inter 
 posed. 
 
 Seth J. Thomas, a representative from Charlestown, one 
 of the leaders of the Democratic party, declared that con 
 servatism was the " party of yesterday " ; but he belonged to 
 the party of to-day, and was in favor of turning the world 
 topsy turvy, providing things were made better by it. " The 
 black man," he said, " will have his day, and I want him to 
 have it peaceably, else he will be obliged to use force, which is 
 the last resort of kings. And if that necessity is resorted to, 
 although I should regret it, yet in the great cause of human 
 rights I should rush into the battle as gladly as I would to a 
 bridal-feast." His subsequent course hardly warranted quite 
 so confident a boast. He did not anticipate, when he uttered 
 it, that in a few years he would be found, not rushing to the 
 rescue of the fearful and fainting fugitive, but as the paid 
 attorney in the ignoble work of remanding him back to the 
 bondage from which he was vainly striving to escape. 
 
 Charles Francis Adams, complimenting Mr. Park on his 
 eloquent speech, proceeded to reply to it in a clear and un 
 answerable argument. Henry Wilson, a representative from 
 Natick, avowed himself in favor of the repeal of the act, 
 as it was founded on inequality and caste. No act of that 
 
492 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 kind, he asserted, dishonored other New England States. 
 He declared that the bill was not inspired by political, but by 
 humane motives ; and, though it might be defeated then, it 
 would ultimately be enacted. It was only a question of time. 
 It was shown by John P. Robinson of Lowell that the law had 
 been passed as a protection against heathenism and paganism, 
 that the question of its constitutionality had been evaded by 
 the Supreme Court, that it had become a dead letter, and that 
 it ought to be repealed. Prejudice and passion, however, again 
 triumphed, and the bill was defeated by a majority of four. 
 
 At the next session the Democrats had a majority in 
 both houses of the legislature. A bill repealing the law was 
 reported in the Senate by George Hood of Essex County, 
 which passed without a division. In the House it was opposed 
 by Gibbens and Park of Boston, and supported by Whitmarsh 
 of Seekonk, Prince of Essex, Wheatland of Salem, and Adams 
 of Boston ; but it passed by a decided majority. 
 
 It was the same unchristian prejudice, with far less apparent 
 reason, which induced the regulations adopted by railroads to 
 exclude persons of color from the ordinary passenger cars, 
 and compelled them to ride in cars by themselves, or some 
 times, without regard to tastes, character, or means, in " sec 
 ond-class " cars, bare and comfortless, the enforced receptacle 
 of all who from any cause would not or could not take their 
 seats in the first class. The two railroad corporations in Mas 
 sachusetts, which were prominent in making and enforcing 
 these odious regulations, were the Eastern and New Bedford. 
 On the New Bedford road, outrages were often perpetrated on 
 persons of color, and sometimes on those friends who remon 
 strated against their treatment. In the year 1841 David Rug- 
 gles, a colored man of New York, who had aided six hundred 
 of his countrymen in escaping from servitude, was ejected 
 from the cars, against the earnest protest of Rev. John M. 
 Spear, for the simple offence of taking a seat with white pas 
 sengers. He brought an action in the Police Court of New 
 Bedford against the employees of the company for an ag 
 gravated assault ; but Justice Crapo promptly discharged the 
 defendants. 
 
CASTE. 493 
 
 Scenes of violence were of frequent occurrence on the 
 Eastern Railroad. Colored persons of intelligence and char 
 acter were, in several instances, violently dragged from the 
 cars occupied by white passengers ; and in some cases their 
 friends, who remonstrated against such brutality, were treated 
 in like manner. Among the persons forcibly ejected from 
 these cars was Frederick Douglass, among the most gifted 
 of his race. The general agent of the Massachusetts Anti- 
 slavery Society was repeatedly insulted, while travelling upon 
 that road, for remonstrating against its unjust and inhuman 
 usages ; and in one instance he received blows and kicks, 
 the effects of which were felt for weeks. On one occasion a 
 well-known colored man being ejected, and Dr. Daniel Mann 
 and several white passengers remonstrating against such con 
 duct, the latter were dragged from the cars, and prohibited 
 from continuing their journey " unless they behaved them 
 selves." Dr. Mann brought an action in the police court of 
 Boston against the conductor of the train ; but he failed to 
 obtain any redress for such high-handed outrages. 
 
 This conduct excited the deepest indignation. Public meet 
 ings were held, the managers of the road censured, and the 
 interference of the legislature invoked. The " Lynn Record," 
 edited by Daniel Henshaw, a gentleman of integrity, charac 
 ter, and moral courage, denounced the ruffianism of such pro 
 ceedings in the most direct and fearless manner. 
 
 In spite, however, of all remonstrances, the managers of 
 that corporation persisted in the enforcement of their harsh 
 and unjust regulations. A striking instance of this was mani 
 fested on the return from his foreign tour of Charles Lenox 
 Remond. He was a native of Salem, a gentleman of intel 
 ligence, of personal worth, and prepossessing manners. In 
 England, where he had spent nearly two years, he had vindi 
 cated the cause of the oppressed, and had won the confidence 
 and applause of the British Abolitionists. He was everywhere 
 hailed as the champion of his race, and treated with the most 
 friendly and respectful consideration. He bore from Eng 
 land the warmest sympathies and best wishes of the friends 
 of emancipation. He was commissioned to bear the address 
 
494 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of sixty thousand Irishmen to their countrymen in America, 
 headed by the names of Daniel O'Connell and Father Mathew. 
 Arriving in Boston, he went to the Eastern Railroad Station 
 to take passage for his home in Salem. He was not allowed, 
 however, to take his seat with the other passengers, but com 
 pelled to occupy what was called the " Jim Crow " car. Sev 
 eral of his white friends, wishing to welcome him on his 
 return, met him at the station, and took seats with him. They 
 were ordered, however, by the conductor, to leave voluntarily, 
 or to be removed by force. Thus was this gentleman of char 
 acter and culture, fresh from his travels and the hospitalities 
 of the best families of England, rudely and roughly treated 
 on his arrival in his native State. And not only that, but so 
 inveterate and implacable was the prejudice that it visited 
 upon his admiring friends a kind of vicarious punishment for 
 the crime of cherishing and exhibiting anything like feelings 
 of regard and sympathy in his behalf. 
 
 Petitions and memorials were sent to the legislature demand 
 ing legislation against such arbitrary proceedings, and that pro 
 tection which could not be obtained from the managers of the 
 roads or from the judicial tribunals. These were referred to a 
 committee before whom there was a public hearing. The com 
 mittee was addressed by Wendell Phillips, Mr. Remond, and 
 Ellis Gray Loring. A bill was reported by Seth Sprague, Jr. ; 
 but interest and prejudice bore sway, and it failed to pass the 
 Senate. The outrages continuing, similar petitions were pre 
 sented at the next session, and a bill was reported to the 
 House; but it failed of enactment, being indefinitely post 
 poned by a majority of more than one hundred. Mr. Adams, 
 a member of the committee that reported the bill, admitted 
 the legality, but doubted the expediency, of such a law. There 
 were but two railroads that made the obnoxious regulations 
 which he thought should be at once abandoned. He doubted 
 whether the time had come for a general law, and advised 
 waiting to see if the point could not be gained without legis 
 lation. 
 
 The managers of these corporations, seeing the determined 
 purpose of the friends of freedom and the temper of the 
 
CASTE. 495 
 
 legislature, adopted Mr. Adams's advice, and gave up their 
 arbitrary discriminations and tyrannical regulations. So an 
 other victory was won, and another of the hateful relics of the 
 slave system, that once disgraced the land of the Pilgrims, was 
 removed. 
 
 Many of the large towns and cities in Massachusetts de 
 manded separation between black and white pupils in the 
 schools and seminaries of learning. Even the common 
 schools, sustained by law, to whose benefits all were entitled 
 without distinction of color, did not escape the hateful dis 
 crimination. Though all were equally taxed for their support, 
 yet all could not alike partake of the privileges they afforded. 
 To put the brand of inferiority upon innocent and unoffending 
 childhood, to lay upon it unnecessary as well as unrighteous 
 burdens as it started on the journey of life, found by its 
 oppressors, with all the advantages of birth, position, and 
 superior culture, at best, hard and harsh enough, was as really 
 disgraceful as it was unchristian. 
 
 Many saw the gross injustice and undeserved opprobrium 
 involved in such discrimination, and its manifest tendency to 
 perpetuate the existence and evils of caste in communities 
 where such a policy was adopted. Protests in various forms 
 were entered against it. In the city of Salem there sprang 
 up a sharp controversy. Stephen C. Phillips, its mayor, main 
 tained the right of the colored children to the full and com 
 plete benefit of the common schools. And it was chiefly 
 through his influence that a legal opinion was obtained from 
 Richard Fletcher, one of the most eminent and conscientious 
 lawyers of the State, in which he maintained that these schools 
 were contrary to the constitution of the Commonwealth. 
 
 In Nantucket, too, the same matter became the subject of an 
 excited controversy. It was brought before the town in 1844, 
 by the report of the school committee recommending that no 
 discrimination should be made between the children of the 
 two races. The report was not, however, sustained, but was 
 indefinitely postponed. A resolution was carried in town 
 meeting that colored children should be instructed by them 
 selves, if deemed practicable by the school committee. A 
 
496 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWEE IN AMERICA. 
 
 portion, however, of the citizens, aggrieved by this decision, 
 held a public meeting, largely attended by many of the most 
 enlightened of its inhabitants, and presided over by John H. 
 Shaw. They protested against the action of the town as 
 unchristian, as a flagrant violation of the State constitution 
 and of the laws of the Commonwealth, and as imposing an 
 additional tax upon the people. They invoked the friends of 
 law and order, morality and religion, freedom and equality, to 
 act in defence of the just claims of their colored population. 
 
 In 1845 petitions were presented to the legislature in favor 
 of legislation. They were referred to the Committee on Edu 
 cation, hearings were had, and. a bill was reported to the Senate 
 by Mr. Barrett of Hampshire, providing that any child unlaw 
 fully excluded from the public schools should be entitled to 
 recover damages in the courts of the Commonwealth. Com 
 ing up for consideration on the 18th of February, it was 
 rejected. 
 
 The next day Mr. Wilson moved a reconsideration of the 
 vote by which it was rejected. He expressed his regret at 
 the failure of the bill, which he represented as the most im 
 portant that had come up during the session. " It concerned," 
 he said, " the rights and feelings of a large but humble portion 
 of our people, whose interests should be watched over and 
 cared for by the legislature, whose imperative duty it was, 
 when complaints were made of the invasion of the rights of 
 the poorest and humblest, to provide a remedy that should be 
 full and ample to secure and guard all his rights." He said 
 the common-school system, the pride and glory of Massachu 
 setts, was based upon the principle of perfect equality, and 
 that the distinction set up at Nantucket aimed a blow at its 
 very existence. The colored people felt, and rightly, that 
 their feelings were trifled with and their rights disregarded. 
 Denouncing the spirit that excluded colored children from the 
 full and equal benefits of the common schools, he said : " It 
 is the same which has drenched the world with blood for 
 six thousand years, made a slaveholder in South Carolina and 
 a slave-pirate on the coast of Africa." He said that those 
 whose rights he wished to guard and secure had but little 
 
CASTE. 497 
 
 influence or power ; while those who opposed them had both, 
 and were only too willing to use them for their own aggran 
 dizement. It was more popular to keep along with the 
 current of prejudice than by resisting it to be denounced " a 
 Radical or Abolitionist." " In retiring from the legislature," 
 he said, " I am sustained by the consciousness that I have 
 never uttered a word or given a vote against the rights of any 
 human being. I had far rather have the warm and generous 
 thanks of one poor orphan boy down on the island of Nan- 
 tucket, that I may never see, nor even know, than to have the 
 approbation of every man in the Commonwealth, whether in 
 this chamber or out of it, who would deny to any child the full 
 and equal benefits of our public schools." 
 
 Mr. Adams of Suffolk thought, if white children left the 
 common school because colored children were admitted, the 
 sooner they went the better. Such distinctions in the com 
 mon schools sanctioned an aristocracy which he did not 
 acknowledge. 
 
 There were several senators, however, who advocated the 
 exclusive policy. Mr. Livermore of Middlesex County avowed 
 his opposition to the proposed legislation. Referring to some 
 remonstrants from Nantucket, he said they had fairly shown 
 that no real injury was inflicted. If the colored children were 
 excluded from the High School of Nantucket, " it was not on 
 account of their color, but of their capacity." "I dislike," 
 he said, " the philanthropic hobby-horses, and am not dis 
 posed to mount any of them." Mr. Clifford of Bristol, after 
 ward attorney-general and governor, warmly eulogized the 
 people and schools of Nantucket, and denied that the col 
 ored children there were deprived of their privileges. He 
 would not sacrifice, he said, the larger class for the benefit 
 of the smaller. Mr. Park of Suffolk traced the history and 
 establishment of the Smith School in Boston. Referring to 
 the objection of the greater distance some colored children 
 must walk by this arrangement, he said : u Boys in the coun 
 try have frequently to walk miles through the snows of winter 
 to attend the district school." Mr. Stone of Worcester Coun 
 ty opposed any action. If the bill passed, he said, " interest 
 
 63 
 
498 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 in the public schools would be lost, and less money would be 
 raised. By driving the colored children in, they will drive 
 the white children out." Mr. Lawrence of Hampshire said 
 if they could legislate to the last moment of time they could 
 not change or remedy the difficulty complained of. "The 
 Ethiopian," he said, " cannot change his skin, nor the leopard 
 his spot ; neither can the white man change his tastes, nor his 
 prejudices against the colored race. I do not justify it ; I de 
 plore it. But it exists, and we cannot change it." 
 
 After an earnest debate, Mr. Wilson's motion was adopted 
 by a large majority, and the bill was then committed to the 
 judiciary committee. That committee reported a bill in 
 accordance with the prayer of the petitioners, which passed 
 and became the law of the Commonwealth. 
 
 A few weeks after the passage of the act a petition was pre 
 sented to the school committee of Boston, from the colored 
 citizens, praying that " separate schools for colored children 
 should be abolished, and that said children be permitted to at 
 tend the schools in their several districts." Vigorous efforts 
 were made by Dr. Henry I. Bowditch, in which he was earnestly 
 supported by Albert J. Wright and Dr. Charles A. Phelps. 
 But the prayer of the petitioners was rejected by a vote of 
 twelve to forty-five. The spirit of caste still lingered in por 
 tions of the Commonwealth, and legislation so just and equita 
 ble could not then be secured. 
 
CHAPTER XXXV. 
 
 POSITION OP THE COLOEED PEOPLE. FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 
 
 Sentiments of the Colored People. Diverse Influences of Slavery and Freedom. 
 
 Childhood of Frederick Douglass. Cruelties of Slavery illustrated. At 
 tempts to escape. Sent to Baltimore. Became a Ship-caulker. Escaped 
 to New York. Introduced to Mr. Ruggles. Arrived at New Bedford. 
 Works in a Ship-yard. Addresses an Antislavery Convention in Nantucket. 
 
 Impressions made upon Garrison and Rogers. Becomes Agent of the Mas 
 sachusetts Antislavery Society. Wonderful Effects of his Speeches. His 
 Devotion to the Cause of his Race. Publishes his Autobiography. Visits 
 England. Reasons for going. Establishes the "North Star." Immense 
 Labors of Twenty Years. 
 
 WHILE the free colored people instinctively distrusted the 
 Colonization Society, and withheld their confidence from it, 
 they at once and heartily accepted the abolition movement. 
 This was especially true of the more intelligent and well-in 
 formed. Among the colored ministers there were several who, 
 seeing its religious as well as humane bearings, rendered es 
 sential aid to the cause. A few others did something in the 
 same direction, arousing public attention and quickening the 
 zeal of the friends of freedom. 
 
 But in 1841 a champion arose in the person of Frederick 
 Douglass, who was destined to play an important part in the 
 great drama then in progress. In him not only did the col 
 ored race but manhood itself find a worthy representative and 
 advocate ; one who was a signal illustration, not only of self- 
 culture and success under the most adverse circumstances, but 
 of the fact that talent and genius are " color-blind," and above 
 the accidents of complexion and birth. He, too, furnished an 
 example of the terrible necessities of slavery, and its purpose 
 and power to crush out the human soul ; as also of the benign 
 energies of freedom to arouse, to develop, and enlarge its high- 
 
500 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 est and noblest faculties, the one aiming, and almost succeed 
 ing in the attempt, to make him a mere mindless and purposeless 
 chattel ; the other actually and indissolubly linking his name 
 and labors with the antislavery cause, both in this country and 
 in Europe. As few of the world's great men have ever had so 
 checkered and diversified a career, so it may be at least plausi 
 bly claimed that no man represents in himself more conflicting 
 ideas and interests. His life is in itself an epic which finds 
 few to equal it in the realms of either romance or reality. 
 
 Frederick Douglass was born on the Eastern Shore, Mary 
 land, about the year 1817. According to the necessities of 
 slavery and the usual practice of slave-masters, he was taken 
 from his mother when an infant, consequently deprived of even 
 the rude care which maternal instinct might have prompted, 
 and placed under the guardianship of his grandmother, with 
 whom he lived until he was seven years of age. At the age of 
 ten he was sent to Baltimore, to be the companion and protector 
 of the son of a young married couple, who, in consequence of 
 general refinement of character and his proposed relation to 
 their darling boy, treated him, at first, kindly. This change 
 Mr. Douglass ever regarded as a providential interposition, 
 as the turning-point where his pathway, leaving the descend 
 ing grade of slave life, entered upon that which led him in 
 that widely divergent and upward direction it has since pur 
 sued. Leaving the rude experience of the plantation, with the 
 barren and desert-like surroundings of the Eastern Shore, for 
 the bustle and necessary companionship of the city, an opportun 
 ity of learning to read was afforded him, which he most sedu 
 lously and successfully, though surreptitiously, improved. But 
 the friendliness which his master and mistress had so gener 
 ously extended to him as an ignorant slave, they felt obliged, 
 by the necessities of the system, to withhold from him now 
 that he could read, and had learned to question the rightful- 
 ness of slavery and to chafe under its chains. 
 
 Returned to the Eastern Shore, he encountered the rigors 
 of plantation life, greatly increased by the drunken caprices 
 of an intemperate master, and doubtless aggravated by his 
 own impatient and contumacious rebellings under such slave- 
 
FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 501 
 
 holding restraint. This, however, was but a prelude to an ex 
 perience graver and still more tragic. Despairing of control 
 ling young Douglass himself, his owner placed him as men 
 place their unbroken colts under the care of horse-trainers 
 in the hands of a professed negro-breaker, known through the 
 region as a cruel and merciless man, who had not only gained 
 that reputation, but founci it necessary or for his interest to 
 maintain it. Concerning this change Mr. Douglass remarks, 
 after referring to the " comparative tenderness " with which 
 he had been treated at Baltimore : " I was now about to sound 
 profounder depths in slave life. The rigors of a field less tol 
 erable than the field of battle were before me." That his ap 
 prehensions were not groundless these extracts, taken from his 
 autobiography, abundantly show : " I had not been in his pos 
 session three whole days before he subjected me to a most 
 brutal chastisement. Under his heavy blows blood flowed 
 freely ; the wales were left on my back as large as my little 
 finger. The sores on my back from this whipping continued 
 for weeks." " I remained with Mr. Corey one year, cannot say 
 I lived with him, and during the first six months that I was 
 there I was whipped either with sticks or cowskins every week. 
 Aching bones and a sore back were my constant companions. 
 Frequently as the lash was used, however, Mr. Corey thought 
 less of it, as a means of breaking down my spirit, than of hard 
 and long-continued labor. He worked me steadily up to the 
 point of my powers of endurance. From the dawn of day in 
 the morning till the darkness was complete in the evening, I 
 was kept at hard work in the field or the woods." 
 
 He gave accounts of individual cases of brutal chastise 
 ment which were revolting almost beyond conception ; while 
 his concise description of himself " as a living embodiment of 
 mental and physical wretchedness " seems but a natural result. 
 " A few months of discipline," he says, " tamed me. Mr. Corey 
 succeeded in breaking me. I was broken in body, soul, and 
 spirit. My natural elasticity was crushed ; my intellect lan 
 guished ; the disposition to read departed ; the cheerful spark 
 that lingered about my eye died ; the dark night of slavery 
 closed in upon me ; and behold a man transformed into a brute." 
 
502 KISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Having completed his year with Corey, he was hired out to 
 another and more humane master. But the iron of slavery 
 rankled in his soul, and he could not endure its galling re 
 straints, however softened by kindness. After long rumina 
 tion upon the subject, and conferences with four or five of his 
 companions in bondage, he proposed and planned an attempt 
 to escape. Betrayed, however, by a confederate, they were 
 prevented from carrying their attempt into execution, and were 
 arrested and imprisoned. Instead of being " sold South " 
 that dreaded alternative of success, which held back thousands 
 from making the attempt he was sent again to Baltimore. 
 Being nearly murdered by the carpenters of a ship-yard, because 
 of their jealousy of slave competition with white labor, a 
 crime for which no indictment could be found, though sought, 
 because no white witnesses would testify against his brutal as 
 sailants, he was sent to another yard to learn the trade of a 
 calker. Becoming an expert workman, he was permitted to 
 make his own contracts, returning his week's wages every Sat 
 urday night to his master. At the same time which was of 
 more importance to him he was permitted to associate with 
 some free colored men, who had formed a kind of lyceum for 
 their mutual improvement, and by means of which he was en 
 abled to increase materially his knowledge and mental culture. 
 All of this, however, did but increase his sense of the essential 
 injustice of slavery, and make him more restive under its gall 
 ing chains. Accordingly he made his plans, now successful, 
 and on the third day of September, 1838, he says, " I bade 
 farewell to the city of Baltimore, and to that slavery which had 
 been my abhorrence from childhood." For prudential reasons 
 the particulars of his mode of escape were withheld from the 
 public knowledge, as they were of little comparative impor 
 tance ; while, had they been known then, they might have 
 compromised some and hedged up the way of escape of others. 
 
 Landing in New York, a homeless, penniless, and friendless 
 fugitive, he thus describes his feelings : " In the midst of 
 thousands of my fellow-men, and yet a perfect stranger ! In 
 the midst of human brothers, and yet more fearful of them 
 than of hungry wolves ! I was without home, without friends, 
 
FREDEEICK DOUGLASS. 503 
 
 without work, without money, and without any definite knowl 
 edge of which way to go or where to look for succor." In 
 the midst of his perplexities he met a sailor, whose seeming 
 frankness and honesty won, as they deserved, his confidence. 
 He introduced him to David Ruggles, chairman of the Vigi 
 lance Committee, a colored gentleman of much intelligence, 
 energy, and worth, who by his position and executive ability 
 did much for his people. This gentleman advised him to go 
 to New Bedford, Massachusetts, assisted him in reaching that 
 city, and introduced him to trustworthy friends there. Here 
 he was employed, mostly as a day laborer on the wharves, en 
 countering the same shameful and unmanly jealousy of colored 
 competition that had nearly cost him his life at Baltimore, 
 and which would not allow him to work at his trade as 
 calker by the side of white men. Being a professing Chris 
 tian, he was interested in religious meetings, where he was 
 accustomed to pray and exhort, a practice which probably 
 had something to do with his wonderful subsequent success 
 as a public speaker. 
 
 The first demonstration of his eloquence which attracted 
 public attention was at a meeting mainly of colored people, in 
 which were specially considered the claims of the Colonization 
 Society. Here began to be emitted specimens of that fiery 
 eloquence from his capacious soul, burning with the indignant 
 and unfading memories of the wrongs, outrages, and the deep 
 injustice which slavery had inflicted on him, and which it was 
 now inflicting upon his brethren in bonds. Of course, the few 
 white Abolitionists of New Bedford were not long in finding 
 out the young fugitive, appreciating his gifts and promise of 
 usefulness, and in devising ways of extending his range of 
 effort for their unpopular cause. Attending an antislavery 
 convention at Nantucket, he was persuaded to address the 
 meeting. His speech here seems to have been singularly elo 
 quent and effective. Among those present was Mr. Garrison, 
 who bore his testimony, both then and afterward, to " the 
 extraordinary emotion it exerted on his own mind, and to the 
 powerful impression it exerted upon a crowded auditory." He 
 declared, too, that " Patrick Henry had never made a more 
 
\ 
 504 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 eloquent speech in the cause of liberty than the one they had 
 just listened to from the lips of that hunted fugitive." Na 
 thaniel P. Rogers, editor of the " Herald of Freedom," thus 
 characterized a speech made by him the same year. After 
 speaking of his " commanding figure and heroic port," his 
 head, that " would strike a phrenologist amid a sea of them in 
 Exeter Hall," he adds : " As a speaker he has few equals. It 
 
 is not declamation, but oratory, power of debate He 
 
 has wit, argument, sarcasm, pathos, all that first-rate men 
 show in their master efforts." 
 
 This language, especially that of Mr. Garrison, seems ex 
 travagant, and the laudation excessive ; nor could it be ac 
 cepted as a general and critical estimate of Mr. Douglass as an 
 orator, great as his powers confessedly were and are. His 
 Nantucket speech was unquestionably one of those rare bursts 
 of eloquence, little less than inspiration itself, which are some 
 times vouchsafed to a man in his happiest moods ; when the 
 speaker seems to rise above himself and to take his audience 
 with him. Besides, there was certainly much in the circum 
 stances and surroundings of that meeting to impress the 
 minds and stir the sensibilities of such an assembly. On that 
 isle of the sea, at some distance from the mainland, one could 
 easily imagine a picture of the nation overshadowed by the 
 dark cloud of slavery, and prostrate beneath a despotism 
 pressing alike on the slaves at the South and on their advo 
 cates at the North. Indeed, the latter had just passed 
 through a baptism of fire and blood, during those fearful 
 years of mobs and martyrdom, which had measurably ceased, 
 but had been succeeded by what the earnest Abolitionist depre 
 cated more than violence, and that was the general apathy 
 which then reigned. 
 
 In the conflict for freedom of speech and the right of free 
 discussion Abolitionists had achieved a victory. What they 
 had contended for had, at length, been conceded ; at least, the 
 principle was no longer contested. They had conquered a 
 peace ; but their opponents were determined it should be the 
 peace of the grave. For the wordy warfare of discussion and 
 the brutal violence of lynch laws they would substitute the 
 
FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 505 
 
 policy of neglect. To let them severely alone, to belittle their 
 cause, to pass them by with a supercilious sneer, and to frown 
 contemptuously upon their attempts to gain a hearing, became 
 at that time the tactics of the enemies against the advocates 
 of human rights. Of course, what were termed antislavery 
 measures had lost much of their zest and potency ; meetings 
 became less numerously attended, and, consequently, less fre 
 quent ; organizations, losing their interest and effectiveness, 
 began to die out. Something was necessary to revive and 
 reanimate the drooping spirits and the languid movements of 
 the cause and its friends. It was then, at this opportune mo 
 ment, while they were thus enveloped in the chill and shade 
 of this most uncomfortable and unsatisfactory state of affairs, 
 the young fugitive appeared upon the stage. He seemed like 
 a messenger from the dark land of slavery itself ; as if in his 
 person his race had found a fitting advocate ; as if through 
 his lips their long pent-up wrongs and wishes had found a 
 voice. No wonder that Nantucket meeting was greatly moved. 
 It would not be strange if the words of description and com 
 ment of those present and in full sympathy with the youthful 
 orator should be somewhat extravagant. 
 
 The Massachusetts Antislavery Society at once made over 
 tures to Mr. Douglass, and he became one of its accredited 
 agents. For this new field of labor, which he reluctantly and 
 hesitatingly entered, and for which he modestly said he " had 
 no preparation," the event proved that he was admirably fitted. 
 In addition to that inborn genius and those natural gifts of 
 oratory with which he was so generously endowed, he had the 
 long and terrible lessons which slavery had burned into his 
 soul. The knowledge, too, which he had stolen in the house 
 of bondage, had enabled him to read the " Liberator " from 
 week to week, as he was engaged in his hard and humble 
 labors on the wharves of New Bedford, and thus to become 
 acquainted with the new thoughts and reasonings of others. 
 Doubtless many things which had long lain in his own mind 
 formless and vague he found there more clearly defined and 
 more logically expressed ; while the fierceness and force of 
 its 'utterances tallied only too well with the all-consuming zeal 
 
 64 
 
506 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of his own soul. Thus fitted and commissioned he entered 
 upon the great work of his life. Though distrustful of his 
 abilities, no knight-errant ever sallied forth with higher resolve, 
 or bore himself with more heroic courage. With whatever 
 diffidence he undertook the proposed service, there was no 
 lack of earnestness and devotion. Nor was his range a lim 
 ited one. Fitted by his talents to move thousands on the 
 platform, he was prepared by his early experience to be equally 
 persuasive in a little meeting in a country school-house. In 
 hall or church or grove he was alike effective. He could 
 make himself at home in the parlors of the great or by the 
 firesides of the humble. He could ride in the public convey 
 ances from State to State, or tramp on foot from neighbor 
 hood to neighborhood. Fertile in expedients and patient in 
 endeavor, he was not easily balked or driven from his purpose. 
 In the midst of the prejudices of caste, hardly less strong and 
 cruel in Massachusetts than in Maryland, he never permitted 
 these, however painful, to divert him from his purpose. If he 
 could not ride inside the stage, he would ride outside ; if he 
 could not ride in the first-class car, he rode in the second- 
 class ; if he could not occupy the cabin of the steamer, he 
 went into the steerage ; but to these insults to his manhood 
 he generally interposed his earnest protest, and often only 
 yielded to superior force. 
 
 The character, culture, and eloquence displayed by his ad 
 dresses provoked the insinuation that he was an impostor, and 
 that he had never been a slave. To silence this imputation, 
 he prepared and published, in the spring of 1845, an autobiog 
 raphy, which was widely circulated. As in it he gave the 
 names of persons, places, and dates, by which his claims and 
 statements could be verified, it was soon known in Maryland, 
 and he and his friends were given to understand that efforts 
 would be made for his recapture. To place himself out of the 
 reach of his pursuers, and, at the same time, help forward his 
 great work, it was proposed that he should visit England. 
 He was very kindly received there, and visited nearly all the 
 large towns and cities of the kingdom. In a lecture in Fins- 
 bury's Chapel, in London, to an audience of three thousand, 
 
FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 507 
 
 he thus answered the question why he did not confine his 
 labors to the United States. 
 
 " My first answer is, because slavery is the common enemy 
 of mankind, and that all mankind should be made acquainted 
 with its abominable character. My second answer is, that 
 the slave is a man, and as such is entitled to your sympathy as 
 a man and a brother. He has been the prey, the common prey, 
 of Christendom during the last three hundred years ; and it is 
 but right, just, and proper that his wrongs should be known 
 throughout the world. I have another reason for bringing this 
 matter before the British public, and it is this : slavery is a 
 system of wrong so blinding to all around it, so hardening to 
 the heart, so corrupting to- the morals, so deleterious to relig 
 ion, so sapping to all the principles of justice in its immediate 
 vicinity, that the community thus connected with it lack the 
 moral power necessary to its removal. It is a system of such 
 gigantic evil, so strong, so overwhelming in its power, that no 
 one nation is equal to its removal. It requires the humanity 
 of Christianity, the morality of the civilized world, to remove 
 it. Hence I call upon the people of Britain to look at this 
 matter, and to exert the influence I am about to show they pos 
 sess for the removal of slavery from America. I can appeal 
 to them as strongly by their regard for the slaveholder as by 
 their regard for the slave to labor in this cause. There is 
 nothing said here against slavery that will not be recorded in 
 the United States. I am here, also, because the slaveholders 
 do not want me to be here. I have adopted the maxim laid 
 down by Napoleon, never to occupy ground which the enemy 
 would like me to occupy. The slaveholders would much rather 
 have me, if I will denounce slavery, denounce it in the North 
 ern States, where their friends and supporters are, who will 
 
 stand by them and mob me for denouncing it The 
 
 power I exert here is something like the power that is ex 
 erted by the man at the end of the lever ; my influence 
 now is just in proportion to my distance from the United 
 States." 
 
 In the same speech, referring to the barbarous laws of the 
 slave code, denying that he was inveighing against tho 
 
508 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 institutions of America, and asserting that his only purpose 
 was to strip this anomalous system of all concealment, he said : 
 " To tear off the mask from this abominable system ; to ex 
 pose it to the light of heaven, ay, to the heat of the sun, that 
 it may burn and wither it out of existence, is my object in 
 coming to this country. I want the slaveholder surrounded as 
 by a wall of antislavery fire, so that he may see the condem 
 nation of himself and his system glaring down in letters of 
 light. I want him to feel that he has no sympathy in England, 
 Scotland, or Ireland ; that he has none in Canada, none in 
 Mexico, none among the poor wild Indians ; that the voice of 
 the civilized, ay, the savage world is against him. I would 
 have condemnation blaze down upon him in every direction, 
 till, stunned and overwhelmed with shame and confusion, 
 he is compelled to let go the grasp he holds upon the persons 
 of his victims and restore them to their long-lost rights." 
 
 That, like other prominent Abolitionists of those days, he 
 overrated the power of truth, and underestimated the power 
 of slavery and its tenacity of life, appears in the same speech, 
 and in this connection, when he says : " I expose slavery in 
 this country because to expose it is to kill it. Slavery is one 
 of those monsters of darkness to whom the light of truth is 
 death. Expose slavery, and it dies. Light is to slavery what 
 the heat of the sun is to the root of a tree ; it must die under 
 it." Mr. Douglass had not to live long his own career 
 furnishing the most convincing evidence of the fact to see 
 that something more than " light " was necessary to destroy 
 slavery. To expose it was not to kill it. 
 
 Of this, too, he received substantial evidence in England 
 and Scotland, especially the latter ; in England, by the refusal 
 of the Evangelical Alliance, at the instance of the American 
 delegation, to exclude the representatives of slaveholding 
 churches from its platform ; in Scotland, where he found the 
 Free Church not only receiving contributions for its church- 
 building fund from such churches, but sturdily defending its 
 propriety by the voice of its prince of scholars and clergymen, 
 Dr. Chalmers, and by that of its hardly less honored leaders, 
 Dr. Cunningham and Dr. Candlish. And this latter was done 
 
FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 509 
 
 in spite of the earnest remonstrances of himself and others, 
 among them that most eloquent Englishman, George Thomp 
 son, urging them not to receive that " price of blood," but to 
 " send back the money." 
 
 Mr. Douglass remained in Great Britain nearly .two years ; 
 in which time he visited England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales, 
 everywhere pressing upon the public mind the evils of slavery 
 and the duty of laboring for its overthrow. He was cordially 
 received, and treated with the utmost consideration. His 
 friends, without solicitation from him, raised one hundred 
 and fifty pounds for his manumission, and twenty-five hun 
 dred dollars with which to establish a press in this country, 
 which he subsequently did, at Rochester, New York. His 
 journal was first called the " North Star," and afterward 
 " Frederick Douglass's Paper," and was ably conducted and 
 well sustained till after the abolition of slavery. Thus by 
 voice, pen, and personal influence has he contributed in no 
 small measure to those manifold labors which the last thirty 
 years have witnessed for the removal of slavery, and for the 
 rehabilitation of his race with those rights of which it had so 
 long been despoiled, and for the still higher purpose of prepar 
 ing it for the new position it now occupies. 
 
 The main interest and importance, however, of Mr. Doug, 
 lass's career, are public, rather than personal. Full of thrilling 
 adventure, striking contrasts, brilliant passages, and undoubted 
 usefulness, as his history was, his providential relations to 
 some of the most marked facts and features of American his 
 tory constitute the chief elements of that interest and impor 
 tance which by common consent belong to it. Lifting the cur 
 tain, it revealed with startling vividness and effect the inner 
 experience and the workings of slavery, not only upon its vic 
 tims, but upon all connected with it. In it, as in a mirror, are 
 seen how unnatural, how inhuman, and how wicked were its 
 demands. Torn from his mother's arms in infancy, he was 
 treated with the same disregard of his comfort and the prompt 
 ings of nature as were the domestic animals of the farm-yard. 
 As he was transferred from one master to another, every one 
 can see what the hazards of a " chattel personal " were, and 
 
510 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 how the kindness of one only aggravated the harshness of an 
 other. In the extreme solicitude manifested by his kind mas 
 ter and mistress at Baltimore that he should not learn to read, 
 and their marked displeasure and change of treatment when 
 he had thus learned, are seen not only the stern necessities of 
 slavery, but how it quenched the kindlier feelings and turned 
 to bitterness even affection itself. In the terrible struggle with 
 Corey which he so graphically describes, when " the dark night 
 of slavery shut in upon him," and he was " transformed to a 
 brute," is disclosed something of the process by which man 
 hood was dethroned, and an immortal being was transformed 
 by something more than legal phrase into a chattel, a thing. 
 Had he, after his first unsuccessful attempt to escape, been 
 " sold South," as he had reason to apprehend, and had not 
 been sent north to Baltimore, that night would have remained 
 unbroken, and that transformation would have been complete ; 
 and the world now knows what a light would have been ex 
 tinguished and what a sacrifice would have been made. He 
 escaped, indeed ; but how many did not ? Not all were so 
 richly endowed, though none can tell how many " village 
 Hampdens," how many " mute, inglorious Miltons " have thus 
 been lost to letters and to man; while many have learned to 
 sympathize with Dr. Campbell, at Finsbury's Chapel, when he 
 exclaimed : " My blood boiled within me when I heard his ad 
 dress to-night, and thought that he had left behind him three 
 millions of such men." 
 
 And sadder still when it is seen that all this was done, if 
 not in the name of the Christian religion, in spite of it, by 
 those professing its holy faith, his owner, and tormentor, 
 Corey, both being members of the church ; the latter punctil 
 ious and pretentious in his church-going, praying, and psalm- 
 singing, adding the latter generally to his daily family worship, 
 and saddest of all, that, when Mr. Douglass, rescued as from 
 the lion's den, bore a testimony which could not be gainsaid, 
 the multitudes, though fascinated by his thrilling story and 
 matchless eloquence, withheld from him what he earnestly 
 sought, while only the few were willing to receive the un 
 popular doctrines of his Abolitionism. For twenty years he 
 
FREDERICK DOUGLASS. 511 
 
 labored as few others could, addressing thousands upon thou 
 sands in the New England, Middle, and Western States ; and 
 yet till the beginning of the Rebellion he belonged to a despised 
 minority, while the system that had so outraged him and his 
 people still dominated the State, and was sanctioned, if not 
 sanctified, by the Church. In the light of such a history this 
 mountain of national guilt assumes more towering propor 
 tions, and its base is seen to rest not upon the South alone, 
 but upon the whole land. The crime was gigantic ; and, 
 though its expiation has already been terrible, who shall say 
 that it has been commensurate with the crime itself ? 
 
 Few have forgotten the closing utterances of Mr. Lincoln's 
 second Inaugural concerning the war still raging, sounding as 
 if they fell from the judgment-seat and were the words of 
 doom itself: " Yet, if God will that it continue until all the 
 wealth piled by the bondmen's two hundred and fifty years of 
 unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood 
 drawn by the lash shall be paid by another drawn by the 
 sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so it still must 
 be said, i The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous 
 altogether."' The solemn significance of this language is 
 still worthy of thought, though the war has ceased and the 
 great armies then in the field have been recalled. 
 
CHAPTER XXXYI. 
 
 THE FLORIDA WAR, SLAVERY ITS CAUSE. 
 
 The Surrender of Slaves by the Seminoles demanded. The Additional Treaty. 
 
 Agreement to remove to the "West. Outrages perpetrated by Slave-traders. 
 
 Exasperation of the Indians. Stern Policy of President Jackson. Seizure 
 of Osceola's Wife. Death of the Indian Agent. Destruction of Major 
 Dade's Command. Conduct of the Citizens of Florida. Recall of General 
 Scott. Action of General Jessup. Treaty of Peace ; rejected by the 
 Government. The Slave-hunters. Admissions of General Jessup. Boun 
 ty offered to the Creeks. Dishonorable Conduct of Army Officers. Honor 
 able Action of the Cherokee Delegation. Cruel Action of the War Depart 
 ment. Violation of Flags of Truce. Noble Conduct of General Taylor. 
 Treaty with the Creeks and Seminoles. Danger of the Exiles. Demands 
 of the Creeks. The Exiles emigrate to Mexico. The Faith and Honor of 
 the Nation tarnished. 
 
 THE citizens of Florida and the adjoining States continued 
 to make demands upon the Seminoles for the surrender of 
 negroes residing among them. Unscrupulous adventurers, 
 too, entered that territory, and in violation of treaty stipula 
 tions, of law, justice, and humanity, sought to re-enslave not 
 only those who had escaped from their masters since the close 
 of the war, but the exiles and their children. The Indians 
 were incensed by these claims and this lawless violence, and 
 it became apparent that peace could not be long maintained. 
 
 By treaty it had been provided that several of the Seminole 
 chiefs should visit the reservation occupied by the Creeks west 
 of the Mississippi. It was intended, if the Seminoles were 
 satisfied with the country and such prospective arrangements 
 as might be made, that they should be removed and become 
 an integral portion of the Creek nation. Whether or not it 
 was the intention of President Jackson by this arrangement 
 to enable the Creeks to enslave the exiles, that would cer 
 tainly have been the practical effect of this proposed removal. 
 
THE FLORIDA WAR, SLAVERY ITS CAUSE. 513 
 
 Of course, as that purpose became known, the exiles were 
 alarmed and the Seminoles became suspicious. Being pressed, 
 too, by the commissioners, the chiefs, though unauthorized by 
 their nation, entered, in 1833, into what was termed the " ad 
 ditional treaty," by which a tract of land was secured for the 
 use of the Seminoles forever. When the chiefs returned to 
 Florida they desired a meeting of the head men of the nation 
 to whom they might make report of the results of their visit. 
 But the Indian agent peremptorily refused to have such a 
 meeting called, and demanded that immediate preparations 
 should be made for removal. 
 
 The citizens of Florida also presented a protest to the Presi 
 dent against allowing the Indians to remain longer in the Terri 
 tory. They alleged that the Seminoles did not recapture fugi 
 tive slaves ; and that unless they did, no slave property would 
 be safe. Although the treaty had not been ratified by the Semi 
 noles, and it was known that they were nearly unanimous in 
 their opposition to it, President Jackson indorsed on the back 
 of this protest an order to the Secretary of War " to inquire 
 into the alleged facts, and if proved to be true, to direct the 
 Seminoles to prepare to remove West and join the Creeks." 
 In assuming this responsibility the President was consistent 
 with his usual policy wherever the demands of slavery were 
 involved. Notwithstanding his traditional personal courage 
 and independence of character, he, either from sympathy with 
 the spirit and purposes of the Slave Power, or from fear of its 
 displeasure, ever showed himself forward, not to say unscru 
 pulous, in any service it required. 
 
 By the treaty of Indian Spring two hundred and fifty thou 
 sand dollars had been reserved to pay the slaveholders of 
 Georgia for slaves lost prior to 1812. These claims had been 
 audited, and one hundred and nine thousand dollars had been 
 paid, leaving one hundred and forty-one thousand dollars, 
 which justly belonged to the Creeks. These slave claimants, 
 with a grasping cupidity which bespoke its origin, made a new 
 claim for this unexpended balance. Nor did an obsequious 
 Congress refuse to allow the singular claim " for the loss of 
 the offspring which the exiles would have borne to their mas- 
 
 65 
 
514 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ters had they remained in bondage." Having paid the slave 
 holders of Georgia this enormous sum, the Creeks claimed 
 that the exiles became their slaves, and demanded of the Semi- 
 noles that they should be surrendered. While, on the one 
 hand, the Creeks were claiming the exiles as slaves, the Presi 
 dent, on the other, was requiring that the Seminoles and 
 exiles should be sent to the Indian reservation in the West, 
 where the former would have the power to enforce their 
 demands. 
 
 By the treaty of Camp Moultrie certain Seminole chiefs, 
 having slaves with whom the exiles had intermarried, were 
 authorized to name certain persons who should reside among 
 them and who should be responsible for their conduct, while 
 the United States were to be responsible for the safety of the 
 agents thus employed. One of these chiefs held about twenty 
 slaves, and there resided on his land several exiles who had 
 never been slaves. Slave-dealers in Georgia desiring to get 
 both the slaves and exiles into their possession, one of their 
 number claimed to have purchased several of a Creek. This 
 claim, having been pronounced fraudulent and void by the 
 judge of the District Court, was sold to other traders more 
 daring and reckless than himself. They provided themselves 
 with fetters and bloodhounds, descended the river, and landed 
 on the reservation. Finding that the negroes were prepared 
 to defend themselves they retired, and with cowardly and 
 mendacious effrontery raised the cry that the Indian chief 
 had armed his slaves and was about to make war. A mili 
 tary force was sent to the reservation ; and, although the 
 chief had explained to the officer that his people had taken 
 arms only against those who had come to rob them of their 
 liberties, their weapons and ammunition were taken from 
 them. The next day the slave-traders returned, seized the 
 slaves and exiles, manacled them, carried them to Georgia, 
 and sold them into bondage. The chief petitioned Congress 
 for redress, but could obtain none either for his own or his 
 people's wrongs. Power was on the side of the oppressor, 
 and not on that of his victim. 
 
 Another chief had upon his plantation slaves and exiles. 
 
THE FLORIDA WAR, SLAVERY ITS CAUSE. 515 
 
 The slave-stealers came and carried away both bond and free. 
 Knowing that a band of slave-stealers was watching his plan 
 tation, another chief armed his people, and when the maraud 
 ers came they fired upon and drove them away. He then 
 propounded to the Indian agent this pertinent inquiry : " Are 
 the free negroes and the negroes belonging to this town to be 
 stolen in face of law and justice, carried off, and sold to fill 
 the pockets of those who are worse than land pirates ? " and 
 he demanded protection according to treaty stipulations, but 
 none was afforded. The slave-stealers returned, seized their 
 victims, carried them to Alabama, and sold them into per 
 petual slavery. 
 
 These lawless deeds exasperated the Indians and alarmed 
 the negroes. If the exiles remained in Florida, they saw 
 that they were to be reduced to slavery by violence ; if they 
 removed to the West, they feared that they would be en 
 slaved by the Creeks. Mr. Thompson, Indian agent ; General 
 Clinch, who had twenty years before commanded the troops 
 at the Port Blunt massacre ; Governor Eaton, late Secretary of 
 War ; and other officials, represented to the government the 
 wrongs of these people in Florida, and the probabilities that 
 they would be enslaved by the Creeks if sent to the West. 
 But the administration was not to be moved from its purpose. 
 General Cass, then Secretary of War, characterized appeals 
 made in behalf of the Seminoles and negroes as " the prompt 
 ings of a false philanthropy." He persisted in the demand 
 that they should go to the West, join the Creeks, and subject 
 themselves to their authority. 
 
 Intent on getting these negroes into their possession, the 
 slave-traders applied for admission to enter Florida for the 
 purpose of purchasing slaves of the Indians. This application 
 was referred to Mr. Grundy, Attorney-General, who reported 
 that he saw " no good reason why the white people should not 
 be permitted to purchase slaves of the Indians." President 
 Jackson gave the permission asked for. The Indian agent, 
 knowing that the Indians, when in a state of intoxication, 
 would give bills of sale ot negroes pointed out to them, whether 
 owning them or not, and that the policy would be most disas- 
 
516 KISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 trous, remonstrated against it. So great, indeed, was the indig 
 nation excited against this infamous order, that it was soon 
 countermanded. But these acts of violence, this constant 
 pressure upon them to go to the West, unite with the Creeks, 
 and become subject to their authority, alarmed both Indians 
 and negroes, and they resolved to defend themselves. 
 
 At that time the number of slaves held by the Seminoles 
 was estimated at two hundred, and the exiles and free negroes 
 at six times that number. Many of the latter had intermar 
 ried with the Indians. Osceola, a young chief, had married 
 the daughter of another chief, whose wife had been one of 
 these exiles. This young chief with his wife visited Fort 
 King for trading purposes. While there his wife was seized 
 as a slave and carried off into hopeless bondage. Frantic at 
 this cruel wrong, Osceola himself was seized, manacled, and 
 put in prison, where he remained for six days. Vowing ven 
 geance on those who had committed this outrage, he lay for 
 weeks with his followers near Fort King, keeping watch upon 
 the movements of the agent. Mr. Thompson and Lieutenant 
 Smith were walking some distance from the fort, when he 
 was fired upon by Osceola and his party, and Thompson fell, 
 pierced with fourteen balls. The few soldiers at Fort King 
 were in no condition to follow them, and Osceola hastened to 
 join his companions. 
 
 In November General Clinch ordered Major Dade, then near 
 Tampa Bay, to prepare for a march to Fort King, about one 
 hundred and thirty miles distant. As his march would be 
 through an unsettled forest, with swamp and lake and horn- 
 mock, he obtained for a guide Lewis, slave of Antonio Pacheco, 
 who spoke and wrote with facility the English, French, and 
 Spanish languages, and also the Indian dialect. Knowing the 
 persecutions and outrages inflicted upon his race, he deter 
 mined to embrace this opportunity to avenge their wrongs. 
 He communicated to the Indians and exiles the information 
 that Major Dade was to go to Fort King, that he was to act 
 as guide, and that he would conduct them near the great Wa- 
 hoo swamp. Hostilities had commenced, and the Indians and 
 exiles had gathered near the designated place. The memories 
 
THE FLORIDA WAR, SLAVERY ITS CAUSE. 517 
 
 of past wrongs and the fear of impending evils gave them a 
 purpose and courage to strike a blow for safety and revenge. 
 Entering the defile into which he and his hundred and ten 
 men had been lured, Major Dade was fired upon, and himself 
 and more than half of his command were killed at the first 
 discharge. Only two soldiers escaped. The murder of the 
 Indian agent and the massacre of Dade's command, both on 
 the 28th of December, 1835, inaugurated a war, which proved 
 to be costly in both blood and treasure. But the Indians and 
 exiles had been forced into it by the sordid and all-grasping 
 avarice, the hatred and contempt of the slave-hunters of 
 Florida and the adjacent States. 
 
 The people of Florida, assuming that the war was fought in 
 their interest, attempted to interfere and to dictate the policy 
 and movements of General Scott. Refusing to yield to this 
 dictation, he was bitterly assailed and his removal was de 
 manded. Influenced by these feelings, and perhaps by his 
 own desire for power, General Jessup wrote to Francis P. 
 Blair, sharply criticising General Scott's policy. This letter 
 was placed in the hands of President Jackson, who imme 
 diately ordered General Scott to report at Washington, and 
 placed General Jessup in command. But that officer found 
 that he had entered upon a struggle, to be stubbornly con 
 tested, with red men fighting for their homes and black men 
 fighting for their freedom. 
 
 Early in the spring of 1837 a conference was held with 
 some of the Indian chiefs. With a magnanimity and self- 
 abnegation in strange contrast with the sordid and unfeeling 
 policy of the government and of those whose cause it cham 
 pioned, they refused to enter into any arrangements that did 
 not guarantee to the exiles equal protection with themselves. 
 Hostilities had then continued sixteen months, blood and 
 treasure had been lavishly expended, and the question of 
 giving the exiles equal protection with the Indians remained 
 the chief obstacle in the way of peace. At length yielding 
 to the pressing exigencies of the situation, General Jessup 
 agreed, in behalf of the United States, that the Seminoles 
 and their allies who would emigrate to the West should be 
 
518 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 secured their lives, liberty, and property. Under tliis treaty 
 the exiles secured that promise of protection for which they had 
 so bravely battled. Abraham, perhaps the ablest man among 
 them, entered upon the task of persuading them to remove to 
 the West, where they would be free from their persecutors. 
 A region of country ten miles square, near Tampa Bay, was 
 marked out as a place of rendezvous for the Indians and 
 negroes preparatory to their Western journey. Even Osceola 
 avowed his purpose to emigrate. Twenty-six vessels were 
 brought for their transportation. General Jessup announced 
 that the war was ended, dismissed the volunteers, and asked 
 leave to retire from active duty. 
 
 But this treaty, though it involved an enforced emigration 
 of the Seminoles from their homes to an untried country, and 
 that, too, against their wishes, contained too much of justice and 
 humanity to be acceptable to the slaveholders of Florida, Geor 
 gia, and Alabama. Accordingly they addressed a communica 
 tion to the Secretary of War, stating the fact that it contained 
 no provision for indemnity or the restitution of negroes, and 
 that unless the Indians were compelled to perform the stipula 
 tions of the treaty of Camp Moultrie, " owners may never regain 
 their slaves." 
 
 In pursuance of this same settled purpose, slave-hunters de 
 sired permission to go among the Indians and negroes who 
 were coming in preparatory to their emigration to the West, for 
 the purpose of identifying arid reclaiming fugitives. Their re 
 quest was indeed refused, but for reasons of policy rather than 
 of principle. " Any interference with the negroes," it was 
 said, " will produce alarm on their part, and inevitably deprive 
 us of all the advantages we have gained." Writing to Colonel 
 Warren of the Florida militia, General Jessup affirmed that 
 while there was no disposition among the Indians to renew 
 hostilities, any attempt to interfere with their negroes would be 
 followed by an instant resort to arms. In a general order of the 
 5th of April he declared that he had reason to believe the inter 
 ference of unprincipled white men with " the negro property 
 of the Seminoles would prevent their emigration and lead to 
 a renewal of the war." 
 
THE FLOKIDA WAR, SLAVERY ITS CAUSE. 519 
 
 Pressed by the clamorous demands of the slave-jobbers, he 
 made an arrangement, not with those with whom he had ne 
 gotiated the treaty, but with Co-had-jo, an unimportant chief, 
 who acted without authority, that the Indians should surrender 
 the negroes of whites, particularly those who were taken dur 
 ing the war. Though this arrangement had no binding force 
 upon the Indians, it created the greatest alarm, and General 
 Jessup was forced soon after to admit that the premature at 
 tempts of the citizens of Florida to obtain possession of slaves 
 had prevented the Indians from coming in, and also that it had 
 caused many of those who had come in to leave the 'camp. But 
 the legislature of Florida affirming the right of the masters to 
 regain their slaves, and popular meetings resolving that the 
 recapture of their slaves constituted an object hardly less im 
 portant than the peace of the country, General Jessup modi 
 fied his order, allowed citizens to enter a portion of the Terri 
 tory, and, though he had repeatedly stated that any attempt to 
 interfere with the negroes would defeat the treaty and cause an 
 immediate resort to arms, he weakly consented, and allowed 
 them to range the country in pursuit of slaves, and to use the 
 army in that infamous work. On the 25th of May General 
 Jessup wrote to Colonel Harvey : " If you see Osceola again, I 
 wish you to tell him that I intend to send exploring parties 
 into any part of the country during the summer, and I shall 
 send out and take all the negroes that belong to the white 
 people, and he must not allow Indians and Indian negroes to 
 mingle with them. Tell him I am sending to Cuba for blood 
 hounds to trail them, and I intend to hang every one that don't 
 come in." Whether this message was ever communicated to 
 the Indian chieftain or not, the re-enslavement of those who 
 had taken refuge with the Seminoles created great alarm. 
 Blacks who had come in fled, though ninety of them, confined 
 within the pickets of Tampa Bay, were immediately, on the 2d 
 of June, sent to New Orleans. This act so alarmed the In 
 dians, who had come in for the purpose of emigrating, that 
 they fled into the interior, resolved to defend themselves. 
 Two weeks after this, General Jessup wrote to General Gads- 
 den that he had captured ninety negroes, the property of citi- 
 
520 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 zens, and had sent them to St. Mark's and St. Augustine ; and 
 also that he had seized and sent off ninety Indian negroes to 
 New Orleans, and held seventeen then. But his vigilant efforts 
 in the service of the slaveholders and slave-catchers had de 
 feated his treaty of peace, and, in the same letter, he wrote, 
 All is lost." 
 
 Hostilities were renewed. The guilt and dishonor rest on 
 General Jessup. At least he was the instrument, though slav 
 ery was the inspiration. He had promised the Creeks the 
 " plunder," understood by both parties to include slaves, they 
 might capture. He now held out the same kind of inducement 
 to the Florida militia. In a letter to Colonel Warren he prom 
 ised that the negroes of the Indians should belong to the corps 
 that captured them. Field officers were to have three shares, 
 company officers two shares, and privates one share each. 
 Documents published by the XXVth Congress reveal the dis 
 honorable fact that the war, which had been renewed, was to 
 be stimulated by the hope of sharing the profits or spoils of 
 forays into the Indian country, including captured negroes. 
 Even the Indians west of the Mississippi were thus appealed 
 to, and the same disgraceful motives held out, and some of the 
 Choctaws and Delawares actually entered the service of this 
 great and magnanimous Christian nation, for the purpose of 
 harrying and distressing this handful of Indians and negroes, 
 with the pledge that negroes taken, instead of being held as 
 prisoners of war, might be sold as their reward or the price of 
 their service. And to make the thing more disgraceful still, 
 on their expressing some discontent at the amount of pay 
 realized, General Jessup sought to pacify them with an addi 
 tional offer, though admitting that he had transcended his 
 authority and the law in what he had already " stipulated." 
 He, however, promised that he would pay them " fifty dollars 
 for every negro " captured. 
 
 But the Cherokees, instead of furnishing slave-catchers, sent 
 a delegation of twelve influential men, who bore to the Semi- 
 noles an address, written by John Ross, assuring them that they 
 might confide in the justice and honor of the United States. 
 This assurance of the Cherokee chief was undoubtedly made 
 
THE FLORIDA WAR, SLAVERY ITS CAUSE. 521 
 
 in good faith, though, in view of the general course and policy 
 of the government, it sounds like the bitterest irony. Indeed, 
 Mr. Ross himself soon had occasion to expostulate with the 
 officials for their breach of faith towards those who, yielding 
 to his suggestions, had placed themselves within the power and 
 reach of United States troops. 
 
 King Philip, an aged chief, was captured by General Her 
 nandez of the Florida militia, with eleven others of his tribe. 
 He sent a message to Wild Cat, his son, one of the most ac 
 tive of the Seminole chiefs, requesting a visit. As the Cher 
 okee delegation had laid before them the assurance of John 
 Ross that they could confide in the honor of the general gov 
 ernment, it was determined that Wild Cat should visit his 
 father and bear with him a peace token. Becoming thus a 
 messenger to his people, he visited them, and, after the space 
 of ten days, returned with the assurance that Osceola and about 
 a hundred Indians and as many Indian negroes were on their 
 way to St. Augustine for the purpose of negotiating peace. By 
 direction of General Hernandez they encamped a few miles 
 from that place, keeping the white flag flying. The General 
 met them at their encampment for the purpose of escorting 
 them into St. Augustine. But instead of doing so, as the In 
 dians expected, he read to Osceola a paper from General Jessup 
 asking these questions : " Are you prepared at once to deliver 
 up the negroes taken from the citizens ? Why have you not 
 surrendered them already, as promised by Co-had-jo at Fort 
 King ? Have the chiefs of the nation acted in relation to the 
 talk at Fort King ? " 
 
 The Indian chief exhibited great emotion and astonishment 
 at these questions. Turning to Co-had-jo, he said : " You must 
 answer, I am choked.'* The Indians were instantly surround 
 ed, disarmed, taken into St. Augustine, and imprisoned. The 
 negroes were sent to Tampa Bay for safe keeping. Wild Cat, 
 who had been innocently used as an instrument for the betrayal 
 of Osceola and his friends, was also imprisoned, though after 
 some weeks he succeeded in effecting his escape. A few weeks 
 after Micanopy, regarded as one of the most important chiefs 
 of the nation, through the influence of the Cherokee delegation, 
 
 66 
 
522 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 which had come more than a thousand miles on their mission 
 of peace, accompanied by a portion of that delegation, seventy- 
 five Indians and forty exiles, bearing a flag of truce, came to 
 General Jessup' s camp. A few days after their arrival, they 
 too were seized, disarmed, made prisoners of war, and sent to 
 St. Augustine. 
 
 Readers of history must go far and peruse many volumes 
 before they can find a parallel to these transactions, in which 
 the principles of humanity, honesty, and fair dealing have 
 been so completely ignored and trampled underfoot. When 
 it is remembered that the Indian's only alleged fault in this 
 controversy was his extension of the rites of hospitality to the 
 trembling fugitive, and his unwillingness to rudely repel those 
 who sought that hospitality from his door ; that his was the 
 pagan and his pursuers the professedly Christian nation, 
 can language be too strong that justly characterizes such con 
 duct ? Is it possible to exaggerate ? Does Carthage alone de 
 serve the unenviable distinction involved in its "Punic faith"? 
 No wonder that the Cherokees remonstrated against this viola 
 tion of the flag of truce. Nor should the wonder be less that 
 their remonstrances were without avail. The poor boon of 
 making an explanation to the deceived Seminoles, to assure 
 them that they were not parties to the cruel fraud, though 
 at first denied but finally permitted, can only be regarded as 
 an exception to the usual course of violence, deception, and 
 wrong. With good reason, though a most damaging reflec 
 tion upon the government, the Cherokees returned to their 
 homes, refusing to have further communication with men so 
 oblivious of the commonest principles of honor and fair deal 
 ing. 
 
 The war went on, and General Jessup continued to employ 
 the military power of the nation in seizing and returning fugi 
 tives. While the officers and soldiers of the United States 
 army deemed the work odious and degrading, the Florida vol 
 unteers were adepts. Early in 1838 General Jessup made 
 a campaign into the country, and had a skirmish with the 
 Indians and their allies. He erected a stockade which lie 
 called Fort Jupiter, and, by the advice of his officers, sent a 
 
THE FLORIDA WAR, SLAVERY ITS CAUSE. 523 
 
 proposition to the Indians to make peace on condition that 
 they and their allies should remain in the southern portion of 
 the Territory. His messenger, whom he designated as a 
 " Seminole negro," returned accompanied by several Indians, 
 who expressed a strong desire to remain in the Territory 
 On the 8th of February, 1838, the principal chief of that re 
 gion met General Jessup, by appointment. The latter agreed 
 to recommend peace upon the basis of allowing the negro 
 allies to remain and occupy a portion of the southern part of 
 Florida, and permitting in the mean while the Indians to oc 
 cupy the Territory, near the place of negotiation, until the 
 views of the President could be ascertained. Writing to the 
 Secretary of War, the next day, General Jessup expressed the 
 opinion that the prospect of terminating the war by employ 
 ing an army to explore the country to remove a band of sav 
 ages from one part of the country to another was not very 
 flattering ; that he did not consider the country south of the 
 Chick-a-so-hatchie worth the " medicines " they would expend 
 in driving the Indians from it ; and that, unless the idea of 
 " immediate emigration " was abandoned, the war would con 
 tinue many years at great expense. 
 
 But the Indians were doomed to fresh disappointment. The 
 Secretary replied that removal was the settled policy of the 
 government, and he could not sanction any arrangement which 
 would assign any portion of Florida as the future residence of 
 the Indians and their allies. Supposing, however, that the 
 proposed arrangement would be carried out, five hundred and 
 thirteen Indians and one hundred and sixty-five negroes had 
 assembled near the encampment. They had met there to 
 negotiate a peace on the idea of remaining in the country. 
 Four days after he received the decision of the Secretary of 
 War he directed the Indian chiefs to meet him in council. 
 They did not do so, however, in consequence, as it was be 
 lieved, of this decision having become known to them. He at 
 once ordered General Twiggs to seize them and hold them as 
 prisoners. Fourteen of the negroes were represented to be 
 slaves of citizens of Florida, and were treated as such. The 
 remainder were hurried off to Tampa Bay, and there confined. 
 
524 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 General Hernandez captured several Indians, and restored 
 more than three hundred negroes to the citizens. How many 
 were fugitives and how many were free negroes and exiles will 
 never be known. 
 
 John Ross addressed a letter to the Secretary of War 
 demanding the release of the prisoners who had come in with 
 a flag of truce through the influence of the Cherokee dele 
 gation. The House of Representatives, on motion of Mr. 
 Everett of Vermont, called for information concerning this 
 violation of the flag of truce. The Secretary of War at 
 tempted to justify this act of treachery by alleging that the 
 Indians had shown bad faith to the United States. His 
 attempt, however, to transfer the charge from the criminal 
 to the victims only committed the administration more fully 
 to the disgraceful policy pursued towards the Indians, and 
 prompted Mr. Everett to make a most thorough exposure of 
 the outrage in an able speech, calling public attention and 
 greatly exciting the indignation of the country at this per 
 sistent policy of the government against humanity, justice, and 
 the most manifest claims of equity and fair dealing. 
 
 After General Taylor, however, took the command, there was 
 a great improvement. Discarding his predecessor's policy, the 
 army was no longer employed to chase down and seize women 
 and children, to be delivered into slavery. He denied the 
 right of any citizens to inspect those captured or to meddle 
 with his prisoners. He no longer separated the Indians from 
 the negroes, but treated both as prisoners of war. Under his 
 more humane and dignified policy many came in and were sent 
 to their homes in the West. In the spring of 1839 General 
 McComb went to Florida. After consulting with the Indians, 
 he issued an order setting apart a portion of this Territory for 
 their future residence ; at the same time forbidding any white 
 persons to enter upon it without permission. The people of 
 Florida, understanding that in the war with the Indians the 
 negroes were to be given up to them, protested for this reason 
 against the peace. 
 
 The war had continued for nearly eight years. During that 
 time several hundred persons had been seized and enslaved, 
 
THE FLORIDA WAR, SLAVERY ITS CAUSE. 525 
 
 nearly forty million dollars had been expended, and hundreds 
 of lives had been lost. The exiles who had been sent West, 
 fearful that they would be reduced to slavery by the Creeks, 
 remained in the Cherokee country, hoping; that there would be 
 assigned to them a territory, as stipulated in the " additional 
 treaty." Their expectations and disappointments were repre 
 sented to the general government, but no action was taken. 
 The Cherokees, too, were dissatisfied at the refusal of the gov 
 ernment to set apart territory for the Seminoles and exiles. 
 But the President adhered to his policy of having the Semi 
 noles and their allies removed to the jurisdiction of the 
 Creeks ; while the Creeks held firmly to their purpose to re- 
 enslave the exiles whenever they should come under their 
 jurisdiction. 
 
 In 1845 a treaty was made with the Creeks and Seminoles, 
 in which it was agreed that all contested cases between the 
 tribes in regard to rights of property should be subject to the 
 decision of the President. The Creeks agreed that the Semi 
 noles should settle as a body or separately in their country, and 
 no discrimination should be made between the two tribes ; and 
 the Seminoles agreed to move to the Creek reservation. But 
 no sooner were they settled on their reservation, than the 
 Creeks claimed the exiles as their slaves. The Seminoles and 
 exiles appealed to the President, according to the terms of the 
 treaty, to determine the question. The President not making 
 a decision, the Creeks became impatient of delay, and threat 
 ened violence unless their demands were acceded to. The 
 exiles, repairing to Fort Gibson and demanding protection of 
 General Arbuckle, its commander, were directed to encamp on 
 the reservation near the fort, and were promised protection 
 there. The President, who had supposed that the matter 
 would be easily settled when the exiles were placed under 
 Creek jurisdiction, referred the matter to General Jessup. 
 That officer reported that he had solemnly pledged the nation's 
 faith that they should not be separated, nor any of them sold 
 to white men ; that they were free and under the protection 
 of the United States, and that this had been promised them. 
 The matter was then referred to the Attorney-General, another 
 
526 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Virginia slaveholder. He decided that the exiles were enti 
 tled to their freedom ; that the President could not interfere ; 
 and that they must return to their towns in the Indian coun 
 try, where they had, a right to remain. 
 
 Informed of this decision the exiles returned to their villages, 
 and for a short time were unmolested. But a slave-dealer, who 
 appears by documents in the War Department to have been 
 previously engaged in kidnapping, went among the Creeks and 
 offered them one hundred dollars for any exile taken and de 
 livered to him, he assuming all risks of titles. Two hundred 
 Creeks assembled, entered the negro villages, and seized sev 
 eral of the exiles. Those, however, having arms offering re 
 sistance, they retired with their captives, delivered them to the 
 slave-dealer, and received the stipulated price. The Indian 
 agent obtained a warrant from the nearest judge in Arkansas, 
 and the captured exiles were brought before him. He urged in 
 their behalf the promises of General Jessup, the opinion of the 
 Attorney-General, and the action of the President, as evidence 
 that they were free. But the judge decided that the Creeks 
 had obtained a title to them by their contract ; that their title 
 was good ; and, having sold them to the claimant, his title 
 was also good. By this strange and wicked decision these 
 manacled victims were thus suddenly and hopelessly bereft of 
 freedom, taken to the New Orleans market, and sold into per 
 petual bondage. 
 
 Alarmed for their safety, and losing all confidence in the 
 government that had thus betrayed them, more than three 
 hundred of these exiles left the United States and went to 
 Mexico, while one or two hundred, connected with the Semi- 
 noles by marriage, remained behind. Stimulated by the slave- 
 dealers the Creeks pursued them. Overtaking them, a battle 
 was fought, and the exiles, under the lead of Wild Cat, drove 
 back the slave-catching Creeks, who left their dead upon the 
 field. Directing their course southwesterly the exiles crossed 
 the Rio Grande and settled on a rich and productive soil, 
 where, at length, they found for themselves homes, which had 
 been so cruelly and persistently denied them in the United 
 States. Was the truthfulness of Wesley's characterization of 
 
THE FLORIDA WAR, SLAVERY ITS CAUSE. 527 
 
 slavery as " the sum of all villanies " ever more completely veri 
 fied and illustrated than in this sad and strange story of the 
 conduct of the citizens and governments of Florida, Georgia, 
 Alabama, and the United States towards these Indians and 
 exiles ? 
 
CHAPTER XXXVII. 
 
 DEMAND FOR THE RECOGNITION OP PROPERTY IN SLAVES. 
 
 The Greed of Gain gratified by Slavery. Mr. Whittlesey's Report. Debates 
 on the Question of Slave Property. Spanish Treaty. The Florida Claims. 
 
 Mr. Cooper's Report. Mr. Giddings's and Mr. Adams's Speeches. Pay 
 ment for Slaves by the British Government. Mr. Fillmore's Bill. Speech 
 of Mr. Giddings. Violent Scenes in the House. Degrading Influences of 
 Slavery. General Jessup's Contract with the Indians. Watson's Claim. 
 General Gaines's Order. His Honorable Conduct. The Collins Claim. 
 Action of General Taylor. Faithless Action of the Government. Renewal 
 of "Watson's Claim. Reports on the Claim. Watson's Claim allowed. 
 
 Claim of Pacheco. Failure of the Bill. 
 
 THOUGH other elements entered into the complex motive 
 which originated and sustained slavery, that of pecuniary profit 
 was most general and mischievous. Indeed it was ever a pro 
 lific source of discord, as there were ever arising conflicting 
 claims in which the principle of property in man was involved. 
 And yet there was a shrinking, on the part of the majority, 
 from its open and undisguised avowal. The fact of slavery 
 was recognized in the Constitution, and the legislation of the 
 general government, but it was as persons, and not as property, 
 that slaves were referred to. Nor was " the guilty fantasy " 
 fully admitted until after many oft-repeated and oft-defeated 
 trials. 
 
 Questions growing out of the war of 1812 involving this 
 principle were early brought to the attention of the govern 
 ment. Slaves taken by officers as servants, and slaves hired 
 in other capacities, were lost, and applications for payment 
 were made. In all these cases it was decided that slaves 
 should be considered persons, and not property, and that the 
 government was not to be held liable to pay for slaves lost in 
 the public service, whether killed in battle or disabled and 
 destroyed by any other agency. 
 
DEMAND FOR THE RECOGNITION OF PROPERTY IN SLAVES. 529 
 
 In the XXth Congress an application was made by M. D'Au- 
 trieve of New Orleans to be remunerated for the lost time 
 and hospital charges of his slave, Warwick, who was wounded 
 in the public service. The claim having been referred to the 
 Committee on Claims, Mr. Whittlesey of Ohio reported against 
 it on the ground that the government had never, in a single in 
 stance, recognized the principle that slaves were property, or 
 paid for slaves lost in its service. Mr. Livingston of Louisiana 
 at once denounced the report as a " by blow " to the idea that 
 slaves were property. He appealed to the representatives who 
 were so happy as not to have that kind of property not to lay 
 the foundation for discontent, jealousy, and divisions, by insist 
 ing on such a discrimination against Southern interests. He 
 moved an amendment providing for the compensation asked 
 for. " Allow the claim," he said, " and you do no more than 
 justice ; reject it on these principles, and you shake the 
 Union." 
 
 Upon the bill and amendment a debate continued several 
 weeks, in which some of the ablest men of the House partici 
 pated. Much feeling was excited, and the debate was char 
 acterized by a thorough examination of the subject. John 
 Randolph maintained that property was the creation of law ; 
 that what " the law makes property is property." He repu 
 diated the doctrine that the Constitution was the protection 
 of slave property. It was created, he contended, by State 
 laws, and the Southern States were able to maintain it. He 
 expressed the hope that no Southern members would deign to 
 debate the question of property in slaves, or allow the general 
 government under any circumstances to touch the question. 
 
 Mr. Drayton of South Carolina maintained that the claim was 
 legitimate, and was justified by the Constitution and the laws. 
 He expressed the deepest abhorrence of slavery in the abstract ; 
 said the African slave-ship was a spectacle from which all men 
 would recoil with horror unless their hearts had been steeled 
 by the vilest love of lucre ; but he thought slavery in the States 
 had grown with their growth, and was then irremediable. " Our 
 consolation," he said, " is that we did not originate it ; when 
 a colony we struggled against it ; we found it at our birth ; it 
 
 67 
 
530 KISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 was a part of our inheritance, from which we can no more de 
 liver ourselves than we can from the miasma of our swamps, or 
 the rays of our burning sun. However ameliorated by compas 
 sion, however corrected by religion, still slavery is a bitter 
 draught, and the chalice which contains the noxious potion is 
 more frequently pressed by the lips of the master than the 
 slave." 
 
 Philip P. Barbour and Archer of Virginia, Hamilton and 
 McDuffie of South Carolina, defended the claim. Some North 
 ern members also spoke in its favor. Mr. Ingham of Pennsyl 
 vania, afterward Secretary of the Treasury under General Jack 
 son, characterized the doctrine advanced by the committee as 
 fallacious, and maintained that if the government had taken 
 the property it was bound to give compensation. Even Edward 
 Everett of Massachusetts favored the claim, remarking that it 
 arose under the provision of the Constitution which declared 
 that private property should not be taken for public uses with 
 out compensation ; and he added that by rejecting the amend 
 ment (Congress would introduce into that instrument the quali 
 fication, " excepting for slaves." 
 
 The claim, however, was strenuously opposed, though, as 
 was common in those days before sectional lines were so 
 clearly drawn, by varied lines of argument and thought. Thus 
 Mr. Storrs of New York agreed with Mr. Randolph that the 
 Constitution had nothing to do with the question, as that 
 never fixed the relation between master and slave. He was, 
 however, in favor of rejecting the claim, leaving the question 
 at issue to be met under the pressure of some future and more 
 imperious necessity. Tristam Burgess of Rhode Island made 
 a characteristic speech in opposition to the claim. He said 
 the question referred to the deterioration which had happened 
 to a slave while in the performance of ordinary labor for the 
 United States ; that no freeman ever made such a claim, or 
 received such compensation ; and that this would be the begin 
 ning of a series of claims which would be pressed or withdrawn, 
 according to the character of the vote now given. To remove 
 the jealousies of Southern men toward the North he entered 
 upon an apologetical explanation of the state of feeling in the 
 
DEMAND FOE THE RECOGNITION OF PROPERTY IN SLAVES. 531 
 
 free States on the subject of slavery. There was a small class, 
 he said, who were in favor of immediate emancipation. They 
 had unbounded zeal, but were entirely without knowledge or 
 wisdom, and could do nothing, as their number was small, 
 their wisdom was small, and their influence was still more in 
 considerable. Another class embraced philanthropists, such 
 men as composed the Colonization Society. They looked to 
 the gradual removal of slavery from this country, and the 
 gradual peopling of Africa with freemen. Southern men, he 
 said unwittingly, though truthfully, had nothing to fear from 
 this large and influential class of genuine philanthropists. 
 There was another class who saw the superiority of free over 
 slave labor ; but Southern men would have nothing to fear from 
 that class, as it was composed of those who would never disturb 
 the tenure by which that kind of labor was maintained. He 
 opposed the claim, however, and sharply reproved those who 
 pressed the question and threatened that the decision would 
 dissolve the Union ; who declared that the discussion and the 
 Constitution would terminate together; and that Southern gen 
 tlemen would leave the hall in case of an adverse decision. 
 
 Mr. Barnard of New York opposed the amendment in a 
 speech of remarkable clearness of statement and force of logic. 
 Mr. Miner of Pennsylvania based his opposition mainly on the 
 ground of justice. " I cannot," he said, " give my sanction to 
 the principles that would take the farmer and mechanic of 
 Pennsylvania to defend a Southern city from an invading 
 enemy, risking poverty and death in your defence, and, if one 
 of your slaves in the battle shall be slain, that you may send 
 the tax-gatherer to such farmer and mechanic, if he should 
 chance to survive, demanding aid from him in payment for 
 such slaves." The amendment was adopted by a close vote, 
 the bill was recommitted to the committee, but was not heard 
 of again. 
 
 A similar demand, involving the same principle, was based 
 upon one of the stipulations in the treaty formed in 1820 be 
 tween the governments of the United States and Spain. By 
 that treaty it was agreed that the inhabitants of Florida should 
 be remunerated for Josses sustained by them in the previous 
 
532 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 military operations in their Territory under General Jackson. 
 The different character of the claims prompted to different re 
 sponses. The claim growing out of the visit of the American 
 troops in 1814 was mainly for one hundred slaves which camp- 
 followers had taken ; that of the invasion of 1818 was for sup 
 plies taken from the inhabitants for the support of the troops. 
 The last was promptly paid ; but the first, involving the prin 
 ciple of property in man, Mr. Crawford, an aspirant for the 
 presidency, rejected. The claimants then appealed to Con 
 gress, and their claim was referred to the Committee on Foreign 
 Affairs. Their appeal to the next Congress secured a favora 
 ble report from the committee to which it was referred, as Mr. 
 Everett was ready to pay a claim which Southern statesmen 
 like Crawford and Archer had refused. But it was rejected 
 in the House. The claim, thus twice defeated in the House, 
 was again presented to the Secretary of the Treasury. Mr. 
 Woodbury paid several thousand dollars, but ascertaining that 
 Mr. Crawford had refused the demand he suspended further 
 payment. 
 
 Repulsed at the Treasury Department, these persistent claim 
 ants again approached Congress. Their petition was referred 
 to the Committee on Claims. But Mr. Giddings being chair 
 man, no action was taken. Appealing again to the same body, 
 the petitioners were gratified by having their demand referred 
 to the Committee on Territories. Its chairman was James 
 Cooper, a native of Maryland, then a representative from 
 Pennsylvania, afterward senator and a general in the war of 
 the Rebellion. Though informed by Mr. Giddings of its char 
 acter, and of the reasons which influenced his adverse decision, 
 yet, belonging to that large class of Northern statesmen which 
 has always seemed to have a tender regard for slaveholders, 
 Mr. Cooper reported in favor of the claims. The bill coining 
 up for consideration, Mr. Giddings, who had mastered the 
 subject, made a vigorous speech in opposition, and so far con 
 vinced even Mr. Cooper himself that he refused to vote for his 
 own report. Mr. Adarns, becoming deeply interested in the 
 question, and obtaining from the Treasury Department a list 
 of ninety negroes, for whom payment was demanded, spoke 
 
DEMAND FOE THE KECOGNITION OF PROPERTY IN SLAVES. 533 
 
 strongly in opposition to the claims. Both he and Mr. Gid- 
 dings dwelt largely upon the moral considerations involved in 
 the proposition to recognize the principle of property in man. 
 Their speeches made a deep impression, and though the dele 
 gate from Florida spoke in defence of the bill, there were but 
 thirty-six ayes recorded in its favor. As an illustration of the 
 sentiment and feeling which pervaded the House, Mr. Gid- 
 dings states that after the vote was taken, Mr. Pickens of 
 South Carolina came across the hall to the seat of his col 
 league, Mr. Campbell, and asked him why he did not vote for 
 the bill. " Why did not you vote for it ? " responded Mr. 
 Campbell. " Because I was ashamed to do so," replied Mr. 
 Pickens. " Such was my case," said Mr. Campbell. And yet 
 while these slaveholders from South Carolina were ashamed to 
 support the proposition, the Democratic members from New 
 Hampshire did not hesitate to record their votes in its favor. 
 
 Near the close of the session of 1841 Mr. Thompson of 
 South Carolina asked leave to introduce a bill appropriating 
 one hundred thousand dollars for the benefit of the Seminoles 
 and their chiefs who should surrender for the purpose of emi 
 grating to the West. Mr. Giddings states that the object of 
 the bill was the purchase of the pretended interest of certain 
 white citizens in the exiles they claimed to own. Being better 
 informed than any other member concerning the origin, cause, 
 and history of the Florida war, he did not fail to oppose the 
 bill, laying bare at the same time the crimes and rascalities 
 involved in a contest prosecuted mainly for the re-enslave 
 ment of those and their posterity who had sought in that Ter 
 ritory a refuge from the oppressor. His speech caused great 
 excitement among the Georgia members, and he was repeat 
 edly called to order. When he closed, Mr. Cooper, of that 
 State, replied, denouncing abolitionism as " a moral pesti 
 lence," and Mr. Giddings and Mr. Adams as abolition leaders. 
 Black, also of Georgia, followed in a high state of excitement, 
 avowing his purpose to be personally offensive to Mr. Gid 
 dings, and declaring if the latter should go to Georgia he 
 " would be hanged." The delegate from Florida made a 
 feeble and vulgar assault, while Mr. Thompson took occasion 
 
534 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 to say that the Whig party was not responsible for the conduct 
 of " the very obscurest of the obscure individuals belonging to 
 that party." 
 
 To this insulting language Mr. Giddings replied with dignified 
 and unruffled firmness, denying the prerogative of the gentle 
 man to designate his position in the Whig party, and assuring 
 Mr. Thompson that he fully appreciated the insult intended. 
 Though he could not resent it after the method so common at 
 the South, he would say, in the language of a military veteran 
 to a young officer who spat in his face, expecting to draw from 
 him a challenge, " Could I as easily wipe the stain of your 
 blood from my soul, you should not live an hour." Mr. Alford, 
 springing from his seat with profane and menacing language, 
 rushed towards him, but was met by Mr. Briggs of Massa 
 chusetts and persuaded to return to his seat. Mr. Thompson 
 again assured the House that he spoke the feelings of both 
 Northern and Southern Whigs, when he assured the member 
 from Ohio that he was considered " the very obscurest of the 
 obscure members of the Whig party." 
 
 Mr. Giddings states that General Harrison, soon to be inau 
 gurated, arriving in Washington on the day the debate occurred, 
 expressed great dissatisfaction at its occurrence, and avowed 
 his purpose to relieve the Whig party from any odium brought 
 upon it by the course of Mr. Giddings. The next day Mr. 
 Giddings called upon him, but the President elect gave him 
 such unmistakable indications of his displeasure, that he never 
 called upon him again. Mr. Giddings was from the same 
 State, had served with him in the war of 1812, and had toiled 
 for his election ; but, true to his convictions, he maintained 
 the freedom of debate, and exposed the crimes of the Flor 
 ida war. Mr. Thompson was from a State that had given 
 General Harrison no vote, and had insulted an honest and 
 God-fearing man, because of his stalwart defence of right and 
 outraged humanity. The former was rewarded by a Northern 
 President with the mission to Mexico, the latter with coldness 
 and manifest tokens of his displeasure. But Mr. Thompson, 
 though the recipient of executive favor, is forgotten, or scarcely 
 remembered ; while Mr. Giddings, whom he insolently charao' 
 
DEMAND FOR THE RECOGNITION OF PROPERTY IN SLAVES. 535 
 
 terized as " the very obscurest of the obscure individuals be 
 longing to the Whig party," left a national reputation which 
 his countrymen cherish with increasing regard, a name which 
 they " will not willingly let die." 
 
 The British government had agreed to pay the sum of 
 seventy-five thousand dollars for slaves on board the " Hornet " 
 and " Encomium," which had been wrecked in its possessions 
 in the West India waters before its act of emancipation. The 
 President, distributing this appropriation to its claimants 
 without consulting Congress, paid on his retirement four thou 
 sand dollars which had not been called for into the treasury. 
 Slave-dealers, claiming this balance which the Secretary of 
 the Treasury refused to pay without authority of Congress, at 
 once applied to that body. The claim was referred to the 
 Committee of Ways and Means. A bill was reported by unan 
 imous consent of the committee to pay the money to the owners 
 of the slaves. The ever-watchful Giddings went to Mr. Stanley 
 of North Carolina, who had charge of the bill, explained to 
 him its character, and proposed that the Treasurer should be 
 authorized to replace the money, which he held without author 
 ity of law, into the hands of the President, who would doubt 
 less pay it over to the claimants, and Congress would be 
 relieved of the odium of the transaction. Mr. Stanley agreed 
 to accept the proposition as a substitute for the original bill. 
 The amendment was accepted by the House, but rejected by 
 the Senate. Mr. Giddings states that when it came up in the 
 House for concurrence, he asked Mr. Stanley for an explana 
 tion of that violation of good faith, but received none ; that 
 he then expressed a desire to speak upon the measure, to 
 which Mr. Stanley apparently consented ; but when it came up, 
 the latter moved the previous question, and the bill was passed. 
 
 Mr. Giddings then, obtaining the floor, moved a reconsidera 
 tion of the vote. Indignant at the treatment he had received, 
 he denounced both it and the measure. Alluding to the fact 
 that it was designed to pay the slaveholding constituents of 
 Mr. Stanley for losses they had incurred in their vocation, he 
 thanked God that he did not hold his seat by the votes of 
 " piratical slave-dealers." He entered, too, his earnest pro- 
 
536 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 test against the policy of making the Whig party incur the 
 odium of thus sustaining a commerce in human flesh. He 
 showed how Presidents Jackson and Van Buren had conde 
 scended to become the solicitors and agents of slave-dealers ; 
 how they obtained payment from England by falsely represent 
 ing, through Mr. Stevenson, that Congress " regarded slaves 
 as property, and paid for them as such when lost in the public 
 service in time of war." He said the representation was 
 "untrue," and affirmed that the records would show that when 
 that question had been raised in Congress the House of Repre 
 sentatives had " repudiated " the doctrine. He charged Mr. 
 Stevenson, who was Speaker of the House in 1828, when that 
 doctrine was thus repudiated, with uttering an " unmitigated 
 falsehood." 
 
 Mr. Giddings challenged the representatives from Virginia in 
 Congress to show one instance in which the House had decided 
 that slaves were " property," or had voted to pay for them as 
 such. The assertion, he said, was " a libel upon Congress and 
 upon the people of the nation," and he protested that he denied 
 the doctrine and would not be a party to the falsehood. He said 
 he felt humbled and deeply humiliated, on looking around him, 
 to see two hundred and thirty American statesmen sitting in 
 that hall and gravely legislating in behalf of piratical slave- 
 dealers, whose crimes had rendered them moral outlaws, unfit 
 for human association, and fitted only for the gallows. He 
 showed with great force of logic that Congress had neither 
 moral nor constitutional right to involve the people of the free 
 States in a war for the defence of the slave-trade. H^ sharply 
 criticised, too, both the President and the Senate for their action 
 in committing the nation to the support of the domestic slave- 
 trade, and of the " heathenish " doctrine of property in man. 
 
 Neither Mr. Fillmore who reported nor Mr. Stanley who had 
 charge of the bill attempted any vindication of the principles 
 involved in it. Caleb Cushing, who had become a champion 
 of Mr. Tyler's administration, contended that, the money being 
 in the treasury of the United States, Congress became trustee 
 for its distribution. It was therefore bound to make the dis 
 tribution without regard to the circumstances under which it 
 
DEMAND FOB THE RECOGNITION OF PROPERTY IN SLAVES. 537 
 
 came into its custody. The motion for reconsideration failed 
 by a large majority. 
 
 Mr. Giddings then rose to a privileged question. He stated 
 that while he was addressing the House he noticed several per 
 sons standing in front of the clerk's desk, one of whom was 
 Mr. Dawson of Louisiana ; that when he had concluded his 
 speech he was pushed by what appeared to be the elbow of a 
 person, and at the same moment Mr. Dawson passed him on 
 his way to the clerk's desk ; that he addressed him in an 
 undertone, when he turned round, seized the handle of a 
 bowie-knife, which partly protruded from his bosom, and ad 
 vanced towards him till within striking distance. Look 
 ing him in the eye, he inquired whether he pushed him in 
 that rude manner. " Yes," he answered. " For the pur 
 pose," inquired Mr. Giddings, " of insulting me ? " " Yes," 
 he replied, partially removing his knife from its sheath. 
 Mr. Giddings then said : " No gentleman will wantonly in 
 sult another. I have no more to say to you, but turn you 
 over to public contempt as incapable of insulting another." 
 Dawson was then seized by one of his colleagues and taken 
 from the hall. In laying these facts before the House, Mr. 
 Giddings wished it to be distinctly understood that he did not 
 claim the protection of the House, but left that body to protect 
 its own dignity. 
 
 Alexander H. H. Stuart, a Whig member from Yirginia, 
 afterward Secretary of the Interior, then stated that he had 
 noticed Mr. Dawson standing in front of the clerk's desk ; 
 that, from his appearance, he apprehended an intention of vio 
 lence, but lost sight of him until he appeared in the aisle where 
 Mr. Giddings was standing. Mr. Wise expressed the opinion 
 that the member had intended no insult to Mr. Giddings. Mr. 
 Adams rose and, in allusion to an incident that occurred a few 
 days before when the same individual, offended at some remarks 
 made by Mr. Arnold of Tennessee, went to his seat and assured 
 him that if he did not keep quiet he would " cut his throat from 
 ear to ear," inquired whether he had made the same threat to 
 Mr. Giddings he had to the gentleman from Tennessee. It was 
 believed that, acting with the approbation of others, Dawson 
 
 68 
 
538 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 intended to insult Mr. Giddings and thus draw from him a 
 blow, which would have been an excuse for an assault with a 
 deadly weapon. In a letter, written on the same day this 
 scene occurred, David Lee Child wrote: "I was sitting in the 
 gallery. I saw Dawson in the centre of the hall, amidst a 
 crowd of Southern members, all of whom were looking ex 
 tremely wrathful, and one of them, as I am informed by a 
 member, said with an oath, ' I would like to cut off Gid- 
 dings's ears.' " 
 
 This disgraceful and instructive incident had a threefold 
 significance. It was an illustration of the tone and temper of 
 that slaveholding regime which controlled the land for more 
 than half a century. It revealed the craven spirit of the North, 
 which, though largely in the majority, submitted to such dicta 
 tion, pocketed such insults, and gave to the villanous cause itself 
 that municipal support and power without which it could not 
 have maintained itself a single day. It revealed, too, the hero 
 ism and martyr spirit demanded in the few who dared to con 
 front these violent men and meet the dangers thus incurred. 
 Still such scenes were not without their influence at the North, 
 nor could they fail to impress upon many there some idea of 
 the degrading and dangerous presence of a system that gener 
 ated such a spirit and prompted to such deeds. 
 
 In 1845 the subject of property in man was again forced 
 upon public attention by appeals made to the XXVIIIth Con 
 gress for its practical recognition. The way in which this was 
 sought, with its antecedents, was still more degrading, the 
 necessary recital of which may well make any American ear 
 tingle with shame, as thus reminded of the base uses to which 
 the government lent itself in its ignoble service to the slave- 
 mongers. 
 
 On assuming the command of the army in Florida in 1836, 
 General Jessup, without authority of law, entered into a con 
 tract with the Creeks by which they were to receive such 
 plunder as they might capture ; and this unauthorized contract 
 was approved by the President and Secretary of War. Among 
 this " plunder " were one hundred negroes which they claimed 
 as coming within the meaning of the contract. This under- 
 
DEMAND FOR THE RECOGNITION OF PROPERTY IN &LA\^. 539 
 
 standing was approved by the President and his Secretary 
 of War, and this Christian republic stood before the world as 
 recognizing the principle that prisoners of war might be held 
 as slaves. 
 
 Complicating matters still more, he gave orders that eight 
 thousand dollars should be paid for these negroes, and that 
 they be sent to Fort Pike and held as the property of the 
 United States. And even this order was approved by the Presi 
 dent, and, so far as his authority could effect it, the nation be 
 came the purchaser of slaves. The Commissioner of Indian 
 Affairs, however, suggested to the Secretary of War a doubt as 
 to the willingness of Congress, in the then state of the public 
 mind, to appropriate the funds to carry into effect General 
 Jessup's order. For thirteen months this question remained 
 unsettled, and it was finally determined to abrogate General 
 Jessup's order, though it had been approved, and to declare 
 that the Creek Indians were the owners of the negroes sent to 
 Fort Pike. 
 
 In this exigency it was suggested, he says, by government 
 officials, to James C. Watson, a Georgia slaveholder, to pur 
 chase these negroes, pay for them the sum of fifteen thousand 
 dollars, and receive a bill of sale, on the condition that the 
 Secretary of War should issue an order to the officers of the 
 army to deliver them to him or to his agent. This sale was 
 effected on the 7th of May, 1838. While the government 
 officials were the active parties in the negotiation, the sale was 
 effected in the name of the Creeks. One Collins, brother-in- 
 law of Watson, was appointed an agent, and furnished with 
 written instructions by the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, to 
 repair to New Orleans and receive the negroes. 
 
 But a few days before these slaves had been purchased by 
 Watson, General Gaines had issued an order directing Major 
 Clark to make arrangements for the embarkation of the Semi- 
 noles and " black prisoners of war," then in Louisiana, for their 
 place of destination in the Indian country. At the same time, 
 as if to make the whole transaction more complicated, the 
 claim of a slave-dealer was allowed by the Louisiana courts to 
 sixty of these negro prisoners. Having secured a favorable 
 
540 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 decision of the court, he demanded them of General Gaines. 
 But that officer, to his great credit, refused assent, and ordered 
 that they should be confined in the barracks for their safe keep 
 ing. He also resisted the requisition of the sheriff of New 
 Orleans, on the ground that they were prisoners of war. Famil 
 iar with both the facts and the law of the case ; knowing, too, 
 that the most intimate domestic and social relations, from in 
 termarriage and the ties of friendship, existed between them, 
 he was willing to assume the personal responsibility of the 
 costs, to appear before the courts, and to plead the laws of na 
 tions and of war in vindication of the position that these 
 negroes were, and should be treated as, prisoners of war. 
 He assured the court that they were not captured from the 
 white people in that or any previous war. Professing to act 
 from his convictions, he said : " I have not learned, while act 
 ing in my official capacity on oath, to take the responsibility 
 of doing what is repugnant to law, unjust, and iniquitous, as, I 
 verily believe, any favor shown to this claim would be." The 
 judge, however, assuming, under the laws of Louisiana, that 
 negroes were slaves to some one, discharged the rule, and 
 affirmed the order of sequestration. 
 
 Lieutenant Reynolds, leaving thirty-one of the negroes be 
 hind, embarked with the Seminoles and negro prisoners of war 
 for the Indian country. But the next day Watson's agent 
 arrived, and, finding that Reynolds had started, immediately 
 followed and overtook him at Vicksburg. Convinced by the 
 evidences of sorrow and mutual interest and attachment exhib 
 ited between the Indians and negroes at parting at New Or 
 leans that he must proceed with caution, Lieutenant Reynolds 
 persuaded the agent to accompany him. Arriving at Little 
 Rock, he called upon the government officials for assistance. 
 Governor Roane, though a slaveholder, declared that there 
 were no witnesses to identify the negroes, expressed the appre 
 hension that to enforce the claim would endanger the frontier 
 settlers of Arkansas, and, instead of rendering assistance, 
 urged him to proceed at once to his point of destination. 
 Arriving at Fort Gibson, Lieutenant Reynolds enclosed to 
 General Arbuckle the order of the Indian Commissioner to sur- 
 
DEMAND FOR THE RECOGNITION OF PROPERTY IN SLAVES. 541 
 
 render the negroes to Watson's agent, with the request that 
 he would give him an adequate force to carry his instructions 
 into effect. The request was refused, however, on the ground 
 that there was no evidence to indicate who were included in 
 the claim. 
 
 But the War Department, having been a party to the sale of 
 these " prisoners of war," sought to carry out that slave-deal 
 ing bargain so far as the thirty-one negroes remaining at New 
 Orleans were concerned. General Taylor's co-operation was 
 sought in a letter from the Adjutant-General. But that hon 
 est and straightforward man would be party to no such arrange 
 ment. In his letter of reply he said : " I know nothing of the 
 negroes in question, nor of the subject further than what is 
 contained in the communication ; but I must state distinctly 
 for the information of all concerned, that, while I shall hold 
 myself ever ready to do the utmost in my power to get the 
 negroes and Indians out of Florida, as well as to remove them 
 to their new homes west of the Mississippi, I cannot, for a 
 moment, consent to meddle with this transaction, or to be 
 concerned for the benefit of Collins, the Creek Indians, or any 
 one else." This noble letter no more inured to the credit of 
 its writer than it reflected upon the action of General Jessup, 
 of the War Department, and of the President of the United 
 States. 
 
 Collins returned to New Orleans, but Major Clark refused 
 to turn the negroes over to him as Watson's agent. They 
 were at once despatched to their Western home, but only to 
 find new proof of the bad faith of the government. Though 
 it had been stipulated with them, as an inducement for them 
 to go west, that a separate tract should be assigned them, 
 they found on their arrival that they were to be taken to terri 
 tory assigned to the Creeks, where they would be subjected to 
 Creek laws. The Cherokees had used their influence to per 
 suade the Seminoles to go west, and they felt that they were 
 in honor bound to fulfil their pledges as far as in their power, 
 and so they consented that they should remain on their reserva 
 tion until the United States government could be persuaded to 
 discharge its obligations to this abused and scattered people. 
 
542 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Without country, the victims of grasping slaveholders, these 
 Indians and exiles appealed for redress to the same govern 
 ment which had already proved so faithless to its promises. 
 But President Van Buren and Mr. Poinsett, his Secretary of 
 War, instead of regarding these appeals, were renewing their 
 efforts to secure for Watson the negro prisoners of war he had 
 purchased. General Arbuckle, who had been directed to in 
 vestigate the case, replied that not one of them could be 
 obtained without force. Of course the slave-dealer grew res 
 tive and impatient under these delays, and wrote to the Indian 
 Commissioner, severely arraigning the military authorities. 
 Lieutenant Reynolds was under the necessity, therefore, of 
 explaining, away these charges. The demands being still 
 pressed, the government made further but ineffectual attempts 
 to meet them. The Seminoles refused to surrender the exiles, 
 and the Creeks would hold no further communication on the 
 subject either with Watson or the officials. 
 
 Baffled in all these efforts, he turned his attention to Con 
 gress, petitioning that body for what he failed to obtain from 
 the executive officers of the government ; and at the com 
 mencement of the session in 1839 the petition was referred 
 to the Committee on Claims. Mr. Dawson of Georgia called 
 to it the attention of Mr. Giddings, its chairman ; but he 
 reported against it. At the next session it was referred to 
 the Committee on Indian Affairs. A bill was reported ; but 
 it failed to become a law. In the XXVIIIth Congress ex- 
 Governor Vance of Ohio was made chairman of the Commit 
 tee on Claims, in place of Mr. Giddings, who had thus far pre 
 vented favorable action, and Mr. Howell Cobb was placed on 
 the committee for the purpose of securing a favorable report. 
 Such a report and bill being presented, it was advocated by 
 Mr. Cobb, Mr. Stephens, and Mr. Belser of Alabama, each 
 alleging that it did not involve the question of property in 
 human flesh ; opposed by Mr. Giddings and Mr. Adams ; and 
 no vote was reached. Not discouraged, Watson persisted in 
 pressing his claim ; though he was again defeated, in 1848, 
 notwithstanding a favorable report from Mr. Daniel of North 
 Carolina. 
 
DEMAND FOR THE RECOGNITION OF PROPERTY IN SLAVES. 543 
 
 In February, 1852, Daniel reported again in its favor. A 
 long debate arose, in which several members took part, a 
 favorable vote was reached, and the bill passed by a major 
 ity of twenty-six, one member alone from the slave States, 
 William R. Cobb of Alabama, voting against it. In the Sen 
 ate it met but little opposition. Thus was consummated, after 
 a delay and struggle of thirteen years, that infamous bargain 
 between a slave speculator and the United States, by which 
 prisoners of war were sold as slaves, and in which were ig 
 nored not only the laws of God and humanity, but the laws 
 of the nation and the laws of war. 
 
 Another case involving this idea of property in man was 
 that of Antonio Pacheco, who presented in 1848 a petition to 
 Congress for the loss of the slave Lewis, whom he had let to 
 Major Dade as a guide, who had been captured by the Indians, 
 surrendered to General Jessup, and sent west of the Missis 
 sippi. It appeared from the testimony of General Jessup that 
 Lewis was a man of extraordinary talents, who had kept up a 
 correspondence with the Seminoles, and had been sent west 
 as " a dangerous man." The petition was referred to the 
 Committee on Military Affairs, Mr. Burt of South Carolina 
 being chairman ; and a bill was reported in accordance with 
 the prayer of the petitioner. Mr. Dickey of Pennsylvania, 
 assisted by Mr. Giddings, drew up an adverse report. At 
 the meeting of the committee the four Democratic members 
 signed the report of the chairman ; and Marvin of New York, 
 Wilson of New Hampshire, and Fisher of Ohio signed that 
 of Mr. Dickey. The majority held that slaves were property ; 
 and the minority contended that " one man could not hold 
 property in another." No action, however, was taken. 
 
 Coming up at the next session, Mr. Dickey and Mr. Wilson 
 of New Hampshire spoke against it, while Mr. Brown of Mis 
 sissippi and Mr. Cabell of Florida followed on the other side. 
 Mr. Burt closed the debate with the assertion that the simple 
 question involved in the bill is, Are slaves property ? The 
 motion to lay it on the table was rejected by nineteen major 
 ity. Mr. Giddings moved a reconsideration, in support of 
 which he made a very able speech, accepting the issue ten- 
 
544 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 dered by Mr. Burt, and boldly enunciating the doctrines of 
 human rights. By a mistake of the clerk it appeared that the 
 casting vote of the Speaker would be necessary, which would 
 have been cast against the bill. Subsequently, however, it 
 appeared that one vote had not been counted, and the bill 
 was lost by that majority. A reconsideration was moved and 
 carried, and the bill was passed by a majority of six. By that 
 majority the House of Representatives declared that slaves 
 were property ; but the bill was not acted upon by the Senate, 
 and it failed of becoming a law. 
 
CHAPTER XXXVIII. 
 
 THE LIBERTY PARTY. 
 
 Early Abolitionists pledged to Political Action. Questioning Candidates. 
 Seward, Gushing, Fillmore, Brooks, Parmenter. A Political Party demanded. 
 
 Myron Holley. New York State Society call a National Convention at Al 
 bany. Opposed by the Board of Managers of the Massachusetts Society. 
 "Meeting of the Convention. Nomination of James G. Biniey for President 
 and Thomas Earle for Vice-President. Small Vote. Address of Committee. 
 
 Salmon P. Chase. State Convention in Ohio. Peterboro' Convention. 
 Address to the Slaves. National Convention. Kesolutions. Candidates. 
 
 Philadelphia Convention. Professor Cleaveland's Address. Election. 
 "Western and Southwestern Convention. Mr. Chase's Address. Eastern 
 Convention. Dissensions. Unconstitutionally of Slavery. Divisions. 
 
 THE early Abolitionists were pledged to the removal of slav 
 ery by political as well as moral agencies. Their modes of 
 political action, however, were undefined. Some contemplated 
 it through existing political organizations, others through the 
 formation of a new party. Mr. Garrison, as early as 1834, 
 advocated the organization of a " Christian party in politics " ; 
 and two years later Professor Follen suggested the idea of a 
 new, progressive Democratic party, of which the abolition of 
 slavery should be a fundamental principle. William Goodell, 
 Alvan Stewart, Myron Holley, James G. Birney, Joshua Leavitt, 
 Gerrit Smith, and other eminent Abolitionists, early and per 
 sistently urged political action, and the formation of a party 
 that should make the abolition of slavery a paramount issue. 
 
 Antislavery men first exemplified the principle of political 
 action by questioning candidates for public office. Though 
 their questions were generally treated with neglect, their num 
 bers so increased that they were able, in some localities, to 
 effect results. In 1838, in the great contest in New York, 
 William H. Seward and Luther Bradish, Whig candidates for 
 
 69 
 
546 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 governor and lieutenant-governor, gave respectful answers to 
 their questions, while the Democratic candidates refused to 
 answer at all. The answers of Mr. Bradish were satisfactory ; 
 those of Mr. Seward were but partially so, and their majorities 
 were unquestionably increased by the abolition votes they re 
 ceived. At this election, Millar d Fillmore, who was a candi 
 date for Congress, was also questioned and gave satisfactory 
 replies ; and he received the antislavery vote. In after years, 
 however, he forgot the pledges he then gave, and disappointed 
 the hopes he then excited. 
 
 Among the questioned candidates of those days was Caleb 
 Gushing of Massachusetts. He had vindicated in Congress 
 the right of petition with signal zeal and ability ; and, when 
 plied with questions, he framed his reply so as to meet even 
 the exacting demands of John G. Whittier. But, like Mr. 
 Fillmore, he failed to remember the pledges he was then so 
 prompt to give ; and, a few years later, he was found ready to 
 use the patronage of the Federal government " to crush out 
 the spirit of Abolitionism " in his native State. 
 
 In the Middlesex district of the same State, Nathan Brooks 
 and William Parmenter were candidates for Congress. Mr. 
 Parmenter, the Democratic candidate, was known to be un 
 sound and unreliable on the antislavery issue. Mr. Brooks, 
 the Whig candidate, though known by his personal friends to 
 be in sympathy with his questioners, declined to answer, from 
 conscientious scruples about giving such pledges. His wife, a 
 lady of culture, was then and continued to be an earnest and 
 self-sacrificing Abolitionist ; one of that class of antislavery 
 women to whose early labors the cause was so largely indebted. 
 But the Abolitionists, firmly adhering to their policy, refused, 
 without such pledges, to give him their votes, and he was 
 defeated. 
 
 The plan of questioning candidates in its practical workings 
 not proving satisfactory, a distinct political organization was 
 demanded by some of the Abolitionists. At a meeting of the 
 New York State Antislavery Society, held at Utica, in Septem 
 ber, 1838, a series of resolutions, setting forth with distinctness 
 the principles of political action, and pledging the society to 
 
THE LIBERTY PARTY. 547 
 
 vote for no candidate unpledged to antislavery measures, was 
 adopted. These resolutions were drawn by William Goodell, 
 and reported by the business committee, at the head of which 
 was Myron Holley. They were not intended to commit the 
 Abolitionists of New York to the formation of a new politi 
 cal party ; but they enunciated principles of action to which, in 
 the then existing state of political parties, it was difficult to 
 adhere without such an organization. 
 
 At the sixth anniversary meeting of the American Antislav 
 ery Society, in May, 1839, a committee was appointed to call 
 a national convention to discuss the principles and measures 
 of the antislavery enterprise. This convention assembled at 
 Albany on the last of July. The convention was not largely 
 attended, nor did its result fully satisfy those who desired a 
 distinct political organization. It issued an address, however, 
 in which it was asserted that the Slave Power was waging a 
 deliberate and determined war against the liberties of the free 
 States ; that the political power of slavery could only be met 
 by political action ; and that slavery must be driven out and 
 dethroned from the stronghold in which it was so firmly in 
 trenched by the ballot-box. In September an antislavery 
 county convention was held at Rochester, New York. A few 
 months before the meeting of that convention, Myron Holley, 
 a resident of that city, had established the " Freeman," in 
 which he had advocated political action with such earnest 
 ness and ability that he has been regarded, by common con 
 sent, the founder of the Liberty party. 
 
 Mr. Holley was a gentleman of superior attainments. He 
 had held a leading position in the politics of Western New 
 York as a supporter of De Witt Clinton, and was a canal com 
 missioner during a considerable portion of the time in which 
 the Erie Canal was in process of construction. He was a ripe 
 scholar, a ready writer, an impressive speaker, and an urbane 
 gentleman, of graceful manners and commanding presence. A 
 bold thinker, and of large forecast, he clearly saw that slavery 
 was to be put down either by the ballot-box or by the car 
 tridge-box, or perhaps by both. He was for hastening without 
 delay a resort to the former, in order that the stern appeal to 
 
548 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the latter might if possible be averted. It was under such a 
 leader that the convention adopted a series of resolutions and 
 an address, in which the necessity of distinct political action 
 was recognized, and the duty enjoined. 
 
 In the month of January, 1840, the New York State Anti- 
 slavery Society held a convention in Genesee County. Mr. 
 Holley, Gerrit Smith, and other Abolitionists, favorable to 
 political action, were present. It was resolved to issue a call 
 for a national antislavery convention, to be held on the 1st 
 of April at Albany. This convention was called to discuss 
 " the question of an independent nomination of abolition can 
 didates for the two highest offices in our national government ; 
 and, if thought expedient, to make such nominations for the 
 friends of freedom to support at the next election." 
 
 The executive committee of the national society took no 
 action in relation to this movement of the New York society ; 
 but the board of managers of the Massachusetts Antislavery 
 Society issued an address to the Abolitionists of the United 
 States, in which they took exceptions to the manner in which 
 the convention had been called, and the designs of those who 
 called it. In this address the organization of a distinctive 
 political party was declared to be in violation of the wishes of 
 the great body of the Abolitionists, as had been shown by 
 the unanimous votes of the State societies of Massachusetts, 
 Rhode Island, and Connecticut. The silence of the executive 
 committee of the national society, and the advocacy of the 
 " Emancipator," its organ, were both sharply criticised. They 
 thus closed their address : " For the honor and purity of our 
 enterprise, we trust that the Abolitionists of the several States 
 will refuse to give any countenance to the proposed convention 
 at Albany. Let their verdict be recorded against it as unau 
 thorized, unnecessary, and premature. Let the meeting be 
 insignificant and local, and thus rendered harmless." 
 
 The convention assembled at the time and place designated. 
 Six States only were represented. Of its one hundred and 
 twenty-one delegates, one hundred and four were from the 
 State of New York. Alvan Stewart was made president. He 
 was an early Abolitionist, having witnessed and realized, while 
 
THE LIBERTY PARTY. 549 
 
 visiting the South, in 1816, the cruelties, corruptions, and 
 crimes necessarily involved in the system of chattel slavery. 
 He was sincere and tender-hearted. The cruelties of the sys 
 tem seemed to affect him more than its crimes ; and he would 
 paint its horrors in language that none who listened to him 
 could ever forget. One that well knew this remarkable man 
 who rendered such effective service to the antislavery cause in 
 its days of weakness and trial, thus describes him : " His 
 conceptions were grand, his sweep of thought majestic, his 
 language unique, his illustrations graphic, and his knowledge 
 varied and minute." He had been a Whig, and one of the 
 favorite orators of the party. A good lawyer, a clear-sighted 
 politician, accustomed to deal with practical affairs, he early 
 saw the necessity of assaulting slavery as a political evil by 
 the use of the ballot. He came to that convention to aid, if 
 possible, in giving form and shape to that idea. 
 
 Though small in numbers and somewhat local in its com 
 position, its members were conscientious, earnest, and deter 
 mined. After full debate and deliberate consideration, it was 
 resolved by the small majority of eleven votes to present candi 
 dates for the presidency and vice-presidency. For the former 
 James G. Birney was selected, and for the latter Thomas Earle 
 of Pennsylvania. 
 
 Born in Kentucky, reared and educated under the slave 
 system, Mr. Birney was an hereditary owner of slaves. He 
 embraced the antislavery reform from the deepest convictions 
 of its justice, and gave freedom to his own slaves from the 
 purest motives. He sacrificed property, political preferment, 
 social standing, home and kindred, that he might serve a 
 cause that could give him neither fortune nor favor. A gen 
 tleman with dignity of mariner and varied culture, a sound 
 lawyer, remarkably well versed in constitutional and inter 
 national law, he wrote and spoke with grace and vigor. He 
 was a prudent counsellor, and inclined to moderate action. 
 Conciliatory in tone and manner, he was firm and fearless in 
 maintaining his convictions of right. Thoroughly compre 
 hending the vitality of the slave system and the tenacity of 
 slaveholders, he foresaw and predicted the terrible convulsions 
 
550 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 into which the Slave Power would plunge the country. He be 
 lieved that the exercise of the elective franchise was binding 
 upon all. To possess and not to use the right to vote he 
 declared to be " inconsistent with the duty of Abolitionists 
 under the Constitution." 
 
 Mr. Earle was a native of Massachusetts, of Quaker ances 
 try and sentiments. A law student under John Sergeant 
 of Philadelphia, and editor and author of several papers and 
 books, he occupied quite a prominent public position in his 
 adopted city and State. Though acting with the Democratic 
 party, he was an active member of the old Pennsylvania Abo 
 lition Society. Laboring for twenty years for constitutional 
 reform in his State, he was a prominent member of the con 
 vention called for that purpose, of which, says Whittier, he 
 was the " recognized author and originator." In that conven 
 tion, his political friends proposed " white suffrage " as the 
 basis of representation ; but, though by so doing he sacrificed 
 all hopes of political preferment, he took and firmly main 
 tained the doctrine of human rights, without distinction of 
 color or race. 
 
 Such were the men selected by the Liberty party as its can 
 didates, as it entered the arena of national politics, and for the 
 first time solicited the suffrages of the humane and liberty- 
 loving for the highest offices of the government. Its vote, 
 however, was but small. Of the two million and a half of the 
 votes cast at that election, its candidates received less than 
 seven thousand. 
 
 But small as was the vote, the friends of this new mode of 
 action were encouraged. Soon after the election the national 
 committee of correspondence issued an address to the friends 
 of the oppressed in the United States. It was written by 
 Alvan Stewart, and bore the marks of his enthusiastic and 
 hopeful spirit. It congratulated the friends of the slave that 
 humanity, as a new element in political action, had been 
 found ; that the voice of stern justice was beginning to speak 
 from a new place ; and that the power to overthrow slav 
 ery had been discovered in " the terse literature of the ballot- 
 box." 
 
THE LIBEKTY PARTY. 551 
 
 The Liberty party received into its ranks, in 1841, an impor 
 tant accession in the person of Salmon P. Chase. Mr. Chase 
 had, as early as 1837, acted as counsel for a woman claimed as 
 a fugitive slave, and also for James G. Birney, who had been 
 indicted for the offence of harboring a slave. In very elaborate 
 arguments he had maintained that the Fugitive Slave Act of 
 1793 was unwarranted by the Constitution of the United States ; 
 that Congress had no power to impose any duties in fugitive- 
 slave cases upon State magistrates ; and that slavery was local, 
 and depended on State law for existence. Like several other 
 antislavery men in Ohio he had voted for General Harrison. 
 But the course of Mr. Tyler had convinced him that the cause 
 of emancipation had little to hope from the Whigs, whose ac 
 tion was modified, if not controlled, by their slaveholding 
 members at the South. He united with others in calling an 
 antislavery State convention, in December, 1841, at Columbus. 
 It was strong in numbers, talent, and character. Samuel 
 Lewis presided, and Leicester King, a gentleman of large in 
 fluence, was nominated for governor. An address, written and 
 reported by Mr. Chase, and unanimously adopted by the con 
 vention, was issued. It was a full exposition of the powers 
 and duties of the people, and of the principles and purposes 
 of the Liberty party. It was, perhaps, the best presentation 
 of the subject that had then been made. No previous paper 
 had so clearly defined the province of political action, its limi 
 tations and prospective results. It was extensively circulated, 
 and exerted considerable influence in giving cohesion and im 
 pulse to the new organization. 
 
 Other conventions, State, county, and district, were held. 
 The men and presses that had inaugurated this mode of effort 
 exhibited activity and zeal, accessions were made, and the 
 party steadily increased. Among these conventions was one 
 held in Peterboro', New York, in January, 1842. It issued an 
 address to the slaves of the United States, written by Gerrit 
 Smith. In justification of this act it was proclaimed that the 
 slave has the right " to all the words of consolation, encour 
 agement, and advice which his fellow-men can convey to him." 
 Slaves were specially enjoined to use no violence, and to cherish 
 
552 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 no vindictive feelings towards their oppressors. They were 
 urged to pray to Him who hears the sighing of the prisoner to 
 grant them speedy deliverance, and never let bribes, menaces, 
 or sufferings obtain their consent to violate God's law. They 
 were told, however, to have no conscience against the inex 
 pressibly wicked law which forbade them to read, and that the 
 slave who had learned to read " has already conquered half 
 the difficulty in getting to Canada, and the slave who has 
 learned to read the Bible has learned the way to heaven." 
 They were cheered by the declaration that the decree of God 
 had gone forth that slavery should continue to be " tortured 
 even unto death," and that their redemption drew nigh. They 
 were counselled to seek liberty by flight, and assured that the 
 Abolitionist knows no more grateful employment than that of 
 carrying the escaping slave to Canada. 
 
 A national convention of the Liberty party was held at 
 Buffalo in August, 1843. There were nearly a thousand dele 
 gates, every free State but New Hampshire being represented. 
 It was a convention of character and integrity, embracing 
 among its leaders men of large ability and influence. This 
 was freely accorded by those who did not belong to it by either 
 association or sympathy. Says Stephen S. Foster, who was 
 present, though not a member : "It was in my judgment the 
 most earnest, devoted, patriotic, and practically intelligent 
 political body which has ever met on this continent." A com 
 mittee was appointed to report a series of resolutions embody 
 ing the principles and policy of the party. An unsuccessful 
 effort was made in this committee, supported by Mr. Chase 
 and opposed by Mr. Goodell, to postpone the nominations till 
 the spring of next year. This committee reported a platform 
 in which were clearly enunciated the purposes of the organiza 
 tion. An effort was made in the committee by John Pierpont, 
 but successfully opposed there by Mr. Chase, to report a dec 
 laration " to regard and treat the third clause of the Con 
 stitution, whenever applied to the case of a fugitive slave, as 
 utterly null and void ; and consequently as forming no part of 
 the Constitution of the United States whenever we are called 
 upon or sworn to support it." Failing in the committee, he 
 
THE LIBERTY PARTY. 553 
 
 introduced it into the convention with the startling question : 
 " Shall we obey the dead fathers or the living God ? " The 
 convention responded to his appeal, and adopted the resolution 
 by a decisive majority. 
 
 The convention nominated for President James G. Birney, 
 then residing in Michigan, and for Vice-President Thomas 
 Morris of Ohio. With its platform and candidates the Liberty 
 party went into the canvass of 1844 with zeal and energy. A 
 series of local and State conventions was held, at which its 
 platform and candidates were earnestly commended for the 
 suffrages of the country. Among these conventions was one 
 in Philadelphia on the 22d of February, 1844. It appointed a 
 committee, of which Professor Charles D. Cleaveland of that 
 city was chairman, to prepare an address to the country. This 
 address from the graceful and eloquent pen of its chairman was 
 an admirable presentation of the principles and purposes of the 
 party. It was largely circulated. Thus supported the Liberty 
 party cast more than sixty thousand votes, had the balance 
 of power in the States of New York and Michigan, and held 
 in its hands the fate of that memorable contest. 
 
 Though the immediate annexation of Texas followed at 
 once the election of Mr. Polk, the leaders of the Liberty party 
 felt justified in their course of action, and still continued their 
 appeals to the people to join their organization and sustain 
 their line of policy. In the spring of 1845 a convention of the 
 party, designed to embrace all who were in favor of continuing 
 an uncompromising warfare against the usurpations of the 
 Slave Power, and who were determined to use all constitu 
 tional and honorable means to effect the extinction of slavery 
 in their respective States, and its reduction to its constitutional 
 limits in the United States, was called to meet at Cincinnati, 
 and was held on the llth and 12th of June, about two thou 
 sand persons being present. It was strong in character as 
 well as in numbers. It issued an address written by Salmon 
 P. Chase, in which the evils of slavery and the crimes of the 
 Slave Power were presented with great comprehensiveness and 
 eloquence. The conditions of ultimate triumph were declared 
 to be " unswerving fidelity to our principles ; unalterable de- 
 
 70 
 
554 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 termination to carry these principles to the ballot-box at every 
 election ; inflexible and unanimous support of those and only 
 those who are true to these principles." Recognizing the 
 moral as well as political character of the struggle in which 
 they were enlisted, and confident of the favor of God, the 
 address said : " We are resolved to go forward, knowing that 
 our cause is just, trusting in God. We ask you to go forward 
 with us, invoking his blessing who sent his Son to redeem 
 mankind. With him are the issues of all events. He can 
 and he will disappoint all the devices of oppression. He can, 
 and we trust he will, make our instrumentality efficient for 
 the redemption of our land from slavery, and for the fulfilment 
 of our fathers' pledge in behalf of freedom, before him and 
 before the world." 
 
 In October a convention of the friends of freedom in the 
 Eastern and Middle States was held in Boston. An address 
 was issued appealing to the people by every consideration of 
 religion, humanity, and patriotism to exert all their powers for 
 the overthrow of slavery. " Your homes and your altars," it 
 said, " your honor and good name, are at stake. The slave in 
 his prison stretches his manacled hand towards you, implor 
 ing your aid. A cloud of witnesses surround you. The 
 oppressed millions of Europe beseech you to remove from 
 their pathway to freedom the reproach and stumbling-block 
 of democratic slavery. From the damp depths of dungeons, 
 from the stake and the scaffold, where the martyrs of liberty 
 have sealed their testimony with their blood, solemn and awful 
 voices call upon you to make the dead letter of your repub 
 licanism a living truth. Join with us, then, fellow-citizens. 
 Slavery is mighty ; but it can be overthrown. In the name of 
 God and humanity let us bring the mighty ballot-box of a 
 kingless people to bear upon it." 
 
 Mr. Chase and other leading men of the party confidently 
 expected large accessions to their ranks as the result of these 
 conventions and from that sense of outrage and injury, felt by 
 large numbers at the North, inflicted by the Texas scheme. 
 They were, however, disappointed ; for the Liberty party con 
 tained within itself the seeds, if not of its own dissolution, at 
 
THE LIBERTY PARTY. 555 
 
 least of dissensions and divisions, and there were marked 
 differences of sentiment on other subjects, growing out of 
 former political and ecclesiastical connections, which could not 
 but reveal themselves in their new relations. 
 
 These differences manifested themselves in a very marked 
 degree in a State convention in New York during the same 
 summer. Among the leading points of these differences was 
 their divergence of views upon the Constitution of the United 
 States ; some regarding it an antislavery instrument, and some 
 maintaining the exactly opposite opinion. Before the disrup 
 tion of the American Antislavery Society the former view had 
 been entertained by some, from which they deduced the conclu 
 sion that slavery was unconstitutional as well as morally wrong. 
 In 1844 Mr. Goodell had published a work entitled, " Views 
 of American Constitutional Law in its Bearings upon Ameri 
 can Slavery." It had a large circulation and exerted consid 
 erable influence. Soon after its publication Lysander Spooner, 
 a lawyer of Boston, published the " Unconstitutionality of 
 Slavery." It was a work of decided ability and acuteness, 
 and, though by many deemed fallacious in its reasonings and 
 conclusions, exerted no small influence upon the popular mind, 
 large numbers of the Liberty party accepting its positions. 
 These causes soon began in a clear and unmistakable man 
 ner to reveal their presence, by the diverse modes of action 
 and policies to which they gave rise. Of course these divided 
 counsels and inharmonious efforts hindered the growth of the 
 party and greatly diminished its influence. 
 
CHAPTER XXXIX. 
 
 MOBS. ANTISLAVERY ACTIVITIES. WOMEN'S FAIRS. 
 
 Riot at Cincinnati. Cowardice of the City Government. Manly Stand of 
 Dr. Bailey. Eiot in Philadelphia. Riots in New Bedford, Nantucket, 
 and Portland. Riotous Demonstration in the North. The Tone of the 
 South. Divisions among Abolitionists. New Organization. Old Organ 
 ization. Antislavery Fairs. Liberty Bell. Address to the Slaves. Ad 
 dress to President Tyler. One hundred Conventions. Thomas P. Beach. 
 Visit of Abolitionists to England. Henry C. Wright. Case of John L. 
 Brown. Decrease of Antislavery Societies. Spread of Antislavery Senti 
 ments. The Impending Struggle. 
 
 THE mob spirit seemed to culminate in the murder of Love- 
 joy and in the burning of Pennsylvania Hall. Subsiding for 
 a time, it burst forth afresh in 1841. In September of that 
 year a terrible riot broke out in Cincinnati against Abolition 
 ists and the colored people. For two days the mob set all law 
 at defiance, and held undisputed sway over the city. Citizens 
 from Kentucky largely participated in the outrage, declaring 
 that they had been sent for, and that there were hundreds who 
 were ready to come and rid the city of negroes and Abolition 
 ists. Bands of armed men patrolled its streets searching for 
 negroes, sending the men to prison under the pretence of pro 
 tection, leaving the women and children defenceless, to be sub 
 sequently outraged and treated with the greatest indignity. 
 Slaveholders hunted among them for runaway slaves, and 
 lawless violence ran riot. The office of the " Philanthro 
 pist " was attacked, and its press was destroyed. A colored 
 meeting-house and several dwellings were demolished, the 
 city authorities doing little to prevent, or even restrain, the 
 outrageous proceedings. But, more significant of the spirit 
 that ruled the hour, and indicating pretty clearly where the 
 responsibility for the riot rested, a public meeting was held, 
 
MOBS. 557 
 
 the mayor presiding, at which resolutions were adopted, that 
 every negro escaping from his master should be given up ; 
 that the negroes should be disarmed ; and that the law of 
 1807, requiring free negroes to give bonds, should be enforced. 
 The meeting also denounced the Abolitionists, and assured their 
 " Southern brethren " that these resolutions were adopted in 
 good faith, and that they would be executed. 
 
 The immediate cause of the riot, it was stated by the " Phi 
 lanthropist," was the presence of men from Kentucky, who 
 precipitated these scenes of violence upon the city and partici 
 pated largely in them. But subsequent revelations disclosed 
 the fact that they were greatly encouraged, if not invited, by 
 some of the business men, who had been threatened with loss 
 of trade if the nuisance of free negroes and Abolitionists was 
 not abated, and who took this method of assuring their South 
 ern brethren of their soundness ; so that there was far too 
 much of truth in the humiliating confession, which was then 
 made, that Cincinnati was but " a conquered province of Ken 
 tucky." A few antislavery men advised Dr. Bailey to suspend 
 its publication. To such advice he nobly replied : " No, friends, 
 the i Philanthropist ' must be published. The war has become 
 now openly a war against free discussion, and shall we give 
 back ? We are not ambitious to be a martyr, life is precious ; 
 but we are willing, Heaven helping us, to suffer all things 
 rather than turn traitor to a cause we have long advocated, 
 a cause identified with the highest interests of man, a cause 
 which God approves, and which he will conduct to a glorious 
 issue, whatever the fate of its advocates." This bold and 
 manly stand taken by Dr. Bailey extorted the admiration and 
 excited the sympathy of those who differed widely from him in 
 their views. Mr. Garrison sent him a hundred dollars to aid 
 him in re-establishing his press, and wrote him a letter urging 
 him not to yield to the violence of his enemies or the timid 
 counsels of his friends. 
 
 On the 1st of August, 1842, the colored people of Philadel 
 phia attempted a celebration in commemoration of West India 
 emancipation. Their procession was assailed by a mob made 
 up largely of Irish laborers. Deeds of violence and blood- 
 
558 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 shed were enacted. A public hall and a church were burned, 
 private houses were demolished, and many families were re 
 duced to abject penury. While the buildings were in flames 
 the fire companies refused to make the necessary effort for 
 their extinguishment ; and for three days the mob received 
 but little check from the city authorities, who, as on a previous 
 occasion, either from timidity or base connivance, shrank from 
 a proper performance of their duties. Adding insult to injury, 
 they proclaimed the colored people and their friends respon 
 sible for the very outrages of which they were but the victims. 
 A decision of the Court of Sessions gave color to the gravest 
 suspicions concerning the motives of this conduct. A public 
 hall, which had been erected by the colored people for temper 
 ance and religious purposes solely, was ordered to be demol 
 ished on a petition representing that there was well-grounded 
 apprehension that it would be burned by the mob, and that it 
 was therefore a nuisance. So overawed by, if not in sympa 
 thy with, these outrages, committed at the bidding of the Slave 
 Power, were the civic authorities of one of the leading cities 
 of the Union. 
 
 Nor was this spirit of lawless violence confined to Pennsyl 
 vania. Similar demonstrations occurred elsewhere. Within 
 a few days of these occurrences, antislavery meetings were 
 broken up in New Bedford and Nantucket in Massachusetts. 
 Early in September, Stephen S. Foster was mobbed at an anti- 
 slavery meeting in Portland, and was with great difficulty 
 rescued from the hands of the rioters. In other places there 
 were similar outbreaks ; meetings were broken up ; halls in 
 jured, persons wounded, and the spirit of riot and misrule too 
 generally prevailed. 
 
 While the North was thus disturbed and disgraced by these 
 riotous assemblages of Southern sympathizers, the peace of 
 the South was seldom broken by such demonstrations. For 
 the same Power that held in bonds the body of the black man 
 inthralled the spirit of the white man. Few were bold enough 
 there to express words of sympathy for the slave, or to question 
 the authority of the master. To be suspected even of pity for 
 the one, or lack of fealty to the other, was to be in danger. 
 
ANTISLAVERY ACTIVITIES. 559 
 
 An enforced and submissive silence there reigned, seldom 
 broken by pulpit or press, by public denunciation, or even by 
 private expostulation. But if perchance heart or conscience 
 did impel utterances, and the feelings of humanity did gain 
 the mastery, then the swift hand of violence was sure to 
 fall. 
 
 When the American Antislavery Society was rent in twain 
 in 1840, the hope had been expressed by John G. Whittier that 
 the members of the old and new organizations, if they could 
 not walk together in unity, could co-operate with each other 
 for the common cause. Catholic and charitable in his views, 
 he recognized the high character, earnestness, and services of 
 such men as Garrison, Phillips, May, Quincy, and Francis 
 Jackson, and such women as Mrs. Child, Mrs. Chapman, Mrs. 
 Mott, the Grimkes, and Abby Kelley, of the old organization, 
 as well as those of such men as the Tappans, Birney, Goodell, 
 Leavitt, Gerrit Smith, Alvan Stewart, Myron Holley, General 
 Fessenden, and Samuel E. Sewall, of the new organization, to 
 which he belonged ; and he desired that the influence of 
 neither should be lost to the cause. But these hopes were not 
 destined to be realized. Divided into two rival, if not hostile, 
 organizations, they too often wasted their forces in mutual 
 criminations and recriminations, which should have been com 
 bined against the common foe. 
 
 The American and Foreign Antislavery Society and its affil 
 iated societies contained many men of eminence and worth. 
 Many of their members were connected with Christian 
 churches and benevolent associations. Fully aware of the 
 moral power of these organizations over the opinions and 
 convictions of the people, the latter sought both to absolve 
 them from all complicity with slavery and to persuade them to 
 bear their testimony against it. In church conference and 
 convocation, in missionary meetings and on anniversary occa 
 sions, they pleaded the cause of humanity as an essential part 
 of the gospel itself. Nor were their efforts without avail, 
 though the full results they aimed at were not secured. Many 
 churches adopted their views, antislavery churches were in 
 some instances formed, and missionary and benevolent asso- 
 
560 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 ciations were organized on the basis of no fellowship with 
 slaveholders ; the most important of them being the American 
 Missionary Association, which was formed in 1846. 
 
 Believing, too, in the necessity of political action, they con 
 stituted an important and controlling element of the Liberty 
 party. In the use of such means, in addition to their asso 
 ciated efforts in connection with the new organization and its 
 branches, they were active and vigilant in their attempts to 
 infuse their sentiments through these channels of influence 
 into the public mind. Nor were these varied efforts without 
 corresponding results, in no degree to be measured by the 
 number and direct efficiency of the societies which were 
 formed or kept alive. The character and influence of these 
 men in their other relations of life, domestic, social, and eccle 
 siastical, were often, without doubt, more effective and diffusive 
 than their action in these distinctive and associated efforts. 
 
 The Abolitionists who adhered to the American Antislavery 
 Society after the separation, claiming that their platform was 
 as wide as the world and as broad as humanity, and that they 
 stood aloof from all political associations and all sectarian 
 biases, asserted that it was their task to enlighten the public 
 mind and awaken the public conscience. Believing that 
 slavery could not be abolished until a change was wrought in 
 the popular mind and heart, they proclaimed it to be their 
 business, in the words of Edmund Quincy, " to sound forever 
 the tale of the wrongs of the slave, and their own guilt in the 
 ears of the people, whether they will hear or whether they will 
 forbear. Our accents may sometimes seem to be lost in the 
 roar of the world's business or of politics, but their still small 
 voice will make itself heard in the secret chambers of the 
 heart. We may never be numerous ; but we shall be always 
 enough to make the general conscience uneasy, until it has 
 purified the nation of its guilt. Our conflict is one in which 
 success is not in proportion to the numbers, but to the faith 
 fulness, of those who engage in it." To the task of carrying 
 into effect these plans, and of endeavoring to make these 
 benign and lofty aspirations realities, they devoted themselves 
 with unflagging resolution. If their forms of expression and 
 
ANTISLAVERY FAIRS. 561 
 
 modes of action do not always command assent, few will be 
 found to withhold from them the meed of an earnest zeal and 
 an honest purpose. 
 
 By the labors of their few but earnest presses, of their elo 
 quent orators, by their conventions in city and country, by 
 meetings in church and hall, they endeavored to scatter broad 
 cast the seeds of living truth, the indestructible principles of 
 human rights. Openly welcoming women to their ranks, they 
 were cheered and sustained by the presence, sympathy, and 
 hearty co-operation of a circle of ladies of Boston and vicin 
 ity of culture and social position, of stainless purity and 
 active philanthropy, who rendered, by presence and purse, 
 speech and pen, essential service to the cause. Among the 
 agencies employed with signal success was that of Fairs. The 
 first was held in Boston, December 16, 1834, under the lead 
 of Mrs. Ellis Gray Loring, Mrs. Lydia Maria Child, and a few 
 others of kindred sympathies. As the Abolitionists were then 
 shut out from the halls and churches of Boston, they were 
 compelled to hold it at the office of the Massachusetts ^.nti- 
 slavery Society on Washington Street. Held in behalf of an 
 unpopular cause, that often subjected its advocates and sup 
 porters to social proscription and insult, and in most unattrac 
 tive quarters, it was deemed a success, although the sum-total 
 of its receipts was but three hundred and sixty dollars. 
 
 The next was the year of mobs, the black year on the 
 calendar of Boston, when its men of property and standing 
 were not above the outrage of breaking up a meeting of anti- 
 slavery women, and of assaulting a young man whose only 
 offence was fidelity to the oppressed. To hold an antislavery 
 fair at such a time was a hazardous experiment. The Female 
 Antislavery Society, which had been, a few weeks before, 
 mobbed and driven from its room, adopted and resolved to 
 hold it, although no hall could be procured, and it was not 
 deemed safe to advertise it. Henry Chapman offered to them 
 his private dwelling, and though the colored people did not 
 dare to attend, for fear that their presence might increase the 
 danger, it was measurably successful, and its managers were 
 encouraged. These Fairs gradually increased in interest and 
 
 71 
 
562 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 success until the seventh, in 1840, yielded the sum of two thou 
 sand dollars. Such an advance had been made that in 1841 
 they were enabled to procure a large and attractive hall, and 
 secure from home and foreign contributions a fine display of 
 articles of fancy and utility. Although a cloud of opprobrium 
 still rested upon the cause and its friends, persons in the more 
 fashionable circles began to extend their presence and patron 
 age. During this year, too, they were specially gratified by a 
 visit from Lord Morpeth of England, afterward Earl of Car 
 lisle and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, who thus gave expression 
 of his sympathy for the object of their efforts. 
 
 Faneuil Hall was asked for and obtained, and these annual 
 gatherings were appropriately held in the Cradle of Liberty 
 for many years. Valuable- contributions were received from 
 abroad, especially from the antislavery women of England, 
 Scotland, and Ireland. They were visited and patronized by 
 increasing numbers, and were continued until slavery finally 
 disappeared. Their receipts contributed largely to the support 
 of the American Antislavery Society, and of its organ the 
 " Antislavery Standard." What became an important feature 
 was the publication of a volume entitled " The Liberty Bell," 
 of which fifteen numbers appeared. It was edited by Mrs. 
 Maria W. Chapman, and received the contributions, in prose 
 and verse, of many of the most gifted writers in England 
 and America. Its very list of contributors was an assur 
 ance that the volumes which contained their writings were 
 replete with conclusive reasonings, glowing thoughts, and ten 
 der appeals which could not fail to affect the thoughts and 
 feelings of the people, and help forward the sacred cause. 
 
 While in no other place except Boston did Fairs become an 
 " institution," they were held in various parts of the country. 
 They were early held in Philadelphia under the direction and 
 impulse of Lucretia Mott, Mary Grew, and others like minded. 
 They, too, were more or less frequently resorted to in other 
 cities and towns, not only in New England, but in the Middle 
 and Western States. Indeed, among the multiplied agencies 
 that were adopted during those years of weary toil to effect the 
 desired change in the public sentiment, this agency was often 
 
ADDRESS TO PRESIDENT TYLER. 563 
 
 and in many places put in requisition. Slight record can be 
 made of the labors of these noble women, and their names 
 may never be known to the lowly ones for whom they toiled. 
 But on the tablets of their own souls were inscribed in endur 
 ing characters these lessons of love and self-sacrifice, truth 
 and trust, which made them wiser and better, however much 
 or however little their efforts may have advanced the common 
 cause. May not, however, their patient and persistent labors 
 have prepared them and stimulated others of their country 
 women for those exhibitions of sublime and heroic devotion, 
 at home and in the camps and hospitals of the army, which so 
 signalized the late civil war ? 
 
 Among other instrumentalities employed by the members 
 of the old organization was the adoption of two addresses, 
 both from the pen of Mr. Garrison, one to the slaves of the 
 South, and the other to President Tyler on the occasion of 
 his visit to Massachusetts at the completion of the Bunker Hill 
 monument. The slaves were assured that the word had gone 
 forth that they should be delivered from their chains. They 
 were invited to transform themselves from things into men by 
 flight from their masters ; and the pledge was sacredly given that 
 they should find succor and protection. " If you come to us," 
 said the address, " and are hungry, we will feed you ; if thirsty, 
 we will give you drink ; if naked, we will clothe you ; if sick, we 
 will minister to your necessities ; if in prison, we will visit 
 you ; if you need a hiding-place from the face of the pursuer, 
 we will provide one that even blood-hounds will not scent out." 
 
 President Tyler was requested to liberate his slaves. He 
 was reminded that, though he occupied the highest office in 
 the land, subscribed to the Declaration of Independence, be 
 lieved in the Christian religion, and was then on a visit to cele 
 brate " the memories of those who bled and died in the cause 
 of human liberty," he was " yet a slaveholder." He was re 
 minded of the influence which such a beneficent example as the 
 emancipation of his own slaves would exert toward the eman 
 cipation of three millions held in bondage, and they implored 
 him to perform that great duty. " It might," said the address, 
 " subject you temporarily to the ridicule of the heartless, the 
 
564 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 curses of the profane, the contempt of the vulgar, the scorn 
 of the proud, the rage of the selfish, the hostility of the power 
 ful ; but it would assuredly secure to you the applause and ad 
 miration of the truly great and good, and render your name 
 illustrious to the latest posterity." Such advice from despised 
 Abolitionists President Tyler of course disdained to follow. 
 Had he accepted it, however, and acted up to its benign pre 
 cepts, he would never have linked his name so indissolubly 
 with the Texas iniquity ; he would have saved his character 
 from the taint of treason, and himself from being remembered 
 as the only traitor President. 
 
 Another instrumentality which they adopted was the hold 
 ing a hundred conventions throughout the free States, mainly 
 in the Northwest, at which one or more of their popular ora 
 tors were present. 
 
 Sometimes that oppression which maketh a man mad moved 
 from their propriety the friends of the oppressed and those 
 who labored for his redemption. His sad fate and cruel 
 wrongs, the indifference of the people, and the coldness of 
 the churches during these years, did not a little to imbitter 
 Abolitionists and impel them to the utterance of words and 
 the adoption of measures which were neither wise nor in har 
 mony with the very doctrine of equal rights of which they were 
 such sturdy defenders. Especially was this true of some of that 
 class which felt constrained to come out from the churches, 
 and to separate themselves from the political parties of their 
 day. Impatient at what they regarded the wicked silence of the 
 pulpit concerning the wrongs of the slave, and provoked at their 
 own general exclusion from the Christian temples of the land, 
 in which they sought to plead his cause, they sometimes entered 
 those sanctuaries unbidden, and, in the presence of congrega 
 tions assembled for religious worship, undertook themselves 
 to supply the lack of service of those who, professing to hold 
 the poorest of men their brethren, children of a common Father, 
 had no plea for the bondman, no rebuke for his oppressor. 
 
 Among the most prominent and persistent of those who 
 adopted this policy were Stephen S. Foster and Thomas P. 
 Beach. The latter entered the meeting-houses of the Friends 
 
VISIT OF ABOLITIONISTS TO ENGLAND. 565 
 
 in Lynn and of the Baptists in Danvers, was forcibly ejected, 
 arrested, and fined for a violation of the law against the dis 
 turbance of religious worship. In default of his fine, which 
 he would neither pay himself nor allow his friends to pay, he 
 was sent to the Newburyport jail, where he lay three months. 
 He published there a little paper called " The Voice from the 
 Jail," which increased the popular sympathy in his behalf, 
 and made the shortcomings of the churches more apparent. 
 But, though Mr. Beach was a man of character and culture, 
 unquestioned integrity and conscientiousness, he could not 
 but fail to convince many, even among Abolitionists, of the 
 wisdom of his course, or the propriety of such modes of action, 
 though adopted for a good purpose. 
 
 Several of their leading advocates visited England and there 
 pleaded the cause, arraigning their country and its institutions, 
 its political parties and sectarian organizations, as recreant to 
 the cause of freedom and the claims of humanity. Nor were 
 they and their British coadjutors any less ready to criticise 
 and censure the shortcomings which there met their eye. 
 The prominent leaders of the Anti-Corn-Law League were in 
 close and friendly correspondence with Calhoun and McDuffie, 
 hailing these champions of slavery as distinguished friends of 
 free trade, and they denounced the inconsistency of recogniz 
 ing " the enemies of personal liberty as the friends of com 
 mercial liberty." They found, too, the Free Church of Scot 
 land receiving contributions from the slaveholding churches 
 of the South, and they demanded that they should return the 
 price of blood. Henry C. Wright was especially persistent, 
 by voice and pen, in his reiterated demands to " send back 
 the blood-stained money." 
 
 Though the money was not sent back, and Southern co 
 operation in the cause of free trade was still welcomed, there 
 was manifested a growing interest in the English mind on the 
 subject of their mission. Nor was this increase due to anti- 
 slavery efforts alone. As often before and since, the slave 
 holders themselves added to its intensity. Among their doings 
 which then excited deep feeling were the trial, conviction, and 
 sentence to death, in South Carolina, of John L. Brown, for 
 
566 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the sole offence of aiding a female slave to escape. When the 
 news reached England, Lord Brougham brought the subject be 
 fore the House of Lords. A memorial, signed by Rev. Wil 
 liam Jay, to the inhabitants of the United States, was published. 
 The ministers and office-bearers of Christian churches, and 
 benevolent societies in Lancashire and London addressed a 
 memorial to the churches of South Carolina, and to Americans 
 generally. It was signed by thirteen hundred of the most 
 eminent of the ministers and elders, among whom was the 
 venerable Clarkson. Petitions were sent from England to 
 the governor of South Carolina, praying for the release of 
 Brown. A feeling of horror and indignation was felt and 
 freely expressed at the enormity of such a penalty for such an 
 oifence. Similar though far less feeling was exhibited in the 
 United States, but it was owing mainly to British efforts that 
 the governor was induced to commute the sentence. 
 
 By these and other modes of action the leading and active 
 members of the antislavery societies prosecuted their work, 
 sometimes with and sometimes without their aid. In earnest 
 to secure the object in view, and regarding organizations as 
 only means to an end, they did not cease to seek the end, 
 though that means might be wanting or ineffective for their 
 purpose. For, as distinctive organizations, these societies soon 
 began to diminish in number and efficiency. This was ad 
 mitted, as early as 1844, by Parker Pillsbury, in the " Herald 
 of Freedom." It was then said by him that they had but a 
 name to live, that " the annual meetings had been a disgrace 
 to humanity, and a scandal to the antislavery cause." Mr. 
 Pillsbury was apt to take gloomy views of affairs, and some 
 times to express himself in extravagant and exaggerated lan 
 guage. And yet there is no doubt whatever that at that time 
 they had largely diminished in numbers. At the time of the 
 disruption it was estimated that there were nearly two thou 
 sand antislavery societies in the United States, with a mem 
 bership of some two hundred thousand. Immediately after 
 the organization of the American and Foreign Antislavery So 
 ciety, auxiliary societies were also formed. But they were 
 never very effective, and most of their members labored for the 
 
SPREAD OF ANTISLAVERY SENTIMENTS. 567 
 
 common cause through political and ecclesiastical associations. 
 Indeed, within five years of the disruption large numbers of 
 antislavery societies had ceased to exist, and their membership 
 had greatly diminished. Some of them, however, especially 
 the American, New England, Massachusetts, Ohio, and Penn 
 sylvania societies were then strong and effective. 
 
 But the decrease of antislavery societies, and the diminu 
 tion of the numbers, interest, and zeal of many that remained, 
 were no indication of the decline of antislavery ideas, but an 
 evidence, rather, that the antislavery cause was assuming larger 
 dimensions, and that the sympathies and views of many found 
 expression in other forms and by other modes of action. The 
 startling issues growing out of the Texas plot, the increasing ag 
 gressions of the Slave Power, brought the various questions per 
 taining to slavery to the hearts and homes of hundreds of thou 
 sands who had heretofore given little heed to abolition move 
 ments. They broadened and deepened the public interest, so 
 that the conflicts of opinion and the adoption of policies passed, 
 in a large degree, from the arena and control of antislavery 
 societies to the wider domain of general debate and political 
 combinations. Matters involving both slavery and antislavery 
 were no longer mere problems of civil polity and reform, to be 
 calmly considered in the study or on the platform as abstract 
 questions of right and wrong merely ; but they became the 
 momentous issues of the hour, instinct with life and impor 
 tance, involving both peril and guilt on the one hand, duty and 
 safety on the other. They forced themselves upon the atten 
 tion of statesmen and into the assemblages of the people ; they 
 entered the halls of State legislatures and the chambers of Con 
 gress. They appealed to the public eye and ear in the columns 
 of the press, in the pulpit, and in meetings of religious assem 
 blies, and at the hustings of political parties. Fiction made 
 them the theme of her most successful efforts, and poetry conse 
 crated to them the magic of its numbers. And thus the subject 
 which had been discussed only by the few became the theme 
 of the many, and that which had been confined to scattered 
 circles overspread the land, until that land trembled under the 
 tread of armies and was reddened with the blood of civil war. 
 
CHAPTER XL. 
 
 NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 
 
 Meeting of the American Antislavery Society in 1842. Debate on the Issue of 
 No Union with Slaveholders. Meeting of the Massachusetts Antislavery So 
 ciety. Protest against the Constitution by Mr. Foster. Mr. Garrison's 
 Proposition. Meeting of the American Antislavery Society in 1844. .The 
 Doctrine of No Union with Slaveholders adopted. Protests. Address to 
 the Abolitionists. Letter of Francis Jackson. Gerrit Smith's Letter to John 
 G. Whittier. Replies. Disunion Policy adopted. 
 
 IN tracing the history of the antislavery struggle and in 
 forming an estimate of the utterances and proposed measures 
 of the men engaged in it, it should never be lost sight of that 
 they were necessarily ignorant of much which is now seen 
 clearly. What, therefore, may now with present lights seem 
 incongruous and extravagant would very likely appear emi 
 nently legitimate and proper, did the critic of to-day have no 
 more facts within his reach than did they who, amid its dark 
 ness and threatening dangers, were grappling with the momen 
 tous problem a generation ago. 
 
 After the disruption of the American Antislavery Society, 
 those who adhered to the original organization evinced a more 
 determined opposition to political action than ever. Espe 
 cially was this true of a small and active body of those who 
 had accepted the extreme doctrines of non-resistance. They 
 were not only opposed to acting with existing political parties, 
 either with or without antislavery pledges, but to the formation 
 of any organization for the purpose of such action. They 
 assumed that personal consistency and duty to the slave 
 required that they should not give voluntary support to the 
 government by holding office themselves, or by voting for 
 others for that purpose. Some were in favor of a dissolution 
 of the Union, and others were fast tending in that direction. 
 
NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 569 
 
 The society was to hold its annual meeting in New York in 
 May, 1842. Mr. Garrison, in urging a full attendance, sug 
 gested that among the questions coming up for consideration, 
 the first in importance would be one concerning " the duty of 
 making the repeal of the union between the North and the 
 South the grand rallying-point, until it be accomplished or 
 slavery cease to pollute our soil." Several of the New York 
 presses commented upon this declaration in language calcu 
 lated to excite popular violence, and Judge Noah charged the 
 grand jury to indict the agitators if such discussions tended 
 to a breach of the peace. But neither the comments of the 
 press nor the charge of the judge prevented a free and full 
 discussion of that question. A resolution was adopted recom 
 mending voting Abolitionists to submit to candidates for office 
 the question : Are you in favor of the abrogation of every pro 
 vision in the Constitution and the laws of the United States 
 requiring the aid of the people or their agents in holding 
 human beings in slavery ? 
 
 To a resolution setting forth that inasmuch as neither the 
 people of the United States nor the Abolitionists had ever 
 asked for the abrogation of the slaveholding features of the 
 Constitution, there was no reasonable ground for asking for a 
 dissolution of the Union, Henry C. Wright offered as a sub 
 stitute that the cause of human rights does imperatively de 
 mand this dissolution. Upon this resolution and substitute 
 there sprang up an earnest and able debate, which ran through 
 two days, in which Mr. Wright, Wendell Phillips, Abby Kelley, 
 Charles Lenox Remond, Thomas Earle, and Ellis Gray Loring 
 participated. They were not, however, ready for action, and 
 the resolution and substitute were laid upon the table. But 
 at the eleventh annual meeting of the Massachusetts Anti- 
 slavery Society, in 1843, a resolution was reported by Wendell 
 Phillips, asserting that no Abolitionist could consistently de 
 mand less than " a dissolution of the union between North 
 ern freedom and Southern slavery, as essential to the aboli 
 tion of the one and the preservation of the other." This 
 resolution was amended, on motion of Mr. Garrison, so as to 
 read that the compact which exists between the North and the 
 
 72 
 
670 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 South is " a covenant with death and an agreement with hell," 
 involving both parties in atrocious criminalities, and that it 
 should be immediately annulled. 
 
 At the twelfth annual meeting of the Massachusetts Anti- 
 slavery Society, Stephen S. Foster presented a protest against 
 the Constitution of the United States, and against the union 
 of the Northern and Southern States, with the reasons for this 
 extreme measure fully enumerated. In the preamble was set 
 forth the declaration that the officers and members of the 
 Massachusetts Antislavery Society " now publicly abjure our 
 allegiance to the Constitution of the United States and the 
 Union, and place the broad seal of our reprobation upon this 
 unnatural and unholy alliance between liberty and slavery." 
 The obligations of the Union were declared to be utterly null 
 and void ; the pledge was given to seek its peaceful dissolu 
 tion ; and the friends of freedom in the North were invited 
 thereafter to vote for repeal, instead of casting their votes for 
 Abolitionists for office. 
 
 Mr. Foster was followed by Mr. Garrison, who also presented 
 a preamble embodying the same propositions in briefer and 
 more concise form, closing with a resolution declaring in sub 
 stance that the national compact was in principle and practice 
 an insupportable despotism ; from its inception, before God, 
 null and void ; and that it was the right and duty of the friends 
 of impartial liberty to withdraw their allegiance, and effect, 
 if possible, its overthrow by peaceful revolution. These reso 
 lutions were discussed with great earnestness, the discus 
 sion being held in the evening, in the State House. In both 
 Faneuil Hall and the capitol the speeches of Garrison, Foster, 
 Phillips, Quincy, and Burleigh in favor of the immediate dis 
 solution of the Union were applauded. But no vote was 
 reached. 
 
 The questions of receding from the government, and of plac 
 ing on the antislavery banners the war-cry of " No union with 
 slaveholders," were carried into the meeting of the American 
 Antislavery Society, in New York, early in May, 1844. On 
 the proposition by Mr. Garrison, the declaration was made, 
 after earnest debate, that " henceforth, until slavery be abol- 
 
NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 
 
 571 
 
 , ished, the watchword, the rallying cry, the motto on the ban 
 ner of the American Antislavery Society shall be, " No Union 
 with Slaveholders." The resolution introduced by Mr. Phillips 
 was also adopted, declaring that secession from the govern 
 ment was the duty of every Abolitionist, and that to take 
 office or to vote for another to hold office under the Constitu 
 tion violated antislavery principles, and made such voter an 
 abettor of the slaveholder in his sin. 
 
 This position was not taken by the American Antislavery 
 Society, however, without the most strenuous and persistent 
 opposition. William A. White, then a young, earnest, and 
 active member from Massachusetts, entered his protest, and 
 withdrew his name from the roll of the society. A protest was 
 presented, signed by Ellis Gray Loring, David Lee Child, 
 Joseph Southwick, and others, declaring that this " novel test " 
 prescribed for the members was " intolerant and presumptuous 
 in its spirit and tendency " ; that it narrowed the antislavery 
 platform ; that it was " not required by enlightened con 
 science " ; was " impracticable," and " calculated justly to im 
 pair the character and influence of the society." A protest 
 was also entered by Thomas Earle and Arnold Buffum. They 
 protested on the ground that it was in effect the exclusion of 
 all but non-resistants from the society ; that it was a loss of 
 power ; that it assumed the province of an ecclesiastical tri 
 bunal in settling questions of conscience, not involved in the 
 original design of the society ; that it tended to retard the 
 cause of emancipation ; and that it proposed to dissolve the 
 American Union without petitioning for a change of the objec 
 tionable features of the Constitution. 
 
 Two weeks after this position was taken, an address was 
 issued announcing the above action and calling upon the 
 friends of freedom to adopt the policy proposed. It charged 
 that the national compact was formed at the expense of liberty ; 
 that it favored a slaveholding oligarchy and an insupportable 
 despotism ; that it was at war with God and man ; that it 
 could not be innocently supported ; and that it deserved to be 
 immediately annulled. In behalf of the society, they called 
 upon their fellow-citizens who believed it to be " right to obey 
 
572 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 God rather than man to declare themselves peaceful revolu 
 tionists, and to unite with them under the stainless banner of 
 liberty, having for its motto, ' Equal Rights for All, No Union 
 with Slaveholders ! ' " " Up," they say, " with the banner of 
 revolution ! Not to shed blood, not to injure the person or 
 estate of any oppressor, not by force of arms to resist any 
 law, not to countenance a servile insurrection, not to wield 
 any carnal weapons ! No; ours must be a bloodless strife, ex 
 cepting our blood be shed, for we aim, as did Christ our 
 leader, not to destroy men's lives, but to save them ; to over 
 come evil with good ; to conquer through suffering for right 
 eousness' sake ; to set the captive free by the potency of truth." 
 It declined to define or describe the form of government which 
 should succeed the present, leaving that matter for time to de 
 termine. But it expressed the opinion that when the people 
 were regenerated and turned from iniquity, when they ceased 
 from oppression and established liberty, what was then frag 
 mentary would in due time be " crystallized and shine like a 
 gem set in the heavens for all coming ages." 
 
 Near the close of the month the New England Antislavery 
 Society adopted the same policy, for substantially the same 
 reasons, by nearly a unanimous vote. But, as in New York, 
 this new position was not taken without earnest protests. One 
 signed by William A. White and Richard Hildreth, the histo 
 rian, and concurred in by George Bradburn, was presented 
 against the adoption of these resolutions. It set forth that 
 consistency required of all persons voting for them an absolute 
 renunciation of all the advantages derived from the govern 
 ment ; that the repudiation of the Constitution and the pur 
 posed dissolution of the Union did not tend in the slightest 
 degree to peaceful abolition ; that abjuration of the Constitu 
 tion did not relieve those persons so abjuring it of any obliga 
 tions and responsibilities they were under as citizens, so long 
 as they remained in the country. 
 
 A protest was entered, too, by Joseph Southwick, a Boston 
 merchant, and an early and devoted friend of the slave. He 
 protested, for the reason that their adoption impaired the efforts 
 of Abolitionists, protracted the time for the removal of slavery, 
 
NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 
 
 573 
 
 contracted the antislavery platform ; and he affirmed that he 
 could not live in the country under the present Constitution, 
 and pay taxes for the support of the government, if he adopted 
 them. 
 
 In spite, however, of these and other protests, State and local 
 societies hastened to accept and proclaim the new doctrine. 
 Francis Jackson, the president of the Massachusetts Antislav 
 ery Society, addressed a long letter to Governor Briggs, asking 
 him to receive his resignation of the office of justice of the 
 peace. In this letter he set forth, at length and in detail, 
 what he deemed to be the demoralizing influences of the pro 
 visions of the Constitution which recognized and protected 
 slavery. " To me," he said, " it appears that the virus of 
 slavery, introduced into the Constitution of our body politic by 
 a few slight punctures, has now so pervaded and poisoned the 
 whole system of our national government, that literally there 
 is no health in it. The only remedy that I can see for the 
 disease is to be found in the dissolution of the patient." He 
 avowed that he could no longer give voluntary assistance in 
 holding up the Constitution of the United States, which had 
 become so imbecile for good and so powerful for evil ; that he 
 withdrew all allegiance to it ; and that " henceforth," he said, 
 " it is dead to me, and I to it." 
 
 Several members of the American Antislavery Society not 
 only dissented from this action, but took an early occasion to 
 state their objections. George Bradburn denounced it as " a 
 wild crusade against voting under the national Constitution " ; 
 and he announced that he should avail himself of the oppor 
 tunity to act thereafter with the Liberty party, which he 
 regarded as " the most efficient antislavery instrumentality, 
 as the grand instrument, indeed, by which the institution of 
 slavery is to be overthrown." 
 
 Gerrit Smith, in a letter to John G. Whittier, affirmed that 
 the people of the North were as guilty as the people of the 
 South, because they were more aroused to the wickedness of 
 slavery, and sinned against greater light. He said that the 
 fact that the nation in its national capacity upheld slavery 
 proved nothing against the Constitution. Maintaining that 
 
574 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the Constitution was an antislavery instrument, it needed, he 
 said, but to be administered in consistency with its principles 
 to effectuate the immediate overthrow of the whole system of 
 slavery. He declared it to be " a power in the hands of the 
 people which they cannot fling away without making them 
 selves guilty of ingratitude to God and of treason to the 
 slave." He regarded the Constitution as a shield given by 
 God to be placed over the head of the slave, and a weapon for 
 fighting the battles of the oppressed, which had been mur 
 derously wielded on the side of the oppressor ; and it is, he 
 said, " a fruit of poor repentance, if now, when our hearts are 
 smitten with a sense of our wrong use of this shield and 
 weapon, we shall, from our study of ease and quiet, from our 
 desire to promote a favorite theory, or from any other cause, 
 throw them away, instead of manfully, courageously, perse- 
 veringly, and therefore successfully, putting them to a right 
 use." 
 
 But Garrison, Phillips, Burleigh, Adin Ballou, and others 
 replied to all protests and criticisms with their accustomed 
 earnestness and vigor. They persisted in the maintenance 
 and advocacy of the new theories and policy. The parent 
 society and its affiliated associations, having accepted this 
 position, made it thereafter the distinctive feature of their 
 organization, and the most prominent article of their creed. 
 " No Union with Slaveholders " was the motto everywhere em 
 blazoned on their banners. Disunion was their recognized 
 remedy. Other antislavery men of whatever organization 
 were proclaimed to be wanting in an essential element of all 
 true and effective opposition. However earnest and devoted, 
 they were deemed inconsistent, and their labors were regarded 
 as only partial, if not wholly inefficient. This general criti 
 cism embraced every class of antislavery men, and every form 
 of antislavery effort. From the adoption of this policy of 
 disunion in 1844, to the opening of the Rebellion, so persistent 
 were they in its promulgation, as the element of all effective 
 effort, that the supporters of slavery seized upon that fact to 
 identify all antislavery men with them, and to characterize all 
 opposition to slavery as disorganizing, revolutionary, and unpa- 
 
NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 575 
 
 triotic. It was indeed a most potent weapon in the hands 
 of the apologists, perpetualists, and propagandists of slavery. 
 Nor did they cease its use until their voices were silenced by 
 the patriotism of the nation, outraged as it was by their own 
 treason or acknowledged complicity with it. 
 
CHAPTER XLI. 
 
 IMPRISONMENT OP COLORED SEAMEN. 
 
 Imprisonment in South Carolina. Laws of Louisiana. Resolutions of Massa 
 chusetts. The Governor authorized to appoint Agents to defend Colored Sea 
 men. Appointment of Mr. Hoar. Excitement in South Carolina. Action 
 of Governor Hammond. Resolutions of South Carolina Legislature. Fines 
 and Imprisonments imposed upon Persons that defend Negroes. Indignation 
 at Charleston. Action of the Authorities. Mr. Hoar forced to leave the 
 State. Mr. Hubbard's Mission to New Orleans. Compelled to leave. 
 Petitions presented to Congress by Mr. Winthrop. Reports of Hoar and 
 Hubbard. Message of the Governor. Action of the Legislature. 
 
 AMONG the aggressive and oppressive measures of the slave- 
 holding States were the arrests and imprisonments, the fines, 
 whippings, and selling into slavery of free colored men, guilty 
 of no offence but entering Southern ports in the prosecution 
 of their lawful callings. 
 
 In 1820 South Carolina passed an act to restrain the eman 
 cipation of slaves, and to prevent free persons of color from 
 entering the State. This act was followed by several others 
 of like character and with more stringent provisions. These 
 acts bore with great severity upon colored persons employed 
 on board vessels entering her harbors. They were arrested, 
 forcibly taken out of their vessels, and imprisoned. A case 
 was taken into one of the State courts, and a discharge 
 demanded, on the ground that such laws were unconstitu 
 tional ; but, that court holding the law to be constitutional, 
 an appeal was taken to the highest tribunal of the State. 
 After argument, the court being divided in opinion, the case 
 was suspended, and the prisoners were still held in custody. 
 
 The petitions of twenty-six masters of vessels were pre 
 sented to the Congress of the United States by Mr. Sergeant 
 of Pennsylvania, in the winter of 1823, setting forth that these 
 
IMPRISONMENT OF COLORED SEAMEN. 577 
 
 acts destroyed the liberty of freemen, interfered with the free 
 dom of navigation and with the employment of seamen. 
 They asked Congress to relieve them from the situation in 
 which these acts placed them by exposing their free colored 
 mariners to unlawful imprisonment, and their vessels to an 
 enormous and unnecessary expense and detention. Congress, 
 however, gave no relief, and South Carolina went on increas 
 ing the severity of her statutes and the rigor of their enforce 
 ment. 
 
 England made formal complaint against these acts, and re 
 monstrated not with that State, but with the national govern 
 ment. The subject was referred to William Wirt, then Attor 
 ney-General of the United States ; and that eminent jurist, 
 though a native of Virginia and a slaveholder himself, in 
 1824, pronounced the acts she complained of an infraction of 
 "the Constitution, treaties, and laws of the United States, 
 and incompatible with the rights of all nations in amity with 
 the United States." South Carolina bowed to that decision so 
 far as it applied to foreign nations, but mercilessly enforced 
 those laws against the citizens of her sister States, who some 
 times found in her ports that temporary protection on the 
 decks and under the flags of other governments which their 
 own failed to secure. Though one of her most eminent sons, 
 William Johnson, then a judge of the Supreme Court of the 
 United States, held the opinion that these laws " trampled 
 on the Constitution," " implied a direct attack upon the sover 
 eignty of the United States," tended " to a dissolution of the 
 Union," and were " unconstitutional and void," yet she per 
 sistently adhered to her illegal, unfriendly, and cruel policy. 
 
 Louisiana and some other Southern States followed her per 
 nicious example. For years the merchants, shipmasters, and 
 seamen of Northern States were thus harassed and burdened. 
 These oppressions continuing, petitions were presented, in 
 1836, to the legislature of Massachusetts, by antislavery men, 
 asking the interposition of the State. Samuel J. May and 
 Samuel E. Sewall appeared before the committee and pre 
 sented the carefully collected facts bearing upon the subject. 
 No action, however, was taken till 1839, when a series of 
 
 73 
 
578 BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 resolutions was passed, protesting against laws under which 
 " citizens of this Commonwealth, visiting those States for 
 purposes of business or driven thither by misfortune, often 
 have been and continue to be, though guiltless of crime, cast 
 into prison, subjected to onerous fines, and in many instances 
 sold into slavery." Assuming that it was the paramount duty 
 of Massachusetts to protect her citizens, the governor was 
 authorized to employ a suitable person, whenever any colored 
 citizen of the State was imprisoned in another State on account 
 of complexion or race, to lay the matter before the proper au 
 thorities and secure the release of the individual. These 
 resolves, so moderate in language and so reasonable in their 
 demands, were unheeded, and treated with contemptuous neg 
 lect. 
 
 After patiently waiting three years, the legislature author 
 ized the governor to take suitable measures at the expense of 
 the Commonwealth to procure the discharge of persons held 
 under such laws, and to test their legality before the Supreme 
 Court ; but this action secured no practical result. These 
 laws were felt to be more and more oppressive and burden 
 some, and petitions were presented in 1843, to the legislature, 
 asking the appointment of counsel in the ports of Charleston 
 and New Orleans to act in behalf of their oppressed citizens. 
 The legislature promptly passed resolves authorizing the gov 
 ernor to employ an agent for the ports of Charleston and New 
 Orleans, for a term not exceeding one year, for collecting and 
 transmitting information respecting the number of persons 
 imprisoned without the allegation of a crime, and to prose 
 cute one or more suits, so as to test the legality of these im 
 prisonments. Governor Morton appointed agents for that pur 
 pose ; but they took no notice of their appointment, or declined 
 to act. 
 
 Defeated in all its efforts to secure the protection of its 
 citizens, the legislature, in 1844, authorized the governor to 
 appoint an agent to reside at Charleston, and another to reside 
 in New Orleans, to carry into effect the resolutions of the pre 
 ceding legislature. Under this authority Governor Briggs 
 appointed for Charleston Samuel Hoar of Concord. Mr. 
 
IMPRISONMENT OF COLORED SEAMEN. 579 
 
 Hoar was a gentleman of ripe age, of great personal worth 
 and influence, eminent in his profession, having served with 
 much acceptance in both the State and national legislatures. 
 He was by temperament, education, and social position cau 
 tious and conservative. He had never been an Abolitionist, 
 but was a supporter and advocate of the colonization scheme. 
 
 Accepting this appointment, Mr. Hoar set out on his mission 
 of justice, humanity, and constitutional law. With his daugh 
 ter, a lady of rare intelligence and excellence of character, he 
 arrived at Charleston on the 28th of November, 1844. On the 
 same day he addressed a communication to the governor of 
 South Carolina, informing him that he had been appointed by 
 the governor of Massachusetts an agent to collect and trans 
 mit accurate information respecting the imprisonment of citi 
 zens of that Commonwealth, and bring one or more suits in 
 their behalf. The next day Mr. Hoar sought an introduction 
 to the mayor of Charleston, for the purpose of obtaining ac 
 cess to " the records of orders on sentences to imprisonment 
 of our colored seamen or other citizens." But that official was 
 at Columbia, attending a session of the legislature. 
 
 James H. Hammond was then governor of South Carolina. 
 His views upon slaveholding were of the most extravagant 
 character. He believed it to be the normal condition of so 
 ciety. In Congress he had shown himself to be its most 
 zealous advocate, and a violent exponent of the most ex 
 treme opinions of his State. Reckless alike of the rights of 
 whites and of blacks, he did not hesitate to make this avowal 
 on the floor of the House : " I warn the Abolitionists, igno 
 rant, infatuated barbarians as they are, that, if chance shall 
 throw any of them into our hands, they may expect a felon's 
 death." On receiving Mr. Hoar's letter, the governor hastened 
 to communicate it to the legislature. Incensed at what they 
 chose to regard " as part of a deliberate and concerted scheme 
 to subvert the domestic institutions of the Southern States," 
 the legislature promptly adopted a series of resolutions declar 
 ing the right of South Carolina to exclude from her territory 
 persons whose presence might be dangerous ; denying that free 
 negroes were " citizens of the United States " in the meaning 
 
580 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of the Constitution ; and requesting the governor to " expel 
 the emissary sent by Massachusetts to South Carolina." 
 
 Nor did the legislature pause with these declarations. They 
 passed an act to punish by fines, imprisonment, and banish 
 ment any person coming within the limits of the State with 
 the intent to disturb or hinder the operation of laws relating 
 to slaves and free persons of color. It also enacted that any 
 resident citizen of the State who should accept any commission 
 for a like purpose should receive a still severer punishment. 
 
 As his mission became known, a like feeling of resentment 
 and hostility ran through the State. Charleston was in a fer 
 ment of rage. The sheriff called on Mr. Hoar, and said to 
 him : " It is considered a great insult on South Carolina by 
 Massachusetts to send an agent here on such business. The 
 city is highly incensed. You are in great danger, and you 
 had better leave the city as soon as possible." He replied 
 with firmness, that he had been sent by the governor of Mas 
 sachusetts on lawful business, and he could not consent to 
 leave until he had attempted, at least, to carry out his instruc 
 tions. The sheriff then read a portion of a letter he had re 
 ceived from the attorney-general, urging the importance of pre 
 serving order and deprecating a resort to lynching, which 
 would be " a disgrace to the city." Repeating several times 
 that the excitement was intense, that the people regarded the 
 object of his visit an insult, he advised him to leave at once, as 
 the only means of safety left. But Mr. Hoar was firm in his 
 unwillingness to leave under such circumstances. Other citi 
 zens called, with similar representations and counsel. 
 
 It was suggested to him by the sheriff, that a case be made 
 up and taken before the Supreme Court, and a decision secured 
 by this means. To this proposition he readily assented ; but, 
 on further reflection and consideration, the sheriff withdrew 
 the offer. Dr. Whitridge, to whom Mr. Hoar had a letter 
 of introduction, also called upon him ; and, though express 
 ing his " unutterable mortification in communicating the state 
 of things existing in Charleston," he felt obliged to apprise 
 him of his danger, and of the necessity of immediate escape. 
 He told him that he had just come from the common council , 
 
IMPRISONMENT OF COLORED SEAMEN. 
 
 581 
 
 that the people were assembling in groups, and that the best 
 course to be pursued was to take a carriage to his plantation, 
 some twenty miles distant, where they could arrange further 
 movements. But he still firmly declined the proffered aid and 
 advice. 
 
 Three gentlemen one of them a bank president and the 
 others two attorneys of that city, one of whom was Mr. Magrath, 
 a lawyer of eminence, afterward a judge of the United States 
 District Court, and one of the leaders of the Rebellion called 
 on Mr. Hoar, avowedly for the purpose of inducing him to leave 
 the city. To their urgent request that he should leave, Mr. 
 Hoar replied by stating the lawful nature of his business, and 
 the pressing necessity he was under to perform it. After fur 
 ther conversation, they informed him that they would call 
 again and escort him to the boat. He replied that fight 
 ing on his part would be very foolish, that he was too old to 
 run, and they would find him there to be disposed of as they 
 should think proper. When they were about leaving the room, 
 he reminded them that he had a daughter with him ; to which 
 Mr. Rose, the bank president, replied : " It is that which 
 creates our embarrassment." While these gentlemen used no 
 violent language, their words and tones indicated that they 
 were determined in their purpose. 
 
 He was further embarrassed by the action of the keeper 
 of the hotel. Without intimating to him a desire that he 
 should leave his house, he presented a request to the city 
 government that they would remove him, to save his house 
 from the impending danger. Informed that a story was circu 
 lating through the city that he had consented to leave, Mr. 
 Hoar stated to Mr. Rose and his friends that he had given no 
 such consent ; and that, if he left the city, it would be because 
 he u must," not because he " would." It was admitted that 
 they had no power to order him away, and that all they could 
 do was to warn him of what was to follow if he should not go. 
 They concurred in assuring him that he had done all he could, 
 and that it was impossible for him to remain longer in the city. 
 " It seemed then," said Mr. Hoar, in his report to the gov 
 ernor of Massachusetts, " that there was but one question for 
 
582 RISE AND FALL OP THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 me to settle ; which was, whether I should walk to a carriage 
 or be dragged to it. Unless I disregarded the statements of 
 friends as well as of foes, and also the preparations which I 
 then saw about me, this, I must conclude, was the only alterna 
 tive. I could perceive no use to any State, cause, or person in 
 choosing the latter ; and I then, and for the first time, said, 
 4 1 will go.' ' He entered the carriage pointed out to him, and 
 was driven to the boat " without any tumult or further abuse." 
 
 Thus was the accredited agent of Massachusetts expelled 
 from the soil of a sister State, while her colored citizens, 
 guilty of no crime, were still doomed, though in the pursuit of 
 their lawful avocations, to arrests, imprisonments, fines, and, 
 for a second offence, to be sold at public sale as slaves. Thus, 
 too, in violation of the guaranty that " the citizens of each 
 State shall be entitled to all the immunities and privileges 
 of citizens of the several States," did South Carolina adhere, 
 not only inflexibly but vauntingly, to her inhuman and lawless 
 policy. Not only did the efforts of Massachusetts to protect 
 her lowly and defenceless sons signally fail, but she found her 
 self powerless either to maintain the rights guaranteed by the 
 Constitution, which she felt herself bound to support, or to 
 vindicate her co-equality among her sister States. 
 
 Significant, indeed, were the inquiries with which Mr. Hoar 
 closed the report of his fruitless mission. " Has the Constitu 
 tion of the United States the least practical validity or binding 
 force in South Carolina ? She prohibits the trial of an action 
 in the tribunals established under the Constitution for deter 
 mining such cases in which a citizen of Massachusetts com 
 plains that a citizen of South Carolina has done him an injury ; 
 saying that she has herself already tried that cause and de 
 cided against the plaintiff. She prohibits, not only by her 
 mobs, but by her legislature, the residence of a free white citi 
 zen of Massachusetts within the limits of South Carolina 
 whenever she thinks his presence there inconsistent with her 
 policy. Are the other States of the Union to be regarded as 
 the conquered provinces of South Carolina ? " 
 
 But South Carolina was not alone in her violent and contu 
 macious course. Henry Hubbard, a lawyer of Western Massa- 
 
IMPRISONMENT OF COLORED SEAMEN. 583 
 
 chusetts, had been appointed the agent for Louisiana. His 
 arrival in New Orleans threw the city into great excitement. 
 At the outset he was careful to disclaim all connection with 
 abolitionism, or any intention to interfere with slavery or with 
 slaves at the South. The purpose of Massachusetts, he said, 
 was to enable the citizens of that State, imprisoned without 
 crime, to avail themselves of all lawful means for their libera 
 tion. In a communication to Governor Mouton he assured 
 him that Massachusetts was simply striving to protect her own 
 citizens, and had done nothing to infringe the right of her 
 sister States. But all these explanations and disclaimers were 
 unavailing. The excitement increased, the murmurs of hos 
 tile intent grew louder, and threats of lynching were freely 
 circulated. Everything boded a popular outbreak. 
 
 Mr. Hubbard was waited upon by the city recorder, accom 
 panied by Mr. Soule*, afterward United States senator, and 
 urged immediately to leave the city. As he declined com 
 pliance with these demands, the recorder, under great excite 
 ment, said to him : " It is from no motive but that of humanity 
 that I come to warn you of your danger. If you do not prom 
 ise to leave the city immediately, your life is not safe this 
 night ; and if I should take you into custody, I could not pro 
 tect you, for they would murder me in a moment. If you stay 
 here another night, your life will certainly be taken." He 
 was assured, too, by Jacob Barker, a native of Massachusetts, 
 but long a citizen of New Orleans, that his life was in immi 
 nent peril. Under these circumstances he addressed a letter to 
 the governor of Louisiana, expressing his purpose, now that 
 his mission was fruitless, immediately to leave the State. The 
 law, the government, and the people of Louisiana were against 
 his mission ; and Mr. Hubbard returned home, made his re 
 port, and resigned his agency. 
 
 Thus Louisiana, like South Carolina, acting on the practical 
 assumption that everything must be subordinate to the inter 
 ests of slavery, did not hesitate to violate both the spirit and 
 the letter of the Constitution ; while Massachusetts, believing 
 that the government was designed to secure the blessings of 
 liberty to all, aimed to make it effectual in guarding the rights 
 
584 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of the humblest of her citizens ; but she found herself, under 
 the slavery regime, powerless for the protection of her most 
 honored official representatives. 
 
 Nor could she look to the national government for the vin 
 dication of her rights. That, too, was bestrode by the Slave 
 Power and compelled to do its bidding. An appeal had al 
 ready been made, and that appeal had been denied. In De 
 cember, 1842, Mr. Winthrop of Massachusetts had presented 
 a memorial of the citizens of Boston, owners and masters of 
 vessels and others, representing that it was necessary to em 
 ploy free persons of color in vessels entering the ports of 
 Charleston, Savannah, Mobile, and New Orleans ; that these 
 men were frequently taken from their vessels and thrown into 
 prison, greatly to the prejudice of their interests and the detri 
 ment of commerce ; and they prayed Congress to grant relief, 
 and render effectual the privileges of citizenship secured by the 
 Constitution. 
 
 This memorial had been referred to the Committee on 
 Commerce, and Mr. Winthrop, who evinced in this case deep 
 interest and zeal, had promptly reported that the judiciary 
 alone could give relief from these oppressive laws, and the 
 State alone could repeal them. But the committee reported a 
 series of resolutions, trusting that their adoption by the House 
 would not be without influence in securing, for the petitioners, 
 and much more for the seamen in their employ, the redress 
 they demanded. These resolutions pronounced that the seiz 
 ure and imprisonment in the ports of any State of free colored 
 seamen against whom there was no charge but that of enter 
 ing such ports in pursuance of their lawful business, and the 
 authorizing of such seizure and imprisonment by State laws, 
 were in contravention of the paramount and exclusive power 
 of the general government to regulate commerce, and were 
 also in direct, positive, and permanent conflict with the ex 
 press provisions and fundamental principles of the national 
 compact. The House of Representatives, however, under the 
 lead of Cave Johnson of Tennessee, soon thereafter made 
 Postmaster-General, laid those resolutions on the table by a 
 large majority ; and by so doing gave its sanction and encour- 
 
IMPRISONMENT OF COLORED SEAMEN. 585 
 
 agement to this inhuman, unjust, and unconstitutional State 
 legislation. 
 
 Early in the session of 1845 Governor Briggs sent to the 
 legislature Mr. Hoar's report, accompanied by a well-reasoned 
 and temperate message. It was referred to a joint special 
 committee, of which Charles Francis Adams was made chair 
 man. That committee, on the 3d of February, reported re 
 solves concerning the treatment of Samuel Hoar by the State 
 of South Carolina, with a declaration to be adopted as the act 
 of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. This declaration 
 clearly set forth the whole case in issue, and justified by indis 
 putable facts and impregnable arguments the course Massachu 
 setts had pursued. With becoming solemnity, as " in the 
 presence of all Christian nations, of the civilized world, and 
 of an omniscient, all-seeing Deity, the final judge of human 
 action," she addressed " each of her sister States," entered 
 her solemn protest, and arraigned South Carolina because the 
 latter had disregarded " the comity acknowledged by all civil 
 ized communities," defied " the express stipulations of the 
 Constitution," and refused to submit her action to be adjudged 
 by the Supreme Court of the United States. 
 
 This admirable State paper, which was unanimously adopted 
 and sent forth to the country, closed with this firm and digni 
 fied enunciation of the purposes of Massachusetts : " She will 
 never relax in her demands of all the rights which belong to 
 her as a State and member of the Union, or in the execution 
 of her utmost energies in support of the undying principles of 
 justice and liberty among men, the base of her social edifice, 
 cemented in the blood of many of its founders, as they are the 
 pride and honor of modern civilization." 
 
 This appeal awoke no response and secured no action from 
 the offending States. Their cruel laws still continued to dis 
 grace their statute-books, and Northern freemen were still sub 
 jected to their harsh and humiliating operation. Nor was there 
 any relaxation until they were swept away by the fire and flood 
 which destroyed the guilty cause itself. What and how potent 
 was the agency which this persistent injustice, these continued 
 oppressions, exerted in bringing on that struggle, Omniscience 
 
 74 
 
586 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 only knows. How important a factor it became in that com 
 bination of causes which hastened on the bloody struggle no 
 human sagacity can divine. Nor can it be known how much 
 the manly stand of Massachusetts, though then overborne, con 
 tributed to the building up of that power which, sixteen years 
 later, grappled with slavery in arms and closed its career of 
 crime. 
 
CHAPTER XLII. 
 
 PLOT FOB THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 
 
 Dominating Influences of the Slave Power. Texas. Immigration from the 
 South. Texas declared Independent. Annexation to the United States pro 
 posed. Rejected by Mr. Van Bureu. Election and Death of General Har 
 rison. Mr. Tyler. Mr. Gilmer's Letter. General Jackson's Letter. 
 Presidential Intrigue. Address of Members of Congress against the Texas 
 Scheme. Duff Green's Letter. Visit of Mr. Andrews and Mr. Tappan to 
 England. Motives for Annexation distinctly avowed. Accusations against 
 England. Position of the British Government. Texas or Disunion. Con 
 ditions demanded by Texas. Death of Mr. Upshur. Mr. Calhoun made Sec 
 retary of State. Treaty. 
 
 So marked had been the slayeholding policy of the United 
 States, so distinct had been its avowals, that well-informed and 
 thoughtful men in the Old World saw, and did not hesitate to 
 characterize in fitting terms, the inconsistency of the great Re 
 public. In the year 1845, Macaulay in the British parliament 
 unquestionably gave expression to the well-considered senti 
 ments of European opinion when he said : " That nation is the 
 champion and upholder of slavery. They seek to extend slav 
 ery with more energy than was ever exerted by any other na 
 tion to diffuse civilization." 
 
 Of this policy and of those avowals no page of American his 
 tory affords more striking examples than that which narrates 
 the inception, progress, and consummation of the plot for the 
 annexation of Texas. For, perhaps, at no point in that his 
 tory was the ascendency of the Slave Power more complete, 
 nowhere along its gloomy pathway did the nation afford sad 
 der examples of abject subserviency to its behests. For that 
 power not only controlled the government and dictated its 
 policy, but it made no concealment of its designs and purposes 
 of control and dictation. It was openly and almost ostenta- 
 
588 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 tiously proclaimed, not only that slavery should be protected 
 against a threatened danger, but that it should be strength 
 ened and its area extended. Its friends were not only busy, 
 but they were open in their avowals of the object of their 
 efforts. 
 
 When Louisiana was purchased of France, in 1803, by Mr. 
 Jefferson, its western boundaries were undefined. Texas was 
 claimed by both the United States and Spain, and there was 
 danger of collision between the authorities of the two nations. 
 Mr. Pinkney and Mr. Monroe were therefore directed by Mr. 
 Jefferson, in 1805, to settle with Spain the question of boun 
 dary ; and in 1816, Mr. Erving, minister to that government, 
 was authorized to make a treaty fixing upon the Sabine River 
 as the boundary between the two countries. Mr. Jefferson 
 had virtually accepted such an arrangement in 1806 by as 
 senting to an agreement between the American and Span 
 ish commanders, on their respective frontiers, by which the 
 troops of the United States were not to move beyond the 
 Rio Hondo, and the troops of Spain were not to come east 
 of the Sabine. 
 
 By the treaty of 1819 the claim of the United States to the 
 undefined territory of Texas was ceded to Spain as a part of 
 the consideration for the cession of Florida. This acquisition 
 had been so earnestly urged by the slaveholders of Georgia 
 and Alabama as a remedy or protection against the escape 
 of slaves into that territory from those States, and so strong 
 was the pressure upon the government, that Mr. Monroe, with 
 the consent of all his Cabinet, agreed to this recession of Texas 
 to Spain. It met with opposition, however, though unavailing, 
 even from slaveholders themselves, a resolution being intro 
 duced into the House by Mr. Clay, dissenting from it. But the 
 resolution was rejected, and the treaty received not only the 
 sanction of the Senate, but also the approval of the country. 
 Texas thus became an undisputed part of Mexico by the action 
 of the United States ; and when that country achieved her in 
 dependence, this territory became an integral portion of that 
 republic. 
 
 Efforts, however, were early made to recover it by treaty. 
 
PLOT FOR THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 589 
 
 In 1827, Mr. Clay, then Secretary of State in the administra 
 tion of Mr. Adams, authorized an offer of a million dollars 
 to Mexico for the territory east of the Rio Grande. Under the 
 administration of General Jackson, two years later, that offer 
 was increased to four or five million dollars for Texas proper, 
 which did not include either New Mexico or the valley of the 
 Rio Grande. Other efforts were made by General Jackson, 
 but Mexico persistently refused to treat for its cession on any 
 terms. The avowed and probably the real reasons for those 
 early efforts were to secure a better western boundary, to pro 
 tect New Orleans, and to prevent the occupation of that terri 
 tory by a foreign and hostile power. It was stated by Mr. 
 Adams, in 1845, in the debate on the resolutions for the an 
 nexation of Texas, that it was a free country when he offered 
 to purchase it, and that he had ever been willing to acquire it, 
 as a free country, with the assent of Mexico. 
 
 By the decree of the President of Mexico, in 1829, slavery 
 was abolished throughout the Mexican Republic. There being 
 very few Mexican inhabitants in the territory known as Texas, 
 the slave-masters looked with hungry eyes upon that region, 
 whose climate, soil, and other natural resources, invited im 
 migration. Adventurers, principally from the southwestern 
 States, many of them broken in fortune and reckless and des 
 perate in character, allured by unbounded prospects of wealth 
 and power, flocked into the territory, and, with characteristic 
 effrontery and lawlessness, took their slaves with them, though 
 in plain defiance of Mexican law. With still greater audacity 
 and criminality, secret agencies were formed for enlisting and 
 arming men for the hardly concealed purpose of re-establishing 
 slavery in territory which had been made free by Mexican stat 
 ute, and even of wresting that territory from its allegiance to 
 the Mexican government. Indeed, in 1832, Sam Houston, who 
 had been a soldier under General Jackson, and who was sub 
 sequently a member of Congress and governor of Tennessee, 
 went to Texas avowedly for the purpose of taking possession 
 of the country, and of establishing there an independent gov 
 ernment. In that work he received the support of large num 
 bers of the Southern people, with the* countenance, hardly dis- 
 
590 BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 guised, of the civil and military authorities of the United 
 States. 
 
 On the 2d of March, 1836, the independence of Texas was 
 proclaimed. A few weeks later the battle of San Jacinto was 
 fought. Santa Anna, president of the Mexican Republic, hav 
 ing been taken prisoner, stipulated for the recognition of 
 Texan independence, though Mexico would not sanction a 
 treaty made by its president while thus held in duress. 
 
 Immediately after the battle of San Jacinto, Mr. Calhoun 
 announced it to be the policy of the government to recognize 
 at once the independence of Texas, and to annex it as soon 
 as possible to the United States. In accordance with this 
 boldly proclaimed object, its independence was recognized 
 early in 1837, and its minister at Washington, General Hunt, 
 proposed in August its annexation. The proposition was, how 
 ever, rejected by Mr. Yan Buren. Though generally subser 
 vient to the slaveholders' policy, he faltered here. This was a 
 little too bold and unequivocal, and consequently Mr. Forsyth, 
 his Secretary of State, in his reply to General Hunt, affirmed 
 that the United States was bound to Mexico by a treaty of 
 amity and commerce, which would be scrupulously observed ; 
 that so long as Texas should remain at war, while the United 
 States was at peace with her adversary, the proposition " ne 
 cessarily involved the question of war with that adversary." 
 The Secretary further stated that the United States might 
 justly be suspected of a disregard of the friendly purposes of 
 the compact, if the overtures of General Hunt were to be 
 reserved even for the purpose of future consideration, as this 
 " would imply a disposition on our part to espouse the quarrel 
 of Texas with Mexico." 
 
 This scheme having failed, no further overtures were made 
 during Mr. Yan Buren's administration. Those, however, 
 who had disapproved of the policy of the cession of Texas to 
 Spain in 1819, looked with favor on its recession if, as Mr. 
 Benton expressed it, " its recovery " could be effected " without 
 crime and infamy." But they generally relinquished the idea 
 when they saw that it had now become a part of a scheme of 
 sectional aggrandizement, another demand of the Slave Power, 
 
PLOT FOR THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 591 
 
 another step in the march of slavery aggression and ascen 
 dency. Mr. Adams had raised his warning voice against it ; 
 Mr. Webster, in his speech at Niblo's Garden, in March, 1837, 
 nearly six months before the proposition had been made by 
 the Texan authorities, declared that he saw " objections, insur 
 mountable objections," to the annexation of Texas to the 
 United States. He thought all the stipulations contained in 
 the Constitution in favor of the slaveholding States which 
 were already in the Union " ought to be fulfilled in the ful 
 ness of their spirit and to the exactness of their letter." " We 
 all see," he said, " that by whomsoever possessed, Texas is 
 likely to be a slaveholding country ; and I frankly avow my 
 unwillingness to do anything that shall extend the slavery of 
 the African race on this continent, or add other slaveholding 
 States to the Union." The legislatures of several States pro 
 nounced against annexation. The warning of Mr. Adams, the 
 emphatic utterances of Mr. Webster, and the decisive refusal 
 of Mr. Van Buren's administration, seemed to check, for a 
 while, the effort, and to give its advocates the idea that a large 
 work of preparation was essential to success. 
 
 But the advanced leaders, confident of ultimate triumph, 
 determined to achieve it at no distant day ; though, for pru 
 dential reasons, they did not make annexation an issue in the 
 presidential contest of 1840. That election resulted in the 
 defeat of the Democratic party. By the election of General 
 Harrison the Whigs came into power. Though antislavery 
 was not a plank in their platform, and the party had its South 
 ern wing, it still embraced the few antislavery men in the 
 country, and was generally regarded as more favorable to a 
 humane and liberal policy than its antagonist. The President 
 died, however, within one month, and John Tyler became his 
 successor. Whatever of hope had been cherished by the 
 friends of freedom was speedily dispelled by the accession 
 of the Virginia slaveholder. The friends of the scheme saw 
 that their hour and man had come. In Mr. Tyler they found 
 one in hearty sympathy with their object, though his party 
 affiliations linked him with the opponents of the measure. 
 They therefore gathered around him, flattered his vanity, 
 
592 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 excited his ambition, and separated him from the great body 
 of the party which had elected him. But Mr. Webster, who 
 had remained in Mr. Tyler's cabinet after his colleagues had 
 retired, stood in the way, until the coldness, not to say 
 rudeness, of some members of the administration, compelled 
 him to resign. The State Department then passed into the 
 hands of Mr. Legare of South Carolina, then into those of 
 Mr. Upshur of Virginia, and soon afterward into those of Mr. 
 Calhoun, each of whom was an admitted propagandist, and 
 ready to make any sacrifices in behalf of slavery and to exe 
 cute any of the behests of the Slave Power. 
 
 Having colonized Texas in order that slavery might be 
 extended, the slaveholders had wrested it from Mexico for 
 the same purpose. They were now determined on its an 
 nexation ; in the words of General Hamilton, to " give a 
 Gibraltar to the South," and in those of Henry A. Wise, to 
 give " more weight to her end of the lever." Southern legis 
 latures declared that annexation would give an " equal poise 
 of influence in the halls of Congress," and " a permanent 
 guaranty of protection " to the slave system. The " Madi- 
 sonian," President Tyler's organ, affirmed that annexation 
 would have the most salutary influence upon slavery, and that 
 " it must be done soon, or not at all." To " fire the Southern 
 heart " and stimulate the administration, the leaders raised 
 the war-cry of " Now, or never." 
 
 In the winter of 1843 it became apparent that a gigantic 
 intrigue for annexation was in progress. Early in January a 
 letter was published in a Baltimore paper, written by Thomas 
 W. Gilmer, a member of the House from Virginia. He was 
 a warm personal and political friend of Mr. Calhoun. Like 
 many other young men of the South, trained in the Whig par 
 ty, he had deserted it, and accepted the theories of the Calhoun 
 school of Democracy. This letter was an adroit and skilful 
 appeal in favor of immediate annexation, in order, as the 
 writer said, to thwart the abolition designs of England. It 
 was sent through Aaron Vail Brown, a member of the House 
 from Tennessee, to General Jackson, with a view of drawing 
 from him an answer in favor of seizing the golden opportunity 
 
PLOT FOR THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 593 
 
 to secure the immediate admission of Texas, and to defeat the 
 nomination of Mr. Van Buren for the presidency. Jackson, 
 always in favor of the scheme, and ever devoted to the cause of 
 slavery, replied, on the 13th of February, 1843, that the annexa 
 tion of Texas had occupied much of his attention during his 
 presidency ; that it had lost none of its importance ; and that, 
 in all its aspects, it was essential to the United States. His 
 letter was withheld from publication for more than a year, 
 when it was brought out, with its date altered to 1844, for the 
 purpose of aiding in carrying through the Senate the annexa 
 tion treaty, and of affecting the action of the Democratic 
 national convention, which was to meet in May at Baltimore. 
 Mr. Benton, in his " Thirty Years' View," states that Gen 
 eral Jackson's letter passed into the hands of Mr. Gilmer, 
 that he showed it to a confidential friend, and said that " it 
 was to be produced in the nominating convention, to over 
 throw Mr. Van Buren and give Mr. Calhoun the nomination, 
 both of whom were to be interrogated beforehand, and as it 
 was well known what the answers would be, Calhoun for, 
 and Van Buren against, immediate annexation, and Jack 
 son's answer coinciding with Calhoun's, would turn the scale 
 in his favor, and i blow Van Buren sky high.' ' 
 
 The leaders in this annexation scheme were unquestionably 
 ambitious, selfish, and unscrupulous intriguers, as charged by 
 many of their political associates ; but their action was mainly 
 inspired by slaveholding policy, so that this, like so many other 
 of the great events of American history which have really 
 tended to the aggrandizement and material advancement of 
 the nation, was prompted and really accomplished for a no' 
 more worthy purpose than to strengthen and perpetuate the 
 vile and inhuman system of chattel slavery. 
 
 At the close of the XXVIIIth Congress, twenty members 
 of the House united in an address to the people of the free 
 States, warning them against the scheme to bring a foreign 
 slaveholding nation into the Union. This address was writ 
 ten, after consultation with Mr. Adams, Mr. Giddings, and Mr. 
 Slade, by Seth M. Gates, a representative from New York. It 
 set forth in direct, clear, and emphatic language the purpose 
 
 75 
 
594 BISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of the slaveholding power to secure, beyond all redemption, 
 the perpetuation of slavery, and to maintain its continued 
 ascendency. It pronounced annexation to be a violation of 
 our national compact, its objects, designs, and the great ele 
 mentary principles which entered into its formation. It de 
 clared it to be " an attempt to eternize an institution and a 
 power of a nature so unjust in themselves, so injurious to the 
 interests and abhorrent to the feelings of the people of the 
 free States, as in our opinion not only inevitably to result in a 
 dissolution of the Union, but fully to justify it ; and we not 
 only assert that the people of the free States ought not to sub 
 mit to it, but we say with confidence that they will not submit 
 to it." It was published generally in the Whig papers of the 
 free States, and contributed largely to awaken the people to 
 the meditated action of the leaders of annexation. 
 
 These motives for annexation, it is to be observed, were dis 
 tinctly avowed by its advocates. Nor did, they hesitate to pro 
 claim, almost defiantly, that all risks to be run and all sacri 
 fices to be made were for slavery. Mr. Upshur, Secretary of 
 State, in his letter of the 8th of August, 1843, to Mr. Murphy, 
 the Charg d'Affaires in Texas, expressly declared that " few 
 calamities could befall this country, more to be deplored than 
 the abolition of slavery in Texas." In a despatch of the 22d 
 of September, he assured Mr. Murphy that there was no reason 
 to fear that there would be any difference of opinion among 
 the slaveholding States touching the policy of annexation, 
 which he pronounced " absolutely necessary to the salvation 
 of the South." In his despatch of the 21st of November of 
 that year, he distinctly announced that " we regard annexa 
 tion as involving the security of the South," and in that of 
 the 16th of January, 1844, he asserted that " if Texas should 
 not be attached to the United States she cannot maintain that 
 institution ten years, and probably not half that time." 
 
 These frank and unhesitating avowals on the part of Mr. 
 Upshur, seemed to alarm Mr. Murphy, who, intent upon secur 
 ing the prize, deprecated anything that looked like a needless 
 obstacle thrown in its way, and he cautioned the too outspoken 
 secretary against offending " our fanatical brethren at the 
 
PLOT FOE THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 595 
 
 North," suggesting, at the same time, that the idea that an 
 nexation was undertaken for " the cause of civil and religious 
 liberty " was the safest issue to present to the nation at large. 
 " The Constitution of Texas," said Mr. Murphy in a despatch 
 to Mr. Upshur, " secures to the master the perpetual right to 
 his slave, and prohibits the introduction of slavery into Texas 
 from any other quarter than from the United States. If the 
 United States preserves and secures to Texas the possession 
 of her Constitution, then we have gained all we can desire, and 
 all that Texas asks or wishes." 
 
 Nor was Mr. Calhoun any less explicit. Having, on the 
 death of Mr. Upshur, succeeded to the State Department, 
 he wrote to Mr. Green, the representative of the government 
 in Mexico, that " it was impossible for the United States 
 to witness with indifference the efforts of Great Britain to 
 abolish slavery in Texas." To the British minister he 
 wrote on the 27th of April, while the treaty was pending 
 in the Senate, that annexation " was made necessary in order 
 to preserve domestic institutions, placed under the guaranty 
 of the Constitutions of the United States and Texas." He 
 also gravely asserted that what is called slavery is in real 
 ity a political institution, " essential to the peace, safety, and 
 prosperity of those States of the Union in which it exists," 
 and he avowed that Texas was to be annexed to guard against 
 the danger of the abolition of slavery in the Southern States. 
 Mr. Green was instructed to say to Mexico, that the treaty of 
 annexation was forced upon the government in self-defence, 
 in consequence of the policy adopted by Great Britain in refer 
 ence to the abolition of slavery in Texas. 
 
 Nor were these statements misapprehended, or the position 
 of the government misunderstood. For the Mexican Minister 
 of Foreign Relations sharply and with dignity replied : " When, 
 in order to sustain slavery and avoid its disappearance from 
 Texas and from other points, recourse is had to the arbitrary 
 act of depriving Mexico of an integral part of her possessions 
 as the only certain and efficacious remedy to prevent what Mr. 
 Green calls 4 a dangerous event,' if Mexico should be silent 
 and lend her deference to the present policy of the Executive 
 
596 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 of the United States, the reproach and censure of nations 
 ought to be her reward." 
 
 Even the more thoughtful and scrupulous of the Democratic 
 party itself saw and felt the degradation of such utterances 
 from men high in station. Thus the New York " Evening 
 Post," then a leading organ of the Democratic party, con 
 ducted by William C. Bryant, well described the unnatural 
 and humiliating position of the government and the vital 
 issue then pending : " It is evident that this presents to the 
 people a question entirely new, and which they cannot avoid. 
 This issue is not as to the abolition of slavery in the South 
 ern States, the District, nor the Territories of the Union, but 
 whether this government shall devote its whole energies to 
 the perpetuation of slavery ; whether all the sister republics 
 on this continent, which desire to abolish slavery, are to be 
 dragooned by us into the support of this institution." 
 
 Unscrupulous as were the annexation managers, and little 
 as they hesitated at any means for the accomplishment of the 
 end in view, nowhere did they seem more reckless of assertion 
 than in their attempt to fix upon England what they repre 
 sented the crime of promoting the abolition of slavery in 
 Texas. Duff Green, a friend of Mr. Calhoun, " an intermed- 
 dler in other men's matters," and fond of intrigue, then in 
 England, reported that there was then in the process of in 
 cubation a plot for the abolition of slavery in Texas. It was 
 charged by this serviceable instrument that Stephen Pearl 
 Andrews, then in London, was negotiating with the British 
 Cabinet, to secure the abolition of slavery in Texas, by the 
 guaranty by England of ten million dollars in Texan bonds. 
 
 There was a modicum of truth in the charge, if it be not an 
 abuse of language to apply that term to any legitimate attempt 
 to rescue such an embryo State from the curse of slavery. 
 Mr. Andrews, who then resided in Texas, had endeavored to 
 form an emancipation party in its two leading cities, Houston 
 and Galveston. Though at first successful in gaining adhe 
 rents to his plan, it failed because of the general unwilling 
 ness to submit to the pecuniary sacrifices involved. The de 
 pressed state of the market for slave products and for slaves 
 
PLOT FOR THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 597 
 
 themselves suggested and encouraged the project of seeking 
 emancipation through compensation, many who had opposed 
 the former plan accepting the latter. Believing that the British 
 Abolitionists would gladly aid in such a scheme, Mr. Andrews 
 visited New York for the purpose of finding those who would 
 be willing to join in the effort. Stating the facts that there 
 were but some twenty-five thousand slaves in Texas, and that 
 the contribution of four or five million dollars would make 
 Texas a free State, he found that the antlslavery men of that 
 city and its vicinity were ready to listen to his suggestions, 
 and to co-operate in the proposed endeavor. 
 
 Lewis Tappan, with his prompt and large-hearted philan 
 thropy, entered earnestly into the attempt, and accompanied 
 Mr. Andrews to England for the purpose of making, if possible, 
 such arrangements with the English government. Members 
 of the Cabinet were consulted. They expressed their sympa 
 thy with the object aimed at, but asserted that the government 
 as such could not enter into any such arrangement without 
 involving England in a war with the United States. Lord 
 Palmerston, though in the opposition, concurred in the views 
 expressed by Lord Aberdeen. Lord Brougham conceded, 
 though reluctantly, that the government could not render such 
 aid and still preserve friendly relations with this country. 
 No objections, however, were urged against such private con 
 tributions as individuals might see fit to make. No money, 
 however, was raised. The Secretary of State, seeming to as 
 sume that it was the duty of the national government to sup 
 port slavery in a foreign nation as well as in his own, com 
 municated these incidents of " an alarming character " to Mr. 
 Murphy, and directed him to consult the Texan authorities in 
 regard to annexation. 
 
 The charges of Duff Green against the British cabinet were 
 promptly denied by Lord Aberdeen, in a communication to the 
 American minister, Mr. Everett, and transmitted by him to the 
 State Department in November of that year. Lord Aberdeen 
 also sent to the British minister a peremptory denial in a de 
 spatch, dated the 26th of December, which was communicated 
 to Mr. Upshur on the 26th of February, two days before his 
 
698 KISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 death, which was caused by the bursting of a gun on board 
 the war steamer " Princeton." In this despatch the British 
 Secretary of Foreign Affairs made this declaration, so honor 
 able to the British government : " The governments of the 
 slaveholding States may be assured that although we shall not 
 desist from those open and honest efforts which we have con 
 stantly made for procuring the abolition of slavery throughout 
 the world, we shall neither openly nor secretly resort to any 
 measures which shall tend to disturb their domestic tranquil 
 lity." Mr. Packingham, too, the British minister, replied to 
 the accusations of the Secretary of State against England, 
 disavowing in the clearest and strongest language the designs 
 imputed to his government. 
 
 When Congress assembled in December, 1843, it was seen 
 that the plot had made great progress, and the probabilities of 
 success seemed to many great. In addition to these utterances 
 of her public men, there were corresponding efforts throughout 
 the South. State legislatures, public meetings, and the press, 
 entered vigorously upon the work of preparing the public mind 
 of the country for the consummation of a purpose its leaders 
 had so much at heart. The legislature of Mississippi perhaps 
 gave expression to the more advanced and intense views and 
 feelings of the propagandists, when it declared slavery to be 
 " the very palladium of their prosperity and happiness " ; that 
 the South does not possess within its limits " a blessing with 
 which the affections of her people are so closely intwined and 
 so completely enfibred " ; and that " the protection of her 
 best interests will be afforded by the annexation of Texas." 
 Governor Gilmer, in the letter already referred to, had ex 
 pressed the opinion that the institutions of Texas would in 
 cline her people " to unite her destiny with ours," and that 
 annexation would have a most salutary influence on slavery 
 itself. But, he added, she must be annexed " soon, or not at 
 all." 
 
 Nor was the menace of dissolution wanting. " Texas or 
 disunion " became a watchword and a rallying cry. A con 
 vention of the slaveholding States was demanded " to take 
 into consideration," in the words of a meeting in the Barn- 
 
PLOT FOR THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 599 
 
 well District, South Carolina, " the question of annexing Texas 
 to the Union, if the Union will accept it ; or, if the Union will 
 not accept it, then of annexing Texas to the Southern States " ; 
 and to have " the alternative distinctly presented to the free 
 States, either to admit Texas into the Union or to proceed 
 peaceably and calmly to arrange the terms of a dissolution of 
 the Union." Another meeting in the Williamsburgh District 
 of the same State declared that " it was better to be out of 
 the Union with Texas than in it without her." At Beaufort, 
 another of these assemblages announced that they would dis 
 solve the Union " sooner than abandon Texas." 
 
 But the scheme was beset with difficulties that would have 
 discouraged any but the desperate men engaged in this work. 
 Indeed, it is difficult to sound the depths of mendacity or to 
 scale the heights of audacity reached. Texas was at war with 
 Mexico, a friendly power, and there was an armistice, with a 
 fair prospect of a favorable result of the negotiations then in 
 progress. The Texan President, therefore, seeing his advan 
 tage, or his danger, or both, made it a condition precedent of 
 all negotiations that the United States should assume the 
 Mexican war, and that it should place at his disposal, " subject 
 to his orders," sufficient naval and military forces for the pro 
 tection of the belligerent State. This audacious and unconsti 
 tutional demand was too much even for Mr. Upshur, who re 
 tained it unanswered for a month, when his death occurred. 
 Mr. Nelson, the Attorney-General, for a few days acting Secre 
 tary of State, gave an adverse decision, affirming that the gov 
 ernment had no constitutional power thus to use the military 
 forces of the nation. 
 
 Mr. Calhoun, however, on his accession as Secretary, saw 
 no insuperable objections. He therefore renewed the nego 
 tiation, and on the day before the treaty of annexation was 
 signed, he gave to Texas, in the words of Mr. Benton, " the 
 fatal pledge which his predecessors had refused, and followed 
 it up by sending our ships and troops to fight a people with 
 whom we were at peace ; the whole veiled with the mantle 
 of secrecy." This was the testimony of a slaveholder, of one, 
 too, who subsequently supported the scheme, that it was a 
 
600 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 palpable violation of the Constitution and of the laws of na 
 tions, and an unpardonable outrage upon the rights of a 
 friendly people. Nor did Mr. Benton seem to have much con 
 fidence in the leaders of this crusade in the matter of slavery 
 itself. He expressed the belief that, at the bottom and under 
 the pretext of getting Texas into the Union, the scheme was 
 to get the South out of it. The whole scheme he characterized 
 " as an intriguing negotiation, concealed from Congress and 
 the people ; an abolition quarrel picked with Great Britain to 
 father an abolition quarrel at home, a slavery correspondence 
 to outrage the North, war with Mexico, the clandestine concen 
 tration of troops and ships at the Southwest, the secret com 
 pact with the President of Texas and the subjection of Ameri 
 can forces to his command, and the flagrant seizure of the 
 purse and the sword." 
 
 Mr. Calhoun, the corypheus of the annexation scheme, en 
 tered the State Department early in March. Proceeding at 
 once with the negotiations begun by Mr. Upshur, he concluded 
 on the 12th of April a treaty of annexation. That concluded, 
 he took up the despatch of Lord Aberdeen, which had remained 
 unanswered, and, seizing upon the declaration that England 
 desired the abolition of slavery throughout the world, made an 
 elaborate argument in favor of slavery and against the policy 
 of England, which he assumed to be hostile to the slaveholding 
 policy of the country. This despatch, written on the 18th, was 
 sent with the treaty to the Senate. But before it left the coun 
 try it was promulgated here to promote the cause of immediate 
 annexation, assumed to be necessary because of the abolition 
 machinations of Great Britain. Ten days thereafter it was 
 sent to the Senate by the President with a message. In it 
 he assured the Senate that the Southern and Southwestern 
 States would find in annexation " protection and security, 
 peace and tranquillity, as well against all domestic as foreign 
 efforts to disturb them." 
 
 Of course a treaty involving such momentous issues and 
 consequences so important to the nation became the occasion 
 of a long and heated debate. During these debates the lob 
 bies of the capitol were crowded by land-jobbers and flesh- 
 
PLOT FOB THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 601 
 
 jobbers ; Texas scrip-holders and the owners and agents of 
 Mexican claims were drawn thither as if by a common in 
 stinct. Like beasts and birds of prey they seemed to scent 
 the spoils they hoped to win, and they infested by their noi 
 some presence every department of the government. They 
 were clamorous for the treaty, and by their paid agents and 
 advocates slandered and misrepresented the motives and ac 
 tions of those who stood between them and the objects of 
 their greedy desire. Never before had Congress been sub 
 jected to a pressure so severe and to influences so corrupt. 
 The administration, too, brought to the support of the treaty 
 all its powers and all its seductive influences. But all these 
 efforts were unavailing. Instead of receiving the needed " two- 
 thirds" vote, less than one third of the Senate were found 
 willing to record their names in its favor ; and on the 10th 
 of June it was defeated by a vote of sixteen to thirty-five. 
 Of the sixteen who voted for the treaty, five were from the 
 North. Of that number were James Buchanan and Levi 
 Woodbury. Their ready obedience to the behests of slavery 
 was not forgotten. The one was soon made Secretary of 
 State, and the other was elevated to the bench of the Supreme 
 Court. 
 
 After the treaty was communicated to the Senate, and before 
 its action, there were public meetings, many without distinc 
 tion of party, in different parts of the country. Among them 
 was one in the city of New York, on the 24th of April. There 
 were present many of the most distinguished men of the city. 
 The aged and illustrious Albert Gallatin presided, and the 
 officers of the meeting were equally divided between the two 
 parties. The venerable Chancellor Kent sent a letter in which 
 he expressed the conviction that the annexation of Texas 
 without the consent of Mexico would be " a breach of faith 
 and honor which should be universally condemned." On tak 
 ing the chair, Mr. Gallatin declared that to annex Texas 
 under the present condition of affairs was to make the United 
 States a party to the war with Mexico, and that, " according 
 to the universally acknowledged laws of nations and univer 
 sal usage of all Christian nations, to annex Texas is war." 
 
 76 
 
602 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 And he further stated that in making that declaration he 
 would be " sustained by any publicist in the Christian world." 
 He said that this would be a war of conquest founded in 
 injustice, a disgrace to the national character. " This meas 
 ure," he said, " will bring indelible disgrace upon democratic 
 institutions ; it will excite the hopes of their enemies ; it will 
 check the hopes of the friends of mankind." " I am highly 
 gratified," he said in closing, " that the last public act of a 
 long life, the last accents of an almost extinguished voice, 
 should be employed in bearing testimony against this outra 
 geous attempt " upon the peace, safety, and honor of our be 
 loved land. 
 
 The causes of this defeat were various. But the main rea 
 son, doubtless, lay in the fact that the work of preparation 
 had not been fully accomplished, the dragooning process had 
 not been completed. The fires had indeed raged furiously, but 
 they had not burned long enough to fuse the conflicting views, 
 purposes, and individualities of those who were, nevertheless, 
 in a position and in a state of mind to be converted to any 
 policy slavery might dictate or its wants render necessary. 
 But up to that hour this work remained incomplete, and thus 
 not only did the Senate reject the treaty by this decisive vote, 
 but the House of Representatives refused a favorable reception 
 to a message from the President still invoking immediate ac 
 tion, while the measure proposed in the Senate by Mr. Benton 
 himself, to open negotiations with Mexico and Texas for the 
 adjustment of boundaries and the annexation of the latter to 
 the American Union, failed. The question had become so 
 complicated with other issues, there were so many points 
 involved on which members had so fully committed them 
 selves, the movement had become so confessedly a simple pur 
 pose and project in the support of slavery, that a majority in 
 neither House could then be controlled or brought to take the 
 position involved in the treaty. 
 
 But the men who were engineering this project were in 
 earnest, not to be deterred by obstacles, and not ignorant of 
 the advantage these two facts gave them, that there were the 
 two national parties, each dependent on its " Southern wing," 
 
PLOT FOR THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 603 
 
 and that with the growing idea in the Southern mind, that, on 
 all questions where there was a conflict between the claims of 
 slavery and of party, the claims of slavery must be paramount. 
 It was also becoming more and more apparent that this was a 
 case in which the vital interests of " the peculiar institution " 
 were involved and must be regarded. 
 
 In this state of affairs the friends of annexation were not 
 only prepared, but determined, to carry the question into the 
 presidential election of 1844. The indications in the winter 
 of that year were that Mr. Yan Buren was the choice of the 
 Democratic party, though he had not the confidence, nor was 
 he the choice, of the plotters of annexation, either South or 
 North. To compel him to define his position, Mr. Hammet 
 of Mississippi addressed him a letter in the month of March, 
 while negotiations were pending, requesting him to make a 
 statement of his opinions upon the question. Having been 
 appointed a delegate to the approaching nominating conven 
 tion, he intimated that Mr. Yan Buren's views would probably 
 influence the results of that convention. Mr. Yan Buren's 
 reply, dated on the 20th of April, only two days before the 
 treaty was transmitted to the Senate, while avoiding any refer 
 ence to slavery, admitted that annexation in itself considered 
 was desirable. He, however, deprecated its immediate con 
 summation because, he said, it would, " in all human proba 
 bility, draw after it a war with Mexico." He also insisted 
 upon the importance and necessity of maintaining the sacred 
 obligations of treaty stipulations, the duty of preserving peace 
 ful relations with friendly powers, and of keeping unsullied 
 our own national honor. This dignified and patriotic letter, 
 however, sealed his fate. Though he was the unquestioned 
 choice of a decided majority of his party as its candidate for 
 the presidency, he could not be trusted by those who were 
 resolved to have Texas at any price. With them patriotism 
 and a nice sense of national honor were at a discount, and 
 some more pliant tool must be found. 
 
 In the Democratic convention, which assembled at Balti 
 more on the 27th of May, Mr. Yan Buren received on the first 
 ballot a majority of thirty. His enemies and treacherous 
 
604 EISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 friends had, however, adopted what was called the " two-thirds 
 rule," and that rendered his nomination impossible. On the 
 eighth ballot his name was withdrawn, and James K. Polk 
 received the nomination. Mr. Polk was a slaveholder, an 
 uncompromising and fanatical advocate of the system, an un 
 scrupulous partisan, and fully committed to the policy of 
 annexation. The nomination for the vice - presidency was 
 offered to Silas Wright of New York, but promptly declined. 
 George M. Dallas of Pennsylvania, ever obsequious to the be 
 hests of the Slave Power, was then selected as candidate for 
 that office. 
 
 The convention then resolved that " the reoccupation of 
 Oregon and the reannexation of Texas at the earliest practi 
 cable period are great American questions which the convention 
 recommends to the cordial support of the Democracy of the 
 Union." By adopting this platform, by overslaughing Mr. Van 
 Buren, who only objected to annexation in the interests of 
 peace and national honor, and by taking a candidate whose 
 chief recommendation was his loudly proclaimed adhesion to 
 the scheme, the Slave Power gained a decisive victory, and 
 fully committed the Democratic party to that policy of slavery 
 propagandism which the Southern leaders were so fiercely 
 pursuing. 
 
 Mr. Clay was unquestionably the choice of the masses of 
 the Whig party, though many in its ranks would have pre 
 ferred a candidate whose position and past avowals had not so 
 fully identified him with slavery. His friends, however, were 
 zealous and enthusiastic in his support, and they believed that 
 the time had come to place him in the executive chair. Of 
 course his views on the subject of annexation became mat 
 ters of public solicitude and inquiry, and he was compelled 
 to define his position on the troublesome question. In a 
 letter, dated at Raleigh, April 17, he set forth his opinions 
 with clearness and precision. He referred to and deprecated 
 the fact that annexation was both espoused and opposed on 
 sectional grounds. He said that the acquisition of territory 
 for the purpose of strengthening one portion of the country 
 against the other would be pregnant with fatal consequences, 
 
PLOT FOR THE ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 605 
 
 He declared that " annexation and war with Mexico are iden - 
 tical " ; and that such a measure at that time would compro^ 
 mise the national character, be dangerous to the integrity of 
 the Union, and be inexpedient in the then financial condition 
 of affairs, and that it was not called for by any general expres 
 sion of public opinion. 
 
 Two weeks after the publication of this letter, Mr. Clay was 
 nominated by acclamation for the presidency at the Whig con 
 vention at Baltimore. With him was associated Theodore 
 Frelinghuysen, a gentleman of high personal worth and posi 
 tion, but of conservative views and tendencies. 
 
 The Liberty party, too, had entered the contest with the 
 name of James G. Birney as its candidate for the presidency, 
 and that of Thomas Morris of Ohio for the vice-presidency. 
 On all the issues growing out of the existence of slavery its 
 principles were clearly defined, and its policy distinctly pro 
 claimed, " the absolute and unqualified divorce of the general 
 government from slavery." 
 
 Of course the Abolitionists who adhered to the American 
 Antislavery Society and its auxiliaries took no part in the 
 election except to criticise each of the parties, its policy, and 
 its candidates. They announced as their watchword " the dis 
 solution of all union between liberty and slavery." They pro 
 claimed their resolute and invincible determination to arouse 
 the country to a sense of its danger, and the necessity of reso 
 lute action. 
 
CHAPTER XLIII. 
 
 TEXAS PLOT CONSUMMATED. 
 
 Presidential Election. The Issue distinctly presented. Position of the Whig 
 and Democratic Parties. Embarrassing Position of Antislavery Men. The 
 Alabama Letter. Secret Circular. Mr. Walker's Letter. Election of Mr. 
 Polk. Meeting of Congress. Mr. Benton's Bill. Mr. Hale's Proposition. 
 Mr. Ingersoll's Resolution. Mr. Hamlin's Motion. The Debates. 
 Adoption of Mr. Brown's Amendment. Passage of the Resolutions. Re 
 ported against by the Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs. Debates in the 
 Senate. Mr. Walker's Amendment. Mr. Miller's Amendment. Passage 
 of Joint Resolutions. Position of Southern Whigs. Weakness or Treach 
 ery of Northern Democrats. Action of Mr. Tyler. Rejoicing of the Friends 
 of Annexation. 
 
 THE adroit leaders of the Slave Power had succeeded in for 
 cing upon the country the direct issue of immediate annexation. 
 Never had the nation been brought to confront an issue so pal 
 pably and flagrantly wrong, and never had it presented a 
 more sad and humiliating spectacle. Mankind could not fail 
 to comprehend that it involved aggression, conquest, the estab 
 lishment of slavery where it had been prohibited by Mexico, 
 the strengthening of the slave system at home, and the con 
 tinued ascendency of the slave-masters in the United States. 
 Nor could the civilized world fail to see that if annexation and 
 war were identical, the banners of Mexico, not the banners of 
 Christian and republican America, would be the banners of 
 liberty and civilization. 
 
 Though painfully awake to this wickedness and ignominy, 
 the antislavery opponents of annexation were so few in num 
 bers, really possessing small political influence, and that 
 diminished by other complications, that they felt greatly per 
 plexed and had grave doubts about the best use of the little 
 political power they did possess. A vote for Mr. Birney was 
 indeed an individual commitment, yet hardly more, as it could 
 
TEXAS PLOT CONSUMMATED. 607 
 
 contribute little or nothing to prevent the impending catastro 
 phe of annexation. A vote for Mr. Clay, with his commitments 
 and the commitments of his party North and South, was clearly 
 a vote against immediate annexation. But such were the con 
 ditions of his opposition and that of his Southern supporters, 
 that it was seen that they could be, and probably would be, re 
 moved at no distant day. Mr. Clay's personal position, too, 
 was far from satisfactory. His life, acts, and opinions had 
 given no assurance that he opposed annexation on the ground 
 that it would strengthen slavery. On the contrary, he was 
 known to entertain and to have expressed the opinion that 
 " slavery ought not to affect the question one way or the 
 other." This embarrassment was increased by his Alabama 
 letter of the 16th of August, which had been wrung from him 
 by the importunity of Southern Whigs, who seriously felt the 
 sectional pressure of the advocates of annexation. 
 
 In this unfortunate letter, believed to have been the fatal 
 obstacle to his success, he expressed the opinion that annexa 
 tion would not prolong or shorten the duration of slavery, 
 which was destined to become extinct, as he believed, at some 
 distant day, by the inevitable laws of population ; besides, he 
 said, " far from having any personal objection to the annexa 
 tion of Texas, I should be glad to see it, without dishonor, 
 without war, with the common consent of the Union, and 
 upon just and fair terms." Mr. Clay's Southern supporters 
 had been put on the defensive, while those in the North had 
 been aggressive, hopeful, and confident of victory. This letter 
 reversed their positions. " It placed," says Mr. Greeley, ever 
 Mr. Clay's admirer and devoted friend, " the Northern advo 
 cates of his election on the defensive during the remainder of 
 the canvass, and weakened their previous hold on the moral 
 convictions of the more considerate and conscientious voters 
 of the free States." 
 
 In a subsequent letter Mr. Clay distinctly avowed that there 
 was not a feeling, a sentiment, or an opinion expressed in his 
 Raleigh letter, to which he did not adhere ; that he was decid 
 edly opposed to immediate annexation, because it would be 
 dishonorable, involve the nation in war, be dangerous to the 
 
608 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 integrity and harmony of the Union, and could not be effected 
 upon just and admissible conditions. But these apparently 
 conflicting declarations served only to confuse the public mind, 
 render more difficult the task of decision, and make still more 
 obscure the path of duty. Yet, under circumstances so well 
 calculated to dishearten, distract, and divide the opponents of 
 annexation, more than sixty thousand men, who really held 
 the result in their own hands, voted for Mr. Birney, although 
 they were morally certain he could not receive a single elec 
 toral vote. 
 
 Few were so blind as not to see that a vote for Mr. Polk was 
 a vote for immediate annexation. When his nomination was 
 announced, Northern Democrats were greatly incensed at the 
 treatment Mr. Van Buren had received. Many of them had 
 warmly approved the sentiments of his letter against immedi 
 ate annexation, and had, in many ways, pronounced against 
 a policy which, they could not fail to see, endangered the peace 
 of the country, besides unreservedly committing the nation to 
 the extension of slavery. Silas Wright had voted against the 
 treaty of annexation, and as the Democratic candidate for 
 governor of New York he had proclaimed in the canvass his 
 continued hostility to that measure. Several eminent friends 
 of Mr. Van Buren in that State united in issuing a circular 
 urging Democrats, while supporting Mr. Polk, to repudiate the 
 Texan scheme. The high character of the men who signed 
 that circular, so sharply criticised and denounced by their asso 
 ciates, is an assurance of the purity of their motives, though 
 a more fatuous course could not have been devised. That cir 
 cular and the declarations of Mr. Wright unquestionably gave 
 the controlling vote of the great State of New York to Mr. 
 Polk, made the immediate annexation of Texas inevitable, 
 and crowned the continued intrigues and plottings of the 
 Slave Power with signal triumph. 
 
 During that evenly balanced and hotly contested canvass 
 seductive appeals were made to the selfishness of the North. 
 Robert J. Walker, perhaps more than any other man the 
 organizing and effective agent of that slavery-extending plot, 
 issued a long and elaborate letter, written with the power and 
 
TEXAS PLOT CONSUMMATED. 609 
 
 tact of which he was an acknowledged master, appealing to 
 the cupidity of the commercial, manufacturing, and moneyed 
 interests of the land. The acquisition of Texas, he claimed, 
 would largely increase Southern production, and thus promote 
 the shipping, mercantile, and mechanical interests of the non- 
 slaveholding States. Nor did he miscalculate. The lust of 
 dominion, the greed of gain, and the love of office, silencing 
 the voice of patriotism, honor, and conscience, gave a tran 
 scendent victory to the Slave Power. 
 
 He used, too, the language of warning. " Let it be known," 
 he said, " and proclaimed as a certain truth, and as a result 
 which can never hereafter be challenged or recalled, that upon 
 the refusal of annexation, now and in all time to come, the 
 tariff as a practical measure fails wholly and forever, and we 
 shall hereafter be compelled to resort to direct taxes to sup 
 port the government." This menace, aimed at the friends of 
 domestic industry, was not wholly without effect. But those 
 who were in any degree influenced by it lived to see the pro 
 tective policy, under the lead of Mr. Walker himself, over 
 thrown, and the free-trade tariff of 1846 carried by the votes 
 of Texan senators. 
 
 On the first Monday of December, 1844, the XXVIIIth 
 Congress commenced its closing session. Emboldened by the 
 manifest significance of the election, the advocates of annexa 
 tion entered at once on the work of its consummation. Presi 
 dent Tyler in his message called for immediate action. He 
 claimed that the verdict of the people had been decisively 
 expressed upon the issue of annexation, which had been 
 nakedly presented to their consideration. He expressed the 
 hope that Congress, in carrying into execution the public will, 
 clearly proclaimed by a controlling majority of the people and 
 by a large majority of the States, would avoid all collateral 
 issues and press at once towards the consummation he had 
 so much at heart. For Mr. Tyler was not only influenced by 
 the ordinary motives which impelled the South to seek for 
 annexation, but he desired, if possible, to signalize his admin 
 istration by an event of so much importance to slavery and 
 to slaveholders. 
 
 77 
 
610 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 Resolutions of admission were introduced into the Senate 
 on the 10th, by Mr. McDuffie of South Carolina. On the llth, 
 Mr. Benton introduced a bill, providing that a State, to be 
 called " the State of Texas, with boundaries fixed by herself," 
 not exceeding in size the largest State, be admitted into the 
 Union, the remainder of the annexed territory to be held by 
 the United States and to be called the " Southwest Territory." 
 This bill further provided that the existence of slavery should 
 be forever prohibited in that part of the Territory west of 
 the 100 of longitude, so as to divide equally the whole an 
 nexed territory between the slaveholding and non-slaveholding 
 States. 
 
 In the House, on the 10th of January, John P. Hale, then a 
 Democratic representative from New Hampshire, moved the 
 suspension of the rules to allow him to introduce a proposition 
 to divide Texas into two parts, by a line beginning at a point 
 on the Gulf of Mexico midway between the northern and 
 southern boundaries, and running in a northwesterly direc 
 tion. In the territory south and west of that line it was pro 
 vided there should be neither slavery nor involuntary servi 
 tude, and that provision was forever to remain an unalterable 
 compact. The motion received eleven majority, but, requiring 
 a two-thirds vote, it failed. 
 
 On the 12th, Charles J. Ingersoll, chairman of the Commit 
 tee on Foreign Relations in the House, introduced resolutions 
 of annexation. Resolutions were also introduced by John B. 
 Weller of Ohio, Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois, and several 
 other Democratic members. Mr. Hamlin of Maine, then a 
 Democratic member, moved to refer these resolutions to a 
 select committee of one from each State, with instructions to 
 report whether Congress had power to annex a foreign, inde 
 pendent nation ; whether annexation would not extend slav 
 ery ; whether by the acknowledgment of Texan independence 
 Mexico was deprived of her right to reconquer that province ; 
 whether Texas owed any debts, and what treaties she had 
 with other powers. But his motion was rejected. The sev 
 eral propositions were referred to the Committee on Foreign 
 Affairs. 
 
TEXAS PLOT CONSUMMATED. 611 
 
 On the 3d of January the House, on motion of Mr. 
 Ingersoll, proceeded to the consideration of the joint resolu 
 tions he had reported. Mr. Weller moved to amend by strik 
 ing out all after the enacting clause and substituting the reso 
 lutions he had introduced, and Mr. Douglas moved to amend 
 Mr. Weller's amendment by substituting for it the resolutions 
 he had introduced. 
 
 In the debate which was then opened were exhibited the 
 different views and shades of opinion evoked by this rash 
 and radical measure thus precipitated on the nation by the 
 Slave Power. As it was a question of power, rather than of 
 reason, of might more than of right, the advocates of the 
 measure prudently abstained from any great show of argu 
 ment. As none but the most violent and outspoken would 
 avow the real reason, eulogies on the compromises of the 
 Constitution, clamors for peace and concession, and diatribes 
 against the aggressions of the Abolitionists, constituted the 
 staple of the speeches in its defence. Against the measure 
 there was greater variety, embracing the language of those who 
 opposed it on the high ground of principle ; Northern Demo 
 crats who deprecated its influence on their party strength ; and 
 the Southern Whigs, who feared its effects on the country arid 
 even on slavery itself. Opening the debate, Mr. Ingersoll 
 referred to the many plans that had been introduced into 
 the House, proving, he said, that many coveted the honor of 
 being the advocates of the admission of Texas. But for slav 
 ery the American people were united for the measure. He 
 avowed that " it is undeniable that Southern interests, South 
 ern frontiers and Southern institutions I mean slavery and 
 all are to be primarily regarded in settling the restoration 
 of Texas." 
 
 One of the earliest and ablest to participate in the debate 
 was William L. Yancey of Alabama. A disciple of Calhoun 
 and an eloquent defender of his principles, he clearly com 
 prehended and frankly admitted the necessities of slavery in 
 its competition with freedom. Referring to statistics which 
 showed that the slaveholding States were losing " relative 
 strength in the representative branch of the government," 
 
612 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 he declared that they had compromised away all possibility of 
 retaining an equality in the Senate by the fatal Missouri Com 
 promise, and that a fearful prospective inequality stared them 
 in the face. Complaining that the world was arrayed against 
 them, that their " favorite institution " was attacked day after 
 day, month after month, and year after year, he avowed that 
 " the highest consideration of individual, sectional, and na 
 tional interests urge us on to annexation." 
 
 Mr. Holmes of South Carolina pronounced that Southern 
 man a fool or a knave who would divide Texas between free 
 dom and slavery; and Mr. Rhett of the same State said, 
 " The South has been wantonly wronged, insulted, and be 
 trayed." He charged the people of the North with the offence 
 of laboring " to instigate hatred, insurrection, and violence," 
 which rendered Texas, in the Southern mind, necessary to 
 insure the domestic tranquillity they had disturbed. 
 
 Moses Norris, a Democratic member from New Hampshire, 
 bitterly assailed the Abolitionists. He charged that while 
 they had " liberty and philanthropy on the folds of their flag, 
 they were arming themselves to overthrow the Constitution 
 and break up the Confederacy." 
 
 Andrew Johnson of Tennessee, afterward President of the 
 United States, said that annexation would give the govern 
 ment the command of the Gulf, that streams of wealth would 
 flow from her mines and fertile fields, and that the profitable 
 employment of slave labor there would enable the master to 
 soften the condition of the bondmen ; and;- singularly enough, 
 he contended that annexation would " prove to be the gateway 
 out of which the sable sons of Africa are to pass from bond 
 age to freedom where they can become merged in a population 
 congenial with themselves, who know and feel no distinc 
 tion in consequence of the various hues of skin or crosses of 
 blood." 
 
 In a very different strain spoke Mr. Rathbun, a member of 
 the same party from New York. He characterized with stern 
 severity the resolution, and denounced the Northern member 
 who should vote for it. " He braves," he said, " the public 
 opinion of the North ; he scorns the interests of the North ; 
 
TEXAS PLOT CONSUMMATED. 613 
 
 he arouses the indignation of the North ; he fixes upon him 
 self a mark which time cannot efface." 
 
 Among the Northern Whigs a similar variety appears. Mr. 
 Winthrop of Massachusetts opposed the project because, he 
 argued, it was unconstitutional in substance, would violate 
 the compromises of the Constitution, would endanger the per 
 manence of the Union ; and because he was u uncompromis 
 ingly opposed to slavery, or the addition of another inch of 
 slaveholding territory to the nation." 
 
 Colonel John J. Harding of Illinois, who afterward fell at 
 the head of his regiment at the battle of Buena Vista, charac 
 terized annexation " as an unwise, reckless, selfish, sectional, 
 and slavery-extending policy." He reminded Southern gen 
 tlemen who had pictured in their imagination a Southern 
 confederacy, that the free States on the Ohio and Mississippi 
 Rivers would hold the latter to its mouth against the united 
 chivalry of the South, and that if dissolution took place, either 
 in consequence of the Texas scheme, or from any other cause, 
 their confederacy must be wholly east of the Mississippi. 
 
 Daniel D. Barnard of New York made a learned and able 
 constitutional argument against the Joint Resolution, denoun 
 cing it as being framed " in contempt of the Constitution." 
 " The measure of annexation is," he said, " wild, bold, and 
 extravagant enough in itself, considered in the light of the 
 Constitution, but it is a thousand times more wild, bold, and 
 extravagant when taken in connection with slavery." 
 
 Mr. Hamlin of Ohio spoke earnestly in deprecation of the 
 measure, and drew gloomy presages of its effect upon the 
 reputation and subsequent political history of the nation. It 
 will present the humiliating spectacle, he said, of the republic 
 standing forth unblushingly before the world as the defender 
 of slavery. No stranger could read the correspondence of the 
 Secretary of State without feeling that " we have no other god 
 but the god of slavery." " The people of the North," he said, 
 " have reaped the bitter fruits of the Missouri Compromise, 
 and have seen and felt the iron rule of slavery." He predicted 
 that if slavery should then triumph, the line dividing parties 
 would henceforth be between freedom and slavery, and " the 
 
614 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWEE IN AMERICA. 
 
 South will then find not only that the sceptre has departed 
 from Judah and a lawgiver from between his feet, but that 
 the Shiloh of the slave has come." 
 
 It remained for Mr. Giddings to place his opposition and 
 that of those he represented on the high plane of moral recti 
 tude, and to draw his arguments, motives, and appeals from 
 the precepts of Christianity as well as from the workings of 
 nature. " Do we believe," he inquired, " that there is a power 
 above us that will visit national sins with national judgments ? 
 I am one who solemnly believes that transgressions and pun 
 ishments are inseparably connected with the inscrutable wis 
 dom of God's providence. With this impression I feel as 
 confident that chastisement and tribulation for the offences 
 we have committed against the down-trodden sons of Africa 
 await this people as I do that justice controls the destinies of 
 nations and guides the power of Omnipotence." 
 
 On the 13th of January, Milton Brown, a Tennessee Whig, 
 introduced into the House a joint resolution declaring the 
 terms on which Congress will admit Texas into the Union as 
 a State ; and on the same day, Mr. Foster, another Tennessee 
 Whig, introduced the same resolution into the Senate. The 
 opponents of annexation had relied upon a majority in the 
 House against that measure. Several Democratic members, 
 who had been confidently relied upon to oppose it, under the 
 influence of an incoming administration pledged to the meas 
 ure, were evidently hesitating and faltering. It had not been 
 anticipated, however, that any Whig member would vote for 
 it. But the action of Mr. Brown created no little anxiety and 
 alarm. 
 
 After this earnest and excited debate, which continued until 
 the 25th of January, the voting was commenced. Mr. Doug 
 las's amendments, as well as several others, offered to Mr. 
 Weller's amendment to the resolution reported by the Commit 
 tee on Foreign Affairs, having been rejected, Mr. Brown moved 
 to strike out Mr. Weller's amendment and insert the resolutions 
 he had introduced. At the suggestion of Mr. Douglas, he so 
 modified it as to provide that slavery should be prohibited in 
 so much of Texas as lay north of the Missouri Compromise 
 
TEXAS PLOT CONSUMMATED. 615 
 
 line. His amendment was then agreed to by ten majority, 
 then substituted for the original resolutions of the Committee 
 on Foreign Affairs by a majority of seventeen, and then passed 
 by a majority of twenty-two. 
 
 Instead of a majority of thirty against it, which had been 
 anticipated, upon estimates based upon former votes and 
 avowals, and upon pledges which had been made to a com 
 mittee appointed by a Whig caucus to canvass the House, 
 there was a majority of more than twenty for it. Whence that 
 change ? Many of the agencies which wrought it were patent 
 to the country. The results of the presidential election, the 
 known opinions and purposes of the President elect, the 
 patronage of the incoming administration, the intense ac 
 tivity and growing power of the slaveholding interest, were 
 potent influences, and contributed mainly to this result. But 
 there were many who, watching that struggle, believed that 
 Texas scrip had much to do in that work of demoralization. 
 
 The Joint Resolution was introduced in the Senate and 
 referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations, of which Mr. 
 Archer of Virginia was chairman. Although from a slave- 
 holding State, he promptly recommended its indefinite post 
 ponement. But Mr. Buchanan, a member of the committee, 
 then as ever afterward, even to the close of his feeble and dis 
 astrous administration, derelict to his section, a serviceable 
 instrument of the Slave Power, more truly deserving than he 
 to whom it was originally applied the appellation of a " North 
 ern man with Southern principles," opposed the action of the 
 committee, and made an elaborate argument in favor of the 
 constitutionality of admitting Texas by Joint Resolution. 
 
 Rufus Choate of Massachusetts made a brilliant and elo 
 quent speech in opposition, both on the ground of power and 
 expediency. We could not, he contended, admit Texas by the 
 joint resolution of the House, " if it would insure a thousand 
 years of liberty to the Union, if, like the fabled garden of 
 old, its rivers should run pearls and its trees bear imperial 
 fruit of gold, yet even then we could not admit her, because 
 it would sin against the Constitution." 
 
 William L. Dayton of New Jersey, then a Whig, afterward 
 
616 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the first candidate for the Vice-Presidency of the Republican 
 party, and subsequently minister to France during the Rebel 
 lion, made an able argument against the passage of the Joint 
 Resolution. Mr. Archer declared that " a blow parricidal is 
 now aimed against the Constitution of the United States." 
 Mr. Buchanan, who was to be Secretary of State of the incom 
 ing administration, on the other hand, protested that in voting 
 for the resolution he was performing the greatest public act of 
 his life. " I shall," he said, " do it cheerfully, gladly, glori 
 ously, because I believe my vote will confer blessings innu 
 merable on my fellow-men, now, henceforward, and forever." 
 
 Several senators participated in the debate, which continued 
 to the 27th of February. It was moved by Mr. Foster of Ten 
 nessee that the Joint Resolution be amended so as to provide 
 that so much of the territory as lay south of the Missouri Com 
 promise line should be admitted with or without slavery, as 
 each State should determine, but the motion was rejected. An 
 amendment was then moved by Mr. Walker of Mississippi, 
 proposing further negotiations if deemed advisable by the Ex 
 ecutive. This adroit move was intended to smooth the way 
 by which Benton, Dix, Niles, and other Democratic senators, 
 who had opposed the treaty, might vote for the measure. 
 
 Mr. Foster declared he would vote for the House resolu 
 tion without, but not with, the amendment, as it was intended 
 to " qualify a great act." He proceeded to express his want 
 of confidence in the North, and wished those who were mak 
 ing outcries against slavery would go to the South and " see 
 how happy is the black man, and compare him with the penury 
 of the East." The Walker amendment was agreed to by two 
 majority. Mr. Crittenden wished to make the mode of admis 
 sion definite. If it was the intention of Congress to admit 
 Texas by treaty, let it say so ; if by resolution, let it say so ; 
 and not leave the mode discretionary with the President. He 
 moved an amendment to that effect ; but his motion was lost 
 by a single vote. 
 
 Mr. Miller of New Jersey moved to strike out the House 
 resolution, and insert in substance the bill which Mr. Benton 
 had introduced early in the session ; and he expressed the hope 
 
TEXAS PLOT CONSUMMATED. 617 
 
 that the senator from Missouri would support it, and " not 
 destroy his own child." But that senator, having yielded to 
 the influences at work, promptly and ostentatiously responded, 
 " I '11 kill it stone-dead ! " This declaration was vociferously 
 applauded by the galleries. This sudden change in Mr. Ben- 
 ton's position was rendered more significant from his previous 
 course, his determined and violent opposition to the meas 
 ure. He had declared it " an act of unparalleled outrage on 
 Mexico," of which he " washed his hands." Indeed, he had 
 been regarded by both friend and foe as holding the fate of 
 the measure at his disposal. But notwithstanding all his ante 
 cedents, his positive and dogmatic assertion, so characteristic 
 of the man, he weakly yielded to, if he did not fabricate, the 
 specious but shallow device proposed by Walker. 
 
 Mr. Tyler was known to be fiercely intent on annexation, 
 and this device gave him absolute power to consummate the 
 act during the few remaining days of his administration. 
 The unwritten history of that transaction may never be fully 
 known, and the actual influences which induced the somer 
 sault of the veteran senator may never be revealed. Without 
 such explanation, however, there was in it the not infrequent 
 or unprecedented occurrence that a Southern slaveholder, in 
 the presence of an assumed necessity of slavery, allowed 
 that necessity to be paramount, and to override all other con 
 siderations. The amendment proposed by Mr. Miller received 
 but eleven votes, and the Joint Resolution was then adopted 
 by a majority of two. The House hastened to concur by a 
 majority of more than fifty. 
 
 In the House four Whigs voted for the measure. Of that 
 number was Alexander H. Stephens, who afterward joined the 
 Democracy, became vice-president of the Confederacy, whose 
 " corner-stone " he declared slavery to be, and who continued 
 to maintain its principles, though they had been so signally 
 overborne and overthrown by the valor and vote of the nation. 
 In the Senate, Merrick of Maryland, Henderson of Missis 
 sippi, and Johnson of Louisiana, also Whigs, voted for it 
 avowedly because it was a measure essentially Southern in 
 its character and purposes, and tended to promote domestic 
 
 78 
 
618 KISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 tranquillity in the States they represented. But the large 
 majority of the Southern Whigs steadily opposed and cast 
 their votes against the Joint Resolution. Nor was their 
 stand maintained without personal sacrifice and hazard. In 
 deed there were none, not even the friends of freedom, who 
 were more sorely tried than were the better and more thought 
 ful portion of the Southern Whigs. For they not only felt a 
 sectional pressure and saw agencies at work which threat 
 ened party disruption and defeat, but they wisely dreaded the 
 effects of these violent and revolutionary proceedings upon the 
 nation, and even upon slavery itself. 
 
 Claiming fealty to Southern institutions, and disavowing all 
 sympathy with abolitionism, they based their opposition to 
 the scheme on constitutional grounds and those of expediency. 
 They denied the right of admitting foreign territory by legis 
 lative resolution, and protested against the bill as a clear and 
 palpable violation of the Constitution of the United States. 
 This position was ably argued by the Virginia senators, Archer 
 and Rives, both of whom, in the words of the first, " lifted a 
 determined though unavailing voice against this blow of parri 
 cide struck at the Constitution " ; the latter declaring it to be 
 " a dangerous and revolutionary precedent." Of their position 
 Mr. Berrien of Georgia, while claiming to " stand on Southern 
 ground and in vindication of Southern rights," said that they 
 stood " unmoved, immovable, resting on its own firm founda 
 tion like some giant rock against which the waves of the ocean 
 break in their fury only to be thrown back in their impotence." 
 He declared also that the acquisition of Texas in this uncon 
 stitutional manner would be " at the sacrifice of the peace and 
 harmony of the Union." " The feeling," he said, " which 
 will be aroused in vast multitudes of that people, by what they 
 will deem a flagrant usurpation of power which they have 
 never delegated, is too deep, too strong, too abiding to be 
 repressed ; and it may not be sported with. The power of the 
 government cannot check it. The patronage of the govern 
 ment will not seduce it. Nay, the iron rule of party, that 
 image of omnipotence here below, will not, cannot control it." 
 
 Characterizing the correspondence of Secretaries Upshur 
 
TEXAS PLOT CONSUMMATED. 619 
 
 and Calhoun " as a deplorable humiliation of diplomatic char 
 acter in the eyes of the world," Mr. Rayner of North Carolina 
 said that by putting the annexation of Texas so squarely on 
 the slavery issue, the South had been driven from its " impreg 
 nable position " that slavery was an institution that neither 
 Congress nor the people of the North could constitutionally 
 interfere with. " If we admit," he said, " that the general gov 
 ernment can interpose to extend slavery as a blessing, we must 
 also admit that it can interfere to arrest it as an evil." Avow 
 ing himself as an unqualified advocate of Southern interests 
 and ready to " hang an Abolitionist without the form of trial 
 for disseminating his hellish doctrines," he said he scorned to 
 ask of the North any other aid than the performance of its 
 constitutional obligations. He expressed his great regret that 
 the Whigs had .not presented an unbroken phalanx in opposi 
 tion to the measure, and he predicted that this sudden change 
 of front in face of the enemy would prove fatal to the party. 
 
 The Joint Resolution was approved on the 2d of March. 
 The next day, President Tyler despatched a messenger to 
 Texas to secure her assent, which, like the executive ap 
 proval, was but too readily given ; and thus was consum 
 mated the scheme audaciously conceived, skilfully planned, 
 boldly and persistently prosecuted, and successfully accom 
 plished. 
 
 Twenty-three Democratic members of the House had voted 
 against the passage of the Joint Resolution. All but three or 
 four, however, voted for concurring with the Senate in the 
 Walker amendment. Their votes were a surprise and a regret. 
 It will ever remain a marvel that honest and intelligent men 
 could have been caught by a device so transparent. Surely 
 they were not surprised when Mr. Tyler eagerly accepted the 
 power thus given him, and at once secured for his administra 
 tion the coveted honor which he had so long and so earnestly 
 sought. 
 
 This vote of the House, concurring in the Senate amend 
 ment, ended the contest. It was taken on the evening of the 
 28th of February. On its announcement, it was hailed with 
 every demonstration of uproarious delight, by bonfires, illu- 
 
620 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 minations, and volleys of artillery, by social revelry and 
 mutual congratulations. The scrip-holders, land-jobbers, and 
 flesh-jobbers gloated over their anticipated profits, the slave- 
 holding chiefs over their grandest victory, and the Democratic 
 leaders, but too well assured, over the prospect of long-con 
 tinued ascendency. Amid these flashing lights and jubilant 
 sounds there were, however, thoughtful men whose hearts 
 throbbed heavily over that new dishonor to the nation and 
 the darkening future of their country. The fearless and ever- 
 faithful Giddings gave expression to the thoughts and feelings 
 of thousands of his countrymen, as he thus described his emo 
 tions on the evening of that fatal day. " Pensively and alone," 
 said he, " the writer walked to his lodgings. Never before had 
 he viewed his country as he then saw it. The exultation of 
 slave-breeders and slave-dealers, at thus controlling the Con 
 gress of the United States, constituted a spectacle that he 
 had not expected to witness. The barbarous war, the blood 
 shed, the devastation, the corruption, and the civil war which 
 resulted from this triumph of the Slave Power were, at no 
 subsequent period of his life, more vividly before his mind 
 than they were that evening, while alone in his room, con 
 templating the results that would naturally follow the action 
 of Congress on that sad day." 
 
CHAPTER XLIV. 
 
 VERMONT AND MASSACHUSETTS. JOHN P. HALE. CASSIUS M. 
 
 CLAY. 
 
 Action of Vermont and Massachusetts. Massachusetts Anti-Texas Conven 
 tion. Prescriptive Policy of the New Administration. John P. Hale. 
 Address to his Constituents. Denounced by the Democrats of New Hamp 
 shire. His Nomination withdrawn. Appeal to the People. "Indepen 
 dent Democrats." The State canvassed by Mr. Hale. Speeches of Hale and 
 Pierce. Coalition between the Whigs and Independent Democrats. The 
 
 Democracy defeated. Mr. Hale elected United States Senator. Brave Fight 
 in the Senate. Cassius M. Clay. Opposes the Annexation of Texas. 
 Visits the Northern States. Advocates the Election of Mr. Clay. Eeturns 
 to Kentucky. Issues an Address to the People. Establishes the "True 
 American." Boldly denounces Slaveholding. Exasperation of Slavehold 
 ers. They demand the Suppression of the Paper. Refusal to comply with 
 the Demand. The Paper forcibly suppressed. Mr. Clay appeals to the 
 People. Re-establishes his Paper. 
 
 SEVERAL State legislatures had passed resolutions against 
 the annexation of Texas. Those of Vermont and Massachu 
 setts were among the first to express opposition to the growing 
 demands of the Slave Power. They had vindicated the right 
 of petition and freedom of debate ; pronounced in favor of the 
 abolition of slavery and the slave-trade in the District of Co 
 lumbia, the prohibition of the coastwise slave-trade, and of 
 slavery in the Territories ; and against the annexation of Texas, 
 and the admission of any more slave States. Indeed, for sev 
 eral years their voice had been clear and distinct in behalf of 
 freedom. 
 
 The uncompromising, aggressive, and persistent action of 
 the Abolitionists, the brave fight of John Quincy Adams in 
 Congress for the right of petition and of the freedom of de 
 bate, and the clearly pronounced sentiments of her legislature, 
 had placed Massachusetts not only in a conspicuous, but in a 
 
622 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 leading, position among her sister States. This was acknowl 
 edged by friend and foe, by the first with hope and trust, by 
 the latter with hatred and hostility. The Democratic party, 
 however, though at first joining in resistance to slaveholding 
 demands, had early yielded to the seductive influences of 
 power, while the Whigs continued firmly to maintain their 
 position. The latter had proclaimed their unalterable deter 
 mination to resist the consummation of the Texan scheme, and 
 had fought with unity and vigor the presidential contest of 
 1844, upon which its immediate fate depended. But, after the 
 defeat of Mr. Clay and the popular triumph of the friends of 
 annexation, defections in the Whig party began to manifest 
 themselves. 
 
 When the legislature assembled in 1845, Governor Briggs 
 called attention to the impending danger of annexation. Reso 
 lutions were promptly reported by Joseph Bell, a lawyer of 
 eminence and a gentleman of conservative opinions, denying 
 the constitutional power of Congress to annex a foreign nation 
 by legislation ; declaring that such act of annexation would 
 have no binding effect upon the people of Massachusetts ; and 
 affirming that she " will never consent, where she is not already 
 bound, to place her own free sons on any other basis than that 
 of perfect equality with freemen ; and, last of all, and more 
 than all, she will never by any act or deed give her consent to 
 the further extension of slavery to any portion of the world." 
 
 These unequivocal declarations received the emphatic in 
 dorsement of a four-fifths vote in the House. When they came 
 up for consideration in the Senate, Mr. Wilson of Middlesex 
 County moved an amendment to the effect that, if Texas should 
 be admitted by a legislative act, that act could and ought to 
 be repealed at the earliest possible moment. After an earnest 
 debate, that amendment was rejected by a vote of twenty-four 
 to eight ; in the minority were Charles Francis Adams, Linus 
 Child, and Nathaniel B. Borden. The resolutions were then 
 unanimously adopted. 
 
 Nor were the protestations of the people of Massachusetts 
 confined to these declarations of her legislature. A State con 
 vention, called by gentlemen of capacity, experience, and large 
 
VERMONT AND MASSACHUSETTS. 623 
 
 influence, without distinction of party, was held on the 29th 
 of January, in Faneuil Hall. It was large in numbers and 
 strong in talent and character. All portions of the Common 
 wealth were represented by delegates differing widely in opin 
 ions on other subjects, but going to Faneuil Hall in the spirit 
 of self-devotion worthy of the cause that brought them to 
 gether. John M. Williams, an aged and venerable jurist, pre 
 sided. An address of great vigor and force, portions of which 
 were dictated by Mr. Webster, was prepared by Charles Allen 
 of Worcester, and Stephen C. Phillips of Salem. It was 
 unanimously adopted by the convention and widely circulated. 
 
 Referring to the grave issues involved in annexation, to a 
 war that, it seemed, must inevitably follow the adoption of the 
 Joint Resolution, which had already passed the House, it ex 
 pressed the hope that the day might " never dawn which shall 
 behold the glorious flag of this Union borne on foreign battle 
 fields to sustain in the name of liberty the supremacy of its 
 eternal foe." It affirmed that " Massachusetts denounces the 
 iniquitous project in its inception and in every stage of its pro 
 gress, its means and its end, and all the purposes and pre 
 tences of its authors." 
 
 An anti-Texas committee was appointed, for the purpose of 
 making an earnest, and, if possible, successful effort to com 
 bine and make effective the public sentiment of the free States 
 against the consummation of a scheme known to be wicked in 
 its purpose, corrupt in its means, dishonorable in its character, 
 and believed to be disastrous in its consequences. 
 
 The discussions were marked by great freedom, earnestness, 
 solemnity, and determination. Thoughtful men filled the hall. 
 Speakers and hearers partook of a common sentiment. They 
 realized as never before the imminence of the impending ca 
 lamity, the gravity of the occasion, and the pregnant issues of 
 the hour. But these speeches, eloquent and graphic as they 
 were, rather increased than diminished the feeling of public 
 danger and impotency which pervaded that assembly, so that, 
 when the illusive battle-cry of " repeal " was raised by Linus 
 Child, a sense of relief ran through the hall, and a gleam of 
 light seemed to illumine the darkness of the immediate future. 
 
624 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 While the struggle for the annexation of Texas by Joint 
 Resolution was in progress, the friends of that measure left no 
 means untried which political chicanery or menace could sug 
 gest. The President elect made no concealment of his pur 
 pose ; and it was distinctly understood that those Democrats 
 who opposed the measure had little to expect from his admin 
 istration. Even those in New York who had signed the secret 
 circular which alone made Mr. Folk's election possible were 
 soon made to feel the force of that displeasure which the Slave 
 Power usually inflicted on those who resisted its authority. 
 
 But its immediate and most marked demonstration was in 
 New Hampshire, and John P. Hale was its first victim. 
 Though at first successful, its ultimate results were disas 
 trous to the cause and party which prompted it. For it placed 
 Mr. Hale in a far more commanding position than he had ever 
 occupied before, and gave his ready tongue a voice and an 
 audience it could never otherwise have obtained, besides afford 
 ing an example of successful resistance to partisan tyranny and 
 slaveholding dictation greatly damaging to their pretentious 
 and hitherto unquestioned supremacy. 
 
 Mr. Hale, then a member of the House of Representatives, 
 had been nominated by the Democratic party for re-election. 
 But he had not, like the great body of that party, forgotten its 
 strong anti-Texas testimonies ; nor would he, at the bidding 
 of the convention which overslaughed Mr. Van Buren and 
 nominated Mr. Polk, or in the hope of the prospective patron 
 age of the incoming administration, disown that record, and 
 applaud what a few short weeks before had been so vociferously 
 condemned. 
 
 Compelled to define his position, he did not hesitate to re 
 affirm his opposition to the scheme, and to vote against it, 
 though he regarded that declaration and vote as his political 
 death-warrant ; a martyrdom from which he evidently expected 
 no resurrection. Indeed, he at once made his arrangements 
 to retire from public life, and to resume his profession in the 
 city of New York ; a purpose from which he was with some 
 difficulty dissuaded. 
 
 "What he apprehended soon transpired. Such honesty of 
 
JOHN P. HALE. 625 
 
 purpose, such fealty to right, such contumacy to party disci 
 pline could not be tolerated in the ranks of the exacting De 
 mocracy of that State. Early in January Mr. Hale addressed to 
 his constituents a letter on the annexation of Texas. It was 
 an earnest and unequivocal condemnation of the scheme. The 
 reasons given by its advocates in support of the measure he 
 declared to be " eminently calculated to provoke the scorn of 
 .earth and the judgment of Heaven " ; and he avowed that he 
 could never consent, by any agency of his, to place the coun 
 try in the attitude of annexing a foreign nation for the avowed 
 purpose of sustaining and perpetuating slavery. 
 
 At once the leading Democratic presses of New Hampshire 
 and of the country opened upon him a war of denunciation, 
 calling upon his constituents to rebuke and silence him. The 
 Democratic State Committee immediately issued a call for a 
 convention at Concord on the 12th of February. Franklin 
 Pierce, who had been distinguished in Congress for his fidelity 
 to the Slave Power, addressed the meeting, sharply and bitterly 
 criticising this independent action of Mr. Hale, and defending 
 the policy of annexation. He admitted that he would rather 
 have Texas annexed as free territory, but he exclaimed, 
 " Give it to us with slavery, rather than not have it, and have 
 it now." And such an avowal was consistently applauded by 
 the same convention which had just voted down, by " an em 
 phatic No," the proposition that the meeting should be opened 
 with prayer. 
 
 Stephen S. Foster, being present, inquired if he might be 
 permitted " to set the speaker right in a few of his misstate- 
 ments." A violent clamor at once arose against permission. 
 The chairman decided that none but delegates could speak ; 
 and Mr. Foster took his seat, with the declaration : " I con 
 sider myself, in common with every man in the house, in 
 sulted by the remarks of the gentleman who has just taken 
 his seat." And that convention of the same party which 
 had a few months before pronounced against the annexation 
 scheme, and whose chief organ had declared it to be " black 
 as ink and bitter as hell," at once changed front on this very 
 issue, and by a unanimous vote struck Mr. Hale's name from 
 
 79 
 
626 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the ticket on which it had so recently inscribed it, and placed 
 in its stead that of an obscure politician. 
 
 But many of Mr. Bale's constituents were more hopeful than 
 their leader; at least, they were less resigned and less disposed 
 to submit to defeat and death. Under the lead of Amos Tuck, 
 who had already taken an active part in giving expression and 
 direction to the popular disfavor against such high-handed 
 tyranny, they at once prepared for action. In consequence of 
 their earnest and vigorous proceedings, even without much aid 
 from Mr. Hale, who deemed all resistance to the decrees of 
 the party hopeless, the Democratic candidate lacked a thou 
 sand votes of a majority. While this result surprised and 
 exasperated the Democratic leaders, it greatly encouraged Mr. 
 Hale and his friends. Stimulated by their success, and con 
 tinuing the struggle with increased determination and vigor, 
 they established at the State capital the " Independent Dem 
 ocrat," under the editorial control of George G. Fogg. It 
 was conducted with signal ability and tact, rendered essential 
 service, and contributed largely to the triumph of this first 
 successful revolt against the iron despotism of the Slave 
 Power. 
 
 In the next election Mr. Hale participated. He canvassed 
 the State, delivering speeches, in which he brought into full 
 play the capacities and characteristics of his peculiar, versatile, 
 and popular eloquence. Great excitement pervaded the State, 
 and crowds thronged to hear him. But the Democratic lead 
 ers were indignant at his continued contumacy, and deeply 
 chagrined at his manifest success with the people. These feel 
 ings found voice at a meeting held at the capital the first week 
 of June. During that week the legislature commenced its 
 session, and the religious and benevolent associations of the 
 State held their anniversaries. Mr. Hale was expected to 
 address a meeting at the Old North Church. Unwilling that 
 his speech should be heard, as it probably would be, by the 
 political and religious representatives of the State then assem 
 bled, the Democratic leaders determined that it should be 
 replied to on the spot. Franklin Pierce was selected for that 
 purpose. Aware that he was addressing many men of large 
 
JOHN P. HALE. 627 
 
 intelligence and influence, and that his words would be sharply 
 criticised by him under whose lead his name had been stricken 
 from the ticket, Mr. Hale spoke with calmness, dignity, and 
 effect. Those who listened to him could not but feel, whether 
 they agreed with him or not, that he had been actuated by 
 conscientious convictions and a high sense of public duty. 
 
 Mr. Pierce had noted, with the quick instincts of an adroit 
 politician, the marked effects produced by Mr. Hale's manly 
 and temperate vindication of his principles and position. 
 Evidently in a towering passion, he spoke under the deepest 
 excitement. He was domineering and insulting in manner, 
 and bitter and sarcastic in the tone and tenor of his remarks. 
 Mr. Hale replied briefly, but pertinently and effectively. He 
 closed his triumphant vindication of his motives, opinions, 
 and purposes against the aspersions of his bitter enemy with 
 these words : " I expected to be called ambitious, to have my 
 name cast out as evil, to be traduced and misrepresented. I 
 have not been disappointed.- But if things have come to this 
 condition, that conscience and a sacred regard for truth and 
 duty are to be publicly held up to ridicule, and scouted at 
 without rebuke, as has just been done here, it matters little 
 whether we are annexed to Texas or Texas is annexed to us. 
 I may be permitted to say that the measure of my ambition 
 will be full if my earthly career shall be finished and my bones 
 are laid beneath the soil of New Hampshire, and, when my 
 wife and children shall repair to my grave to drop the tear of 
 affection to my memory, they may read on my tombstone : 
 4 He who lies beneath surrendered office and place and power, 
 rather than bow down and worship slavery.' ' 
 
 At the second election the Democratic candidate lacked some 
 fifteen hundred votes necessary to an election. Several other 
 attempts were made, in which the " Independent Democrats," 
 though they failed of electing their own, succeeded in defeat 
 ing the Democratic candidate, and in holding the balance of 
 power. In the election of 1846, Mr. Hale was chosen a mem 
 ber of the legislature, was made Speaker, and subsequently 
 elected to the Senate of the United States. The State was 
 then subdivided into congressional districts, and Mr. Tuck was 
 
628 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 nominated to fill the seat Mr. Hale had occupied in the na 
 tional House of Representatives. As a majority of votes was 
 necessary for an election, no choice was effected during the 
 whole of the XXIXth Congress. But in July, 1847, by a 
 coalition between the Whigs and " Independent Democrats " 
 in the first and third districts, Mr. Tuck was chosen in the 
 former and General James Wilson in the latter. Mr. Tuck 
 served six years in Congress, and made an honorable record. 
 His chief distinction, and perhaps his chief service, however, 
 grew out of his bold and wise leadership in that first and suc 
 cessful assault upon the party which had for years controlled 
 the State with iron sway ; beating down the very Gibraltar of 
 the Northern Democracy, and making it one of the leading 
 and most reliable States in opposition to the Slave Power. 
 
 And if merit is due to any actors in the great struggle now 
 under review, surely no inconsiderable share belongs to those 
 who, in that dark night, dared to beard the lion, in his Northern 
 lair, and strike for freedom with the odds so fearfully against 
 them. Nor is the nation's debt of gratitude to Mr. Hale small 
 for his long, brave fight in the Senate, against the scorn and 
 contumely of the slaveholding majority. For if he did not 
 then proclaim the full and perfect evangel of liberty, his 
 was certainly the voice of one crying in the wilderness, pre 
 paring the way of complete deliverance. As his successful 
 resistance to party and slaveholding tyranny broke the spell 
 of its assumed invincibility, and encouraged others to go and 
 do likewise, so his ready eloquence and wit, his brilliant rep 
 artee and unfailing good-humor, did much to familiarize the 
 country with the subject, and to call attention to its facts and 
 principles, which perhaps a sterner advocate would have failed 
 to effect. 
 
 While Mr. Hale was making his gallant and successful fight 
 in New Hampshire, by which he placed himself at once among 
 the foremost advocates of liberty, freedom found another cham 
 pion, on the very soil of slavery itself, in the person of Cassius 
 M. Clay. Belonging to an eminent family, reared under the 
 influences of slavery, he was identified with it by birth, inheri 
 tance, and position. From personal knowledge and his affilia- 
 
CASSIUS M. CLAY. 629 
 
 tions of family, party, and business, he had spoken during the 
 presidential canvass of 1844 with authority upon the subject 
 of slavery, revealing to thousands the inner life and workings 
 of the system. 
 
 Mr. Clay was a native of Kentucky. Educated at Yale, he> 
 had soon learned to recognize the difference between the slave 
 and the free States, while the antislavery discussions that were 
 rife during his stay in New England greatly excited his feel 
 ings and changed his sentiments ; and at an early day he 
 determined to emancipate his slaves. Entering the Kentucky 
 legislature in 1835, he at once introduced and became the 
 champion of a common-school system for his native State. 
 But he soon learned that such a system was incompatible with 
 the presence and power of slavery wherever the latter was 
 established, and was giving tone to the thought and feeling 
 of society. 
 
 In 1841 an act was introduced into that legislature for the> 
 repeal of a law adopted in 1833 to prevent the importation 
 of slaves into the State. He, of course, arrayed himself against 
 the repeal, and denounced in fitting language this reactionary 
 measure. Such a demonstration from one occupying his posi 
 tion naturally excited surprise, and provoked that kind and style 
 of opposition in which the slave-masters were accustomed to 
 indulge toward any who opposed their policy or condemned 
 their cherished system. But he declared that denunciation 
 could not silence him ; that epithets and the cry of abolition 
 had no terrors for him ; and that bowie-knives, pistols, and 
 mobs could not force him to desist. He said that his blood 
 was ready for the sacrifice, though he warned gentlemen that 
 he should not be " a tame victim of either force or denuncia 
 tion." He affirmed that there was a party in the country which 
 was the advocate of perpetual slavery, and in favor of destroy 
 ing the Union. He protested against what he termed the trea 
 sonable scheme of the disunionists ; and he asserted that on 
 the day when this should be seriously attempted or consum 
 mated there should be " one Kentuckian shrouded under the 
 stars and stripes ; one heart undesecrated with the faith that 
 slavery is the basis of civil liberty ; one being who could not 
 
630 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 exist in a government denying the right of petition, the liberty 
 of speech and of the press ; one man who would not be the 
 outlaw of nations or the slave of a slave. " 
 
 Entertaining such sentiments, and believing that the pro 
 posed annexation of Texas was for " the extension of slavery 
 among men," he interposed a most determined opposition. In 
 a speech in December, 1843, in reply to ex- Vice-President 
 Richard M. Johnson, he made an impassioned appeal to the 
 people of Kentucky to enter their solemn protest against this 
 most unholy scheme. He reminded them, if this project was 
 carried out for the purposes for which it was formed, they could 
 no longer cover themselves, when reproached for the existence 
 of slavery, under the plea that it was an entailed evil for which 
 they could not be held responsible. If they supported this 
 scheme, with this the real and avowed object, they would com 
 mit themselves anew to the system it was thus proposed to 
 strengthen and extend. 
 
 Holding these ideas of annexation, and deeply impressed 
 with the magnitude of the interests at stake and the gravity 
 of the impending peril, he entered with great earnestness 
 into the presidential contest of 1844. He traversed the free 
 States, urging the claims of Henry Clay. He was specially 
 urgent that antislavery men should give him their votes, 
 as the only way by which annexation could be prevented. 
 Affirming that Mr. Clay had virtually pledged himself to op 
 pose the admission of Texas, by making the conditions of his 
 support such as could not be fulfilled, he contended that they 
 themselves held the power in their hands to prevent it. Among 
 those conditions was the " common consent of the Union." 
 " So long, then," he said, in one of his speeches, " as the vestal 
 flame of liberty shall burn in your bosoms, eternal and inextin 
 guishable, so long is Mr. Clay, three several times, in the most 
 solemn manner, before the nation and all mankind, irrevoca 
 bly bound to oppose the annexation of Texas to the United 
 States." " Of all men," he continued, " now present I have 
 the greatest cause to take care that I am not deceived in this 
 matter ; but I can go I say it before God and man with a 
 good conscience for him, because I believe it will save my 
 
CASSIUS M. CLAY. 631 
 
 country from ruin if we shall secure his election." His labors 
 in the canvass were arduous, his feelings were deeply enlisted 
 in the issues at stake, and his consequent disappointment in 
 view of defeat was very great. 
 
 The defeat of Mr. Clay, however, while it made annexation 
 certain, did not discourage him. His spirit rose with the oc 
 casion, and his purpose to war against the cause of all this 
 scheming and plotting seemed to be strengthened. Returning 
 to Kentucky, he issued, in January, 1845, an address to the 
 people of his State, in which he portrayed the baleful effects 
 of slavery, even upon that " young and beautiful Common 
 wealth," to whose " Italian skies " and " more than Sicilian 
 verdure" he mournfully referred as being blighted and clouded 
 by this terrible curse. " Her fields," he says, " relapse into 
 primitive sterility ; her population wastes away, manufactures 
 recede from her infected border, trade languishes, decay 
 trenches upon her meagre accumulations of taste or utility, 
 gaunt famine stalks into the portals of the homestead, sullen 
 despair begins to display itself in the careworn faces of men, 
 the heavens and the earth cry aloud, the eternal laws of happi 
 ness and existence have been trampled underfoot Agri 
 culture drags along its slow pace with slovenly, ignorant, and 
 reckless labor. Science, literature, and art are strangers here. 
 Poets, historians, artists, and machinists ; the lovers of the 
 ideal, the great, the beautiful, the true, and the useful, flour 
 ish where thought and action are untrammelled A loose 
 
 and inadequate respect for the rights of property, of neces 
 sity, follows in the wake of slavery. Duelling, bloodshed, and 
 lynch-law leave but little security to person. A general de 
 moralization has corrupted the first minds in the nation, its 
 hot contagion has spread among the whole people ; licentious 
 ness, crime, and bitter hate infest us at home ; repudiation and 
 the forcible propagandism of slavery is arraying against us the 
 world in arms." 
 
 He urged upon them to choose delegates to a convention for 
 amending the Constitution, and to repeat the attempt " until 
 victory shall perch on the standard of the free." 
 
 While the struggle was in progress in both Congress and 
 
632 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER LN AMERICA. 
 
 the country for the expansion of slavery, he issued proposals 
 for the establishment of a paper to advocate its " overthrow " 
 in Kentucky. Its publication was commenced at Lexington, 
 and on the 3d of June was issued the first number of the 
 " True American." In it he discussed with great vigor the 
 evils and remedies existing and proposed. The general tone 
 and character of its utterances were very offensive to the 
 slaveholders of the State, whose course he condemned, and 
 whose interests, they felt, he was putting in peril. This 
 indignation was specially increased and intensified by articles 
 that appeared on the 12th of August, in which the writer 
 referred not only to the general principles of the contest, but 
 to certain contingencies and possibilities, and which very 
 naturally and very greatly excited their ire. 
 
 In those articles not only was emancipation advocated, but 
 the securing of the civil and political rights to the colored peo 
 ple was vindicated. The pride and selfishness of the slave- 
 master, too, was referred to ; and the charge was made that, 
 in his esteem, national character, conscience of the people, 
 and sense of duty weighed nothing against that pride and self 
 ishness. The warning, too, was given that the Abolitionists 
 were becoming quite as reckless as the slaveholders them 
 selves ; and, when provoked by injustice and wrong, they might 
 manifest something of the same spirit. " It is in vain," it was 
 said, " for the master to try to fence his dear slaves in from all 
 intercourse with the great world, to create his little petty and 
 tyrannical kingdom on his own plantation, and keep it for his 
 exclusive reign. He cannot shut out the light of information 
 any more than the light of heaven. It will penetrate all 
 disguises, and shine upon the dark night of slavery. He must 
 recollect that he is surrounded. The North, the East, the 
 West, and the South border on him, the free West-Indian, 
 the free Mexican, the free Yankee, the more than free Abo 
 litionists of his own country. Everything trenches upon his 
 infected district, and the wolf looks calmly in upon his fold." 
 
 The slaveholders were greatly exasperated, too, by these 
 words : " But we are told the enunciation of the soul-stirring 
 principles of Kevolutionary patriots is a lie ; that slavery the 
 
CASSIUS M. CLAY. 633 
 
 most unmitigated, the lowest, basest that the world has seen, 
 is to be substituted forever for our better, more glorious, holier 
 aspirations. The Constitution is torn, and trampled underfoot, 
 justice and good faith in a nation are divided, brute force is 
 substituted in the place of high moral tone, all the great prin 
 ciples of national liberty which we inherited from our British 
 ancestry are yielded up, and we are left without God or help 
 in the world. When the great-hearted of our land weep, and 
 the man of reflection maddens in the contemplation of our 
 national apostasy, there are men, pursuing gain and pleasure, 
 who smile with contempt and indifference at their appeals. 
 But remember, you who dwell in marble palaces, that there 
 are strong arms and fiery hearts and iron pikes in the streets, 
 and panes of glass only between them and the silver plate on 
 the board and the smooth-skinned woman on the ottoman. 
 When you have mocked at virtue, denied the agency of God 
 in the affairs of men, and made rapine your honeyed faith, 
 tremble, for the day of retribution is at hand, and the masses 
 will be avenged." 
 
 The establishment of such a paper by such a man, with 
 views so radical and a purpose so determined, was naturally 
 regarded by the slaveholders as a challenge to them to come 
 to the defence of their cherished and menaced system. It 
 was, therefore, doomed from the start. Probably no journal, 
 however mildly and courteously conducted, that contemplated 
 and advocated emancipation, would have remained unmo 
 lested. Certainly one with sentiments so decided and un 
 compromising might naturally expect resistance. It came in 
 the form of a committee, which waited upon him on the 14th 
 of August, while confined to a bed of sickness, requiring 
 him to suspend the publication of his paper, " as," they say 
 in their note, " its further continuance, in our judgment, is 
 dangerous to the peace of the community, and to the safety 
 of our homes and families." 
 
 His reply was very decided and defiant. Alluding to the 
 phrase in their letter that they had " been appointed as a com 
 mittee on the part of a number of the respectable citizens of 
 the city of Lexington," he wrote : " I say, in reply to your 
 
634 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 assertion that you are a committee appointed by a ' respect 
 able ' portion of the community, that it cannot be true. Trai 
 tors to the laws and Constitution cannot be deemed respectable 
 by any but assassins, pirates, and highway robbers." After 
 reminding them that their meeting was unknown to the laws 
 and Constitution, and that its " proceedings " were secret, and 
 its purposes were " in direct violation of every known princi 
 ple of honor, religion, or government," he added : " I treat 
 them with the burning contempt of a brave heart and a loyal 
 
 citizen. I deny their power and defy their action Your 
 
 advice with regard to my personal safety is worthy of the 
 source whence it emanated, and meets with the same contempt 
 from me which the purposes of your mission excite. Go, tell 
 your secret conclave of cowardly assassins that Cassius M. 
 Clay knows his rights, and how to defend them." 
 
 He then issued an appeal to the people of Kentucky to stand 
 by him in his conflict with the enemies of law in the defence 
 of the civil and political rights of all. On the 18th of August 
 a meeting was called to consider the question of suppressing 
 the " True American." To this meeting he sent a communi 
 cation, in which he endeavored to remove some false construc 
 tions which had been placed upon the articles in question, 
 and in which he made some further statements concerning the 
 purposes and plans of his paper, concluding with the solemn 
 and unequivocal averment that his constitutional rights he 
 should never " abandon." 
 
 The meeting, unmoved by his appeal, proceeded to the con 
 summation of the purpose for which it was convened, by choos 
 ing a committee of sixty, which proceeded to the office of the 
 offending journal, boxed up its press, and sent it out of the 
 State. It also unanimously adopted an address to the people 
 of Kentucky, reported by Thomas F. Marshall. In this ad 
 dress it was charged that a formidable party had arisen in 
 the North which held that slavery was " opposed to religion, 
 morals, and law," and that the negro was entitled to his ^free 
 dom. It asserted, too, that the aim of this party was the aboli 
 tion of slavery in America. It charged Mr. Clay with being in 
 full sympathy with this party ; that he had visited the North, 
 
CASSIUS M. CLAY. 635 
 
 and, having been " received there in full communion by the 
 abolition party, caressed and flattered and feasted, hailed in 
 the stages of his triumphal progress by discharges of cannon, 
 and heralded in the papers devoted to the cause as the bold 
 est, the most intrepid, the most devoted of its champions, he 
 returned to his native State, the organ and agent of an incen 
 diary sect, to force upon her principles fatal to her domestic 
 repose, at the risk of his own life and the peace of the com 
 munity." 
 
 Stigmatizing an abolition paper in a slave State as a " nui 
 sance of the most formidable character," a blazing brand in the 
 hands of an incendiary or madman, which might scatter ruin, 
 conflagration, revolution, crime unnamable over everything 
 dear in domestic life, sacred in religion, or respectable in mod 
 esty, it denounced the " True American "as an example of 
 the worst type of such papers. Representing Abolitionists as 
 traitors to the Constitution, and abolition principles in a slave 
 State as " fire in a magazine of powder," the address urged 
 these considerations as the justification of its authors for the 
 summary measures they adopted. 
 
 Mr. Clay also issued several appeals to the people of Ken 
 tucky, calling upon them to vindicate their rights, stricken 
 down in his person. But though overpowered, he exhibited 
 the same defiant spirit and unconquerable purpose^ as he 
 dedicated himself anew to the liberty of his country and of 
 mankind, and called upon Americans to " rise up in the om- 
 nipotency of the ballot, and peaceably overthrow the slave 
 despotism of the nation." 
 
 He re-established his paper, which, though published in Lex 
 ington, was printed in Cincinnati. But when the war with 
 Mexico opened, he, to the great regret of many and the sharp 
 censures of others, entered the army ; and, under the plea of 
 standing by the flag of his country in the day of battle, volun 
 teered his services for that most indefensible war. After his 
 return he renewed and continued his warfare on slavery until 
 it ceased to exist. 
 
CHAPTER XLY. 
 
 TEXAS ADMITTED AS A SLAVE STATE. 
 
 Resolve of Antislavery Men to continue the Struggle. Action of the Massa 
 chusetts Legislature. Differences among leading Whigs. Celebration of the 
 1st of August by the Abolitionists. Anti-Texas Conventions held in Massa 
 chusetts. Committee appointed. Petitions against the Admission of Texas 
 as a Slave State. Meeting of Congress. Presentation of Petitions. Reso 
 lutions for the Admission as a State. Speech of Mr. Rockwell. Resolutions 
 for Admission. Considered in the Senate. Protest of Mr. Webster. Texas 
 admitted. Address of the Anti-Texas Committee. Complete Victory of the 
 Slave Power. 
 
 ANTISLAVERY men were humiliated, but not disheartened, by 
 the success of the annexation plot. While they comprehended 
 in some degree the fearful significance of that baleful triumph, 
 and the purposes and power of the men who achieved it, they 
 felt constrained by an imperative sense of the duty they owed 
 their country and humanity to continue the struggle. Two 
 days after the Joint Resolution had been approved by the Presi 
 dent, Charles Francis Adams proposed, in the Senate of Mas 
 sachusetts, the inquiry whether any further action should be 
 taken. A few days afterward he reported from a special com 
 mittee resolutions declaratory of the position and purposes of 
 that Commonwealth. They affirmed that Massachusetts refused 
 to acknowledge the act of annexation as binding or legal ; that 
 it put at hazard the predominance of the principles of liberty. 
 When they came up for consideration, a motion was made by 
 Mr. Clifford that they be laid upon the table. But this motion 
 received but five votes, and the resolutions were then adopted 
 by both Houses. It was evident, however, that a portion of 
 the Whig party gave them a reluctant support. 
 
 On the 4th of March, Mr. Wilson introduced an order 
 requesting the Committee on the Judiciary to report a bill 
 
TEXAS ADMITTED AS A SLAVE STATE. 637 
 
 making it a penal offence to surrender a slave escaping from 
 Texas and taking refuge in Massachusetts. Mr. Lawrence 
 of Hampshire County reported against the proposed legisla 
 tion. The report was sustained by himself and other senators, 
 on the ground that no action was required, that it was a ques 
 tion to be determined by the courts whenever a case contem 
 plated by the order should arise. 
 
 Mr. Wilson moved to recommit the report with instructions. 
 He would, he said, provide by law that the moment a man 
 held as a slave in Texas stepped upon the soil of Massachu 
 setts, his liberty should be as sacred as his life. He would 
 make it a high crime to molest him, and he would treat him as 
 a felon who should make the attempt. Massachusetts had pro 
 claimed that the Joint Resolution admitting Texas should have 
 no binding force upon her. Whether constitutional or not, 
 Texas would instantly demand the guaranties of the Constitu 
 tion. He would " meet the issue at once, and declare that the 
 sou of Massachusetts should not be the Texan slaveholder's 
 hunting-ground. The panting fugitive from that region should 
 find in Massachusetts a city of refuge, and his pursuing 
 master a felon's cell. Everything indicated an impending 
 struggle between freedom and slavery that would absorb the 
 mighty energies of the nation ; and in that contest it was fit 
 that Massachusetts should lead." But the motion failed, and 
 the adverse report was then accepted. 
 
 When the legislature adjourned in the spring of 1845, there 
 were marked indications of a wide divergence touching slav 
 ery among the leading Whigs of the Commonwealth. After 
 the defeat of Mr. Clay, a portion of the wealthy and influential 
 members of the party, especially those connected with the 
 commercial, manufacturing, and monetary interests of the 
 State, positively refused to take part in the efforts made to 
 defeat annexation, or to prevent the admission of Texas as a 
 slaveholding State. When the call for the anti-Texas meeting 
 in Faneuil Hall was circulated in the legislature by Mr. Wilson, 
 ex-Governor Lincoln, then president of the Senate, and several 
 other members of the party, peremptorily refused to affix their 
 names to it. They said that they had fought annexation so 
 
638 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA, 
 
 long as it was an open question, and they had been defeated 
 by the Abolitionists who withheld their votes from Mr. Clay. 
 Abbott Lawrence and Nathan Appleton, representative men, 
 and especially influential with the manufacturing interest, 
 took no part in that meeting. It was well understood, too, 
 that ex-Governor Davis, Mr. Winthrop, and several other emi 
 nent Whigs did not concur in that action, and manifested 
 much coldness towards those who did. On the 4th of July, 
 when the feelings of grief and indignation were fresh in the 
 hearts of the people, and their murmurs still filled the air, 
 Mr. Winthrop took occasion, in Faneuil Hall, to give utter 
 ance to the sentiment, " Our country, however bounded," 
 which was understood to be the expression of his acceptance 
 of the result, and a tacit rebuke of those of his political asso 
 ciates who did not readily acquiesce in the same policy. 
 
 Though Texas had promptly accepted the conditions of an 
 nexation, and her territory had become an integral portion of 
 the Republic, she was not actually a State of the Union. The 
 free States had a majority of fifty in the House of Representa 
 tives. Why should not another stand be made for freedom and 
 the country ? The defection of so many of their leaders in the 
 political and commercial circles, and their readiness to acqui 
 esce in the great iniquity, was indeed disheartening and omi 
 nous. But they were not the majority, and it was hoped they 
 did not represent it. It was certainly worth the trial for the 
 chance of defeating a nefarious project even at the last mo 
 ment and, at the same time, for the opportunity of ascertaining 
 whether the same appliances which had debauched and sub 
 dued the government had corrupted and conquered the people. 
 
 Nor was there a more fitting field in which that trial could 
 be inaugurated than Massachusetts. Though the efforts were 
 crowned with no great success, and few in other States seemed 
 disposed to join in the attempt, there is a mournful satisfaction 
 in tracing the steps of those earnest men who would bow to 
 nothing but the inevitable, and yield only when resistance was 
 manifest folly. There was something heroic in the closing 
 though ineffectual struggles of that great conflict. And if 
 readers are sometimes tempted to smile at their bold, defiant, 
 
TEXAS ADMITTED AS A SLAVE STATE. 639 
 
 and hopeful words, with so feeble a following, and a foe in 
 front rampant with victory, audacious in his insolence, with a 
 nation at his beck, a little study of the situation will change 
 that feeling to sympathy as they consider how hopeless was 
 the task those brave men were undertaking, how absolutely 
 " forlorn " was the hope they were attempting to lead. 
 
 On the 1st of August, the anniversary of West India eman 
 cipation, several meetings were held by the Abolitionists of 
 Massachusetts. The recent crime of the Slave Power, which 
 had insulted the reason and outraged the patriotism and con 
 science of the antislavery men of the North, contributed not 
 only to increase their numbers but greatly to deepen their in 
 terest. At the meeting in Dedham Mr. Garrison presided. 
 Pungent, vigorous, and eloquent speeches were made by him 
 self, Theodore Parker, and Edmund Quincy. 
 
 A large meeting was held at Leicester, which was addressed 
 by Samuel May, Jr. In a speech full of faith and hope in the 
 ultimate triumph of the cause of emancipation, although the 
 omens in that hour of defeat were far from auspicious, he said 
 that they had come together to acquire new courage and zeal 
 in their warfare. He would have their faith increased in 
 moral power and in the living truth of Christ, and he would 
 send " forth words of instruction, exhortation, and rebuke, 
 until Slavery utters her last groan, and expires, never to 
 know a resurrection." 
 
 Wendell Phillips, in reply to the oft-repeated assertion that 
 the church was right in nine cases out of ten, and that slavery 
 was but " one case," referred to the fact that one sixth of the 
 population of the country was now held as property, subject 
 to the crudest treatment and to the grossest outrages, and all 
 unprotected by law or by public opinion. In such a condition 
 of affairs he maintained that the church either remained silent, 
 or, if it spoke at all, it denounced the friends of the slave as 
 infidels. " I will not," he said, " have for mine the Christian 
 ity of this land, with its negro pew in the corner of every church, 
 and its negro hate in the corner of every heart. And yet I am 
 a Christian. I hang all my hopes on the faith of my fathers ; 
 and I should feel myself forever disgraced if I failed to rebuke 
 
640 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 the moral dwarfs which have now come into our fathers' 
 places." 
 
 On that day a large assemblage gathered at Waltham. 
 Francis Jackson, president of the Massachusetts Antislavery 
 Society, presided. The meeting was addressed by Jonathan 
 Walker, who had been fined, imprisoned, and branded in the 
 right hand for assisting slaves to escape in Florida. But in 
 spite of all the barbarities which he had borne, he avowed that 
 as long as life remained that "branded hand" should be raised 
 against slavery. In response to the question, often asked, why 
 Captain Walker broke the laws of Florida, John Weiss, then 
 the Unitarian clergyman of Watertown, said that man was 
 more than constitutions, and Christ was greater than Hancock 
 or Adams. " Our Northern apathy," he truly said, " heated 
 the iron, forged the manacles, and built the pillory." William 
 Henry Channing, in a speech of graceful eloquence and beauty, 
 said that the republic was the child of promise, but slavery was 
 denationalizing the people, and that it proclaimed itself auto 
 crat and dictator. The Constitution, he said, had been tried 
 and found to be an instrument of slaveholding usurpation, and 
 the annexation of Texas absolved the people from its support. 
 
 Rev. Caleb Stetson agreed with Mr. Channing that the 
 bond of union had been broken, but the government of Massa 
 chusetts was under the rule of the cotton aristocracy, and if 
 " the fiery cross was raised the people would prove recreant." 
 William I. Bowditch, in a thoughtful and temperate speech, 
 urged the friends of the slave to apply the great reformatory 
 principle of love to the slaveholder. " Let us," he also said, 
 " fearlessly and constantly extend the principle of human 
 brotherhood to the despised and oppressed slave, and let us 
 here solemnly pledge ourselves to follow out these great princi 
 ples, and resolve, Constitution or no Constitution, custom or 
 no custom, that nothing shall ever induce us to acquiesce in 
 or tolerate slavery." 
 
 Mr. Wilson, then a senator from Middlesex County, said that 
 the calamity and disgrace of annexation had come upon the 
 country through the treachery of Northern men ; that even the 
 representative of Concord and Lexington had proved recreant. 
 
TEXAS ADMITTED AS A SLAVE STATE. 641 
 
 To the question what should be done, he said, " Act ; hold 
 meetings in every district, town, and county of the State. 
 Oppose the admission of Texas into the Union as a slavehold- 
 ing State, and appeal to the people of the free States to arrest 
 the consummation of the great iniquity. Say to the men of 
 the South, ' You are warring against civilization, against 
 humanity, against the noblest feelings of the heart, the holiest 
 impulses of the human soul, and the providence of God ; and 
 the conflict must ultimately end in your defeat.' ' 
 
 Ralph Waldo Emerson said that it was the office of power 
 to protect, to help, to preserve ; and that it was the ruin of 
 power to oppress and injure. It was the property of govern 
 ment to govern, of the sun to shine, of moral power to 
 strengthen, raise, and refine. The Persian poet has said, 
 " Beware of the cries of the orphan, for his cries reach the 
 throne of the Almighty." The oppressed had the power to 
 destroy prosperity and overturn stately edifices. Those who 
 hoped and trusted were ever proved right, and he would have 
 Massachusetts take the attitude of " a sublime patience," and 
 trust " in principle, honor, and justice, rather than in the com 
 binations of physical power." On the motion of Mr. Bowers 
 of Concord, afterward a captain in the civil war, a committee 
 was appointed to make arrangements for a meeting, to be held 
 on the third Wednesday of August, to protest against the 
 admission of Texas as a State. As no action was taken by 
 the committee, the meeting was not held. 
 
 Early in September, Mr. Wilson, who had been appointed 
 one of its members, prepared a call and obtained the signa 
 tures of a large number of gentlemen of character and in 
 fluence for a meeting to be held at Concord, on the 22d of 
 that month, to " take into consideration the encroachments of 
 the Slave Power, and recommend such action as justice and 
 patriotism shall dictate to resist those encroachments and 
 arrest the progress of events so rapidly tending to that fearful 
 consummation when slavery shall have complete control over 
 the policy of the government and the destinies of the country." 
 Men of all parties, sects, and pursuits were invoked to " de 
 vote one day to the country and the oppressed." " Let old 
 
 81 
 
642 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 age," it said, " with its garnered treasures of wisdom and 
 experience, be there ; let manhood in its maturity and vigor 
 be there; let youth with its high hopes and aspirations be 
 there, to devise such measures and awaken such a spirit as 
 shall free the country from the dominion, curse, and shame 
 of slavery." 
 
 The convention was large, earnest, and united. Elisha Hun- 
 tington, mayor of Lowell, and afterward lieutenant-governor 
 of the State, presided, and Mr. Wilson reported a preamble 
 and a series of resolutions. The preamble set forth the char 
 acter of slavery and the aggressions of the Slave Power. It 
 closed by " distinctly presenting the issue to the people of the 
 free States of an unconditional and pusillanimous submission, 
 or a determined and constitutional resistance." This paper 
 had been prepared by Samuel Hunt, a Congregational clergy 
 man, then a resident of Natick, who had always in the pulpit, 
 in religious and political organizations, and at the ballot-box, 
 acted for the slave and against the domination of his master. 
 
 The resolutions declared : " We solemnly announce our 
 purpose to the South, and to the execution of that purpose we 
 pledge ourselves to the country and before Heaven, that, reject 
 ing all compromise, without restraint or hesitation, in our pri 
 vate relations and in our political organizations, by our voices 
 and our votes, in Congress or out, we will use all practicable 
 means for the extinction of slavery on the American conti 
 nent." The resolutions were unanimously adopted, and a com 
 mittee, of which E. Rockwood Hoar, afterward Attorney-Gen 
 eral of the United States, was chairman, was appointed to 
 confer with the general committee appointed by the anti-Texas 
 Convention held in the preceding January in Faneuil Hall, 
 and with other opponents of slavery and of annexation, to 
 endeavor to have meetings held, and in other ways to organ 
 ize an efficient resistance to the final consummation of that 
 measure. 
 
 A letter waa received from Charles Francis Adams, urging 
 unity and concert of action. In the midst of doubts and dis 
 couragements, he said that he had but one single word of hope 
 to present, and that word was " union." " Let the people," 
 
TEXAS ADMITTED AS A SLAVE STATE. 643 
 
 he said, " throughout the length and breadth of this great land, 
 feel that without it their industry, their property, nay, even 
 their lives and liberty, may in the course of time fall under the 
 oligarchy of two hundred thousand owners of slaves." 
 
 A letter was also received from John G. Whittier. He said 
 he was no blind worshipper of the Union, and as an Abolition 
 ist he was shut out from its benefits. " But I see nothing," he 
 said, " to be gained by an effort necessarily limited, sec 
 tional, and futile to dissolve it. The moral and political 
 power requisite for doing it could far more easily abolish every 
 vestige of slavery." 
 
 Conciliatory, earnest, and eloquent speeches were made by 
 William A. White, Stephen C. Phillips, William Lloyd Garri 
 son, William Henry Channing, and other gentlemen. An ad 
 journed meeting was held at Cambridgeport, which was well 
 attended, and was addressed by several gentlemen. The con 
 vention then adjourned to meet in Lyceum Hall in Cambridge, 
 and took measures to secure the attendance of the opponents 
 of annexation from other sections of the State. 
 
 On the 21st of October the convention reassembled. Henry 
 Wilson presided, and Colonel William Schouler acted as sec 
 retary. On taking the chair, Mr. Wilson made a hopeful ap 
 peal for prompt, bold, and united action. " Let us," he said, 
 " at once take an advanced step against the Slave Power. Let 
 us act and, as far as we have the constitutional right, go in 
 favor of emancipation. Let us make it the cardinal doctrine 
 of our creed, the sun of our system. Let us inscribe eman 
 cipation on the banners under which we rally in letters of light. 
 Let us go to the country on that issue. We shall reach the 
 heart and conscience of the people. They will come to the 
 rescue, and we shall lay the foundations of an enduring 
 triumph." 
 
 Mr, Garrison presented a resolution, asserting that it would 
 be the constitutional duty of the legislature of Massachusetts 
 promptly to declare that, if the illegal act of annexation 
 should be consummated, it was null and void. Mr. Stetson 
 affirmed that he would meet the issue of the admission of 
 Texas as a slave State with an " everlasting No." Mr. Gar- 
 
644 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 rison came to the meeting, he said, to learn the spirit of Mid 
 dlesex, and not to give his own plans. As a peace man he 
 had no difficulties. He would submit, but he would never 
 sanction or acquiesce. 
 
 William A. White spoke with great earnestness and anima 
 tion. " Let us go on," he said, " rallying the country as we 
 go. Like those Spartans who passed the night of their reso 
 lution to sacrifice themselves for their country in prayer and 
 song, and then went forth in the morning joyfully, though 
 they knew it was to die, let us gladly devote ourselves to the 
 salvation of our country." 
 
 Mr. Adams said it did not become them to speak in very 
 strong terms, in view of the "divided condition of the Common 
 wealth. " We fought the battle last year," he said, "and lost 
 it ; and I will not say why we lost it. But I will say that your 
 own situation is owing to your own party divisions ; and I will 
 add that unless you can agree to act together, you will always 
 be defeated in like manner. Look at Massachusetts, divided 
 into I know not how many parties, and then look at the South, 
 united in all that concerns slavery as the heart of one." 
 
 Wendell Phillips favored Mr. Garrison's resolutions, though 
 Mr. Adams had declared that they could not be made the basis 
 of union and action. " As long," he said, " as men lie in the lap 
 of Delilah, they may be sure they will have their locks shorn. 
 What cares the South for all you can do while under the 
 sceptre ? " He expressed a belief that disunion must come, as 
 Calhoun wanted it at one end of the Union and Garrison wanted 
 it at the other. " and it was written in the counsels of God." 
 
 Resolutions were reported by the business committee in 
 favor of instructing the committee appointed at Concord, to 
 gether with such members as might be appointed at that time, 
 co correspond with individuals in different parts of the State 
 with a view to calling county and State conventions. The 
 convention urged unity and co-operation. During a recess a 
 conference was held. Ellis Gray Loring was chairman, and 
 Edmund Quincy was secretary. A large State committee 
 was appointed, of which Charles Francis Adams was chair 
 man. This committee at once entered upon its duties, an 
 
TEXAS ADMITTED AS A SLAVE STATE. 645 
 
 address to the people was issued, a form of remonstrance 
 against the admission of Texas as a slave State was sent to 
 every part of the Commonwealth, and to other States. A 
 weekly paper, called the " Texas Chain Breaker," edited by 
 Elizur Wright, was established. Public meetings were held, 
 and speeches of rare eloquence and power were delivered by 
 some of the most gifted men of the Commonwealth. Petitions 
 signed by tens of thousands were sent to this committee, and 
 Henry Wilson and John G. Whittier were commissioned to 
 carry them to Washington. 
 
 On the 4th of November Faneuil Hall was thronged by the 
 citizens of Boston, to protest against the admission of Texas 
 as a slave State. Charles Francis Adams presided. Resolu 
 tions drawn up by Charles Sumner were presented by John G. 
 Palfrey. They distinctly set forth that annexation was sought 
 for increasing the market in human flesh, for extending and 
 perpetuating slavery, and for securing political power, and they 
 protested against the admission of Texas as a slave State " in 
 the name of God, of Christ, and of humanity." These reso 
 lutions were supported in earnest, learned, and eloquent 
 speeches by Mr. Palfrey, Mr. Sumner, Mr. Phillips, Mr. Stan- 
 ton, Mr. Hillard, Mr. Charming, and Mr. Garrison. 
 
 This was the first public participation of Mr. Sumner in that 
 great conflict in which he subsequently bore a part so impor 
 tant and honorable. His speech and the resolutions from his 
 pen were based on the fixed and indestructible principles of 
 justice, humanity, and moral rectitude. Stating that the 
 object of the meeting was to strengthen the hearts and hands 
 of those opposed to the admission of Texas into the family 
 of States, and referring to the voices of discouragement they 
 heard, that all exertion would be in vain, he declared that 
 their efforts could not fail to accomplish great good, as no 
 act of self-sacrifice and devotion to duty can ever be without 
 its reward. Such an act as theirs, he said, must ever stand 
 as a landmark, and " future champions of equal rights and 
 human brotherhood will derive new strength from these exer 
 tions." " Massachusetts," he said, " must continue foremost 
 in the cause of freedom ; nor can her children yield to dal- 
 
646 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 liance with slavery. They must resist it at all times, and 
 be forearmed against its fatal influence." He closed by ex 
 pressing the hope that it might be hereafter among the praises 
 of Massachusetts that " on this occasion she knew so well how 
 to say ' No ! ' " 
 
 This attempt, however, to rally the people of Massachusetts 
 and, if possible, of the free States, resulted in the most dis 
 heartening revelation of sentiments and purposes among the 
 leaders and in the ranks of the Whig party. Indeed, little was 
 found that was calculated to inspire courage and confidence. 
 Prominent and honored members not only positively declined 
 to take any part in the movement themselves, but discouraged 
 the efforts of others. Abbott Lawrence, in his reply to the 
 anti-Texas committee, said, " I have opposed the annexation of 
 Texas, and continued my opposition so long as it was an open 
 question. I deem further action on my part useless, as a ma 
 jority of the people have decided in favor of annexation, and 
 Texas now virtually composes a part of the Union." Nathan 
 Appleton went still further. He referred to the fact that he 
 saw among the parties engaged in the movement many who 
 had distinguished themselves as Abolitionists ; and he doubted 
 whether the abolition movement was " reconcilable with duty 
 under the Constitution." At any rate he thought it had pro 
 duced nothing but evil, banded the South into a solid phalanx, 
 exasperated the feelings of slaveholders, increased the severity 
 of their slave laws, postponed the period of emancipation in 
 the Northern slave States, and secured the election of Mr. 
 Polk and the admission of Texas into the Union. " I can 
 not," he said, " take part in this Texas movement. For all 
 practical purposes, as far as the people are concerned, I con 
 sider the question as settled. I have opposed it, and contrib 
 uted funds to oppose it so long as there appeared a chance of 
 preventing it. Massachusetts has done her duty, and her sen 
 ators and representatives will continue to do theirs. Beyond 
 that I cannot think it good policy to waste our efforts upon the 
 impossible." These sentiments expressed the views and feel 
 ings of a large class of Massachusetts Whigs. Although no 
 division took place at the State convention of that year, and its 
 
TEXAS ADMITTED AS A SLAVE STATE. 647 
 
 resolutions were distinct and full in their condemnation of an 
 nexation, and of the continued aggressions of the Slave Power, 
 it was seen and felt that there were radical differences in the 
 party, and that a conflict was certain, and a rupture probable 
 in the near future. 
 
 The XXIXth Congress met on the 1st of December, 1845. 
 On the 10th Mr. Adams presented remonstrances from Massa 
 chusetts against the admission of Texas into the Union as a 
 slave State, and moved their reference to a select committee. 
 But the House, by a vote of one hundred and fifteen to seventy- 
 two, laid them on the table. The next day a large number of 
 similar memorials, signed by thousands, were presented by 
 Mr. Adams and other members, but they shared the same 
 fate. 
 
 On the 16th the House proceeded to the consideration of the 
 Joint Resolution, reported by Mr. Douglas, chairman of the 
 Committee on Territories, for the admission of Texas as a 
 State into the Union. The previous question, with indecent 
 haste, was immediately moved, and sustained, by eighteen 
 majority, and the bill ordered to a third reading by a major 
 ity of eighty-four. On its final passage, Mr. Julius Rockwell 
 of Massachusetts, a member of the Committee on Territories, 
 contrived to obtain the floor, and spoke earnestly and eloquently 
 against it. He declared that amidst all the heat and dust, 
 amidst all the misrepresentations, intrigues, and violent efforts 
 to which the Texan question had given occasion, there stood 
 out one honest feature on the part of the government, and 
 that was the clear, distinct, and open avowal, that the motive 
 was the preservation of domestic slavery. Massachusetts dis 
 sented from the measure on that very ground. She objected 
 to annexation because that had been the purpose in urging it, 
 and was likely to prove its actual effect. As one called to 
 represent in part the people of his ancient Commonwealth, he 
 must enter his " solemn protest against the extension of slav 
 ery, as an evil directed against the truest interests of his 
 country ; as militating directly against her prosperity and free 
 dom, and darkening that national character which she ought 
 to hold up to all nations and ages of the world ; as being in 
 
648 KISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWER IN AMERICA. 
 
 opposition to the Constitution which had preserved us hitherto 
 in concord ; as against the principles of the fathers of the 
 republic, who lived themselves in slaveholding States, who 
 would have saved us, if they could, from so great an evil, and 
 who openly confessed that they trembled for their country 
 when they remembered that God is just. The vote was then 
 taken, and the resolution of admission was adopted by a ma 
 jority of eighty-five. In that minority of fifty-six there were 
 only three members of the Democratic party, Preston King, 
 Bradford R. Wood, and Horace Wheaton, of the State of New 
 York. 
 
 On the 22d of December Mr. Ashley of Arkansas reported 
 to the Senate from the Judiciary Committee the House resolu 
 tion, and that body proceeded at once to its consideration. 
 Mr. Webster rose and declared that he had felt it to be his 
 duty " steadily, uniformly, and zealously to oppose it." He 
 closed his brief speech by saying : " I agree with the unani 
 mous opinion of the legislature of Massachusetts ; I agree with 
 the great mass of her people ; I reaffirm what I have said and 
 written during the last years at various times against this 
 annexation. I here record my own dissent and opposition ; 
 and I here express and place on record, also, the dissent and 
 protest of the State of Massachusetts." 
 
 But all arguments were unavailing, and the protests, how 
 ever impressively pronounced, by States or statesmen, could 
 not avert the impending blow. The slaveholders had the 
 " giant's strength," and they did not hesitate to " use it like 
 a giant," however " tyrannous " it might appear. By a vote 
 of thirty-one to fourteen the Joint Resolution was passed, 
 and Texas became a State of the American Union. And the 
 saddest page in this gloomy record, the bitterest ingredient 
 in this cup of humiliation, was the large support the measure 
 received from the free States. It seemed as if the demon of 
 slavery had power over the souls as well as the bodies of men, 
 and by his infernal sorceries had bound the one as completely 
 as the other. But there were those who still had faith in 
 God and in the power of truth, and who still believed that, 
 in some way they were not able to forecast, this great wrong 
 
TEXAS ADMITTED AS A SLAVE STATE. 649 
 
 would be righted and this haughty power be overborne. At 
 any rate they meant to struggle on in the great endeavor, and 
 hope in God for success. 
 
 The Massachusetts Anti-Texas Committee issued an address 
 to the public. " Massachusetts," it said, " had done her part 
 honestly, conscientiously, and manfully, to sustain the true 
 principles of the Puritans of New England." Affirming that 
 annexation had been accomplished by slavery, it said : " Slav 
 ery has corrupted liberty in her fountain seat ; slavery has 
 hardened the hearts of this generation of political leaders, so 
 that they heed no warning except it should be a miracle from 
 heaven. Slavery has infused its pestiferous venom into the 
 veins of the body politic in the free States to such an extent 
 that they see not what mere instruments of tyranny it is mak 
 ing of their people." 
 
 This address from the pen of Charles Francis Adams closed 
 with the declaration : " The contest about Texas has been 
 fought and lost, the Constitution trampled under foot, and the 
 Spirit of Liberty is driven from her natural home ; but unnum 
 bered fields yet remain, each of which should be the subject 
 of a greater contest than the last, until either the institution 
 of slavery shall be overthrown, or else the Samson of the 
 North, intoxicated by the cup of worldly prosperity, and en 
 feebled by his dalliance with the harlot, shall ultimately perish 
 amidst the crumbling of the edifice which he had made for 
 his protection." 
 
 Hitherto the government of the United States, in obedience 
 to the exacting demands of slave-masters, had indeed been per 
 verted from its original purpose to the antagonistic and degrad 
 ing service of protecting and fostering domestic slavery. Now, 
 in obedience to fresh demands, the nation had taken another 
 and an advanced step, and had officially announced through 
 its Secretary of State, the channel of communication with for 
 eign governments, to England, France, and Mexico, that it 
 looked with apprehension upon the extinction of slavery in a 
 foreign nation, and demanded the annexation of that nation, 
 to prevent its abolition there, and to strengthen it at home. 
 Regardless of the opinion of the Christian and civilized world, 
 
 82 
 
650 RISE AND FALL OF THE SLAVE POWEE IN AMERICA. 
 
 it had avowed these motives and principles of action. Nor 
 were the means employed less reprehensible than the end pro 
 posed. There seemed, moreover, to have been a combination 
 of circumstances, a fatality, not to say fatuity, of conduct, 
 which conspired to facilitate and effect the result so pregnant 
 with danger and dishonor. 
 
 The underlying cause of this complete victory of the Slave 
 Power was unquestionably the inadequate conception by the 
 people of the high and comprehensive duties of self-govern 
 ment. That was the weak and vulnerable point of the contest. 
 Busy on their farms, in their work-shops, factories, and stores, 
 masses of the people too often think they are fulfilling the 
 duties of citizenship by sometimes voting at elections and pa 
 triotically observing the anniversary of national independence. 
 Is it singular, then, that the clearest utterances, the most 
 solemn warnings and earnest appeals, failed of evoking hearty 
 and effective responses ? Failing to comprehend, notwithstand 
 ing all that was spoken and written, the real iniquity of the 
 Texas plot, many left that troublesome question to be solved 
 by the political leaders at Washington, while they answered 
 the demands of their business and grappled with the problems 
 of their personal and domestic life. Perhaps in coming years 
 juster views of personal responsibility will obtain, and it will 
 be seen and felt that republicanism is not a mere sentiment ; 
 that human rights are indissolubly linked with human re 
 sponsibilities ; that freedom is not a glittering bauble which 
 constitutions can confer, but a prize that is to be won and 
 kept in the presence of active and ever-watchful foes. 
 
 And, in the light of subsequent events, is there reason to 
 doubt that there was a higher than any human agency at work 
 in the defeat of Mr. Clay and the success of the annexation 
 plot, then deemed so mysterious and unfortunate ? As it is 
 the general conviction, that, in 1861, the nation was not pre 
 pared for victory on the battle-field of Bull Run, then wisely 
 and fortunately withheld, may it not be believed that, in essen 
 tially the same conflict and for essentially the same reasons, it 
 was not prepared for triumph in 1844 ? The success of the 
 Slave Power then may now be looked upon not only as a means 
 
TEXAS ADMITTED AS A SLAVE STATE. 651 
 
 of stimulating its grasping purposes and its vaulting ambition 
 till it o'erleaped itself and rushed to its own overthrow, but as 
 a necessary step in that march of events which has so rapidly 
 and wonderfully opened the continent to the forces of a fresher 
 energy and a higher civilization. " God in history," to the 
 American and Christian patriot thus instructed, should there 
 fore be a perpetual inspiration in the darkest hour, a perennial 
 source of faith and hope, of consolation and courage. 
 
 
INDEX TO VOL. I. 
 
 ABERDEEN, Lord, 597. 
 
 Abolitionists, dissensions among, 406- 
 410. 
 
 Adams, Benjamin, of Mass., 76. 
 
 Adams, Charles Francis, of Mass., 485, 
 491, 585, 622, 642, 645, 649. 
 
 Adams, John, Commissioner to Paris, 
 113. 
 
 Adams, John Quincy. Remarks on 
 speech of Rufus King, 143. On Mis 
 souri Compromise, 149. Presents peti 
 tions, 307, 311. Remarks on admission 
 of Arkansas, 344. Presents petition 
 from slaves, 346, 348. Impressive re 
 marks on right of petition, 350, 353. 
 On power of Congress to abolish 
 slavery, 395. Remarks on petition, 
 399. Action on revision of rules, 424. 
 His reply to Rayner of North Caro 
 lina, 425. Further defence of right 
 of petition and debate, 427. Presents 
 petition for dissolution of the Union, 
 427. Attempt to censure him, 428. His 
 scathing reply to Wise, 430. His ten 
 years' struggle for right of petition, 
 432. Not friendly to abolition so 
 cieties and measures, 433. Criticisms 
 on his course, 435 - 437. Defends 
 right of slaves of " Creole " to their 
 liberty, 447. As counsel for slaves of 
 the " Amistad," 463. His defence in 
 " Amistad " case, 467 - 469. Presents 
 petition of Massachusetts basing repre 
 sentation on free persons, 482. Speaks 
 against the doctrine of property in 
 
 man, 532. Presents remonstrances 
 from Massachusetts against admission 
 of Texas, 647. 
 
 Alford, of Ga., 347. 
 
 Allen, Charles, of Mass., 370, 623. 
 
 Allen, of Conn., 82. 
 
 Alvord, James C., of Mass., 371, 372. 
 
 " Amistad," seized by slaves on board, 
 and brought into New London, Conn., 
 457. Slaves of, declared free by Judge 
 Story, 465. 
 
 Anderson, R. C., of Ky., 74, 115. 
 
 Andrews, resident in Texas, 596. 
 
 Anne, Queen, instructions of, to Royal 
 African Company, 4, 5. 
 
 Anti-government, its advocates and 
 measures, 568. Repeal of the Union 
 demanded, meetings and debates, 569 - 
 575. 
 
 Antonio Pacheco, 543. 
 
 Antislavery publications. " Genius of 
 Universal Emancipation," 169. "Na 
 tional Inquirer," 174. "Pennsylva 
 nia Freeman," 174. "Liberator," 
 176. "Journal of the Times," 177. 
 " Emancipator," 231 . Tracts and doc 
 uments issued from New York office 
 in one year, 272. " Philanthropist," 
 276. Measures to suppress their cir 
 culation through the mails, 323 - 327. 
 " Observer," at St. Louis, 375. " Abo 
 litionist," 412. "Antislavery Stand 
 ard," 421. "Philanthropist," 557. 
 "Liberty Bell," 562. " True Ameri 
 can," 632. " Texas Chain Breaker," 
 645. 
 
 Antislavery Societies. Pennsylvania, ad- 
 
654 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 dress of, to governors of States, 23. 
 Memorials of, to Congress, 24. New 
 Haven, one of oldest, 25. In New 
 York, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New 
 Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, 
 and Baltimore, 26 - 28. Societies in 
 general, and their influence, 28. Con 
 vention of societies, 80. Union Hu 
 mane, 168. New England, 224 - 228. 
 New York City, 231. American, 
 formed in Philadelphia, 249-263. 
 Declaration of Sentiments, 256-259. 
 Personnel, 259 - 263. Female, Boston, 
 281. South demands of Northern 
 legislatures to suppress them, 325. 
 Action of Massachusetts Society in 
 defence of liberty of speech and press, 
 330. Meetings and measures on occa 
 sion of the martyrdom of Lovejoy, 
 383 - 389. Massachusetts Abolition, 
 414. American and Foreign, origin 
 and formation of, 420. Disruption of 
 American, 421 . Number, agency, and 
 diminished importance of, 422. Old 
 and new organizations pitted against 
 each other, 559. Their diminished 
 number and importance, 567. Ameri 
 can advocates disunion, 568 - 572. 
 
 Appleton, Nathan, of Mass., 638, 646. 
 
 Arbuckle, General, 525, 542. 
 
 Archer, of Va., 157, 530, 615. 
 
 Arkansas. Bill for territorial government 
 in, 139. Prohibition of slavery in, 
 moved by Mr. Taylor, 139. Amend 
 ments prohibiting slavery in, lost, 140. 
 Admitted as a slaveholding Territory, 
 140. Applies for enabling act, 343. 
 Admitted to the Union, 345. 
 
 Arnold, of Tenn., 430, 453. 
 
 Ashburton Treaty, 401, 452. 
 
 Ashley, of Ark., 648. 
 
 Atherton, of N. H., 394, 395. 
 
 Atlee, Dr. Edwin P., 250. 
 
 Attucks, Crispus, colored patriot, first 
 martyr in Boston Massacre, 18. 
 
 Austin, Elbridge Gerry, of Boston, in 
 Latimer case, 477. 
 
 Austin, James T., of Boston, disgraceful 
 speech of, 384. 
 
 Aves, Thomas, of Boston, 371. 
 
 B. 
 
 Bacon, of Mass., 85. 
 
 Bailey, Dr., of Pa., 418, 476. 
 
 Baldwin, Judge, of Conn., 75, 462. 
 
 Baldwin, of Ga., 51, 64. 
 
 Ballou, Adin, 574. 
 
 Baltimore, Abolition Society of, 28. 
 Journal of, describes domestic slave 
 scene, 99. 
 
 Bancroft, George. Comment on slave- 
 traffic and British policy, 16. On 
 foundation of new republic, 18. 
 
 Barbour, Philip P., of Va., 137, 530. 
 
 Barnard, Daniel D., of N. Y., 531, 613. 
 
 Barrow, of La., 442, 444. 
 
 Bates, of Mass., 484. 
 
 Bayard, James A., of Del., 82, 84. 
 
 Beach, Thomas P., 564. 
 
 Beardsley, Samuel, of Utica, N. Y., 288, 
 311. 
 
 Beecher, Dr Edward, 361, 379, 380, 
 420. 
 
 Bell, Joseph, of Mass., 622. 
 
 Beman, D,r. S. S., 294. 
 
 Benezet, Anthony, 10. 
 
 Benson, ofN. Y., 67. 
 
 Benton, Thomas H., of Mo., 342, 343, 
 392, 401, 443, 600, 610, 617. 
 
 Berrien, John M., of Ga., 618. 
 
 Berry, of Va., 204. 
 
 Bill. Of Mr. Fitzsimmons, prohibiting 
 slavery in territory northwest of the 
 Ohio, 33. Of committee on slave- 
 trade, 103. By Mr. Middleton in ad 
 dition to acts prohibiting slave-traffic, 
 105. To punish with death persons 
 engaged in slave-trade, 105. To pre 
 vent fitting out slave- trading expedi 
 tions, 107. For admission of Mis 
 souri Territory, 136. Prohibiting slav 
 ery in Missouri lost, 139. Providing 
 Territorial government for Arkansas, 
 139. To admit Missouri as State, 
 141. For the admission of Maine, 
 141. For prohibition in Missouri, de 
 feated, 143. Passed in Senate, prohib 
 iting slavery in country ceded by 
 France, 143. In House, with amend 
 ment forbidding slavery and involun- 
 
INDEX. 
 
 655 
 
 tary servitude in Missouri, 143-145, 
 and passed, 147. Taken up in Senate 
 and prohibition clause stricken out, 
 147. From committee of conference, 
 debated and passed both Houses, 148. 
 For suppression of freedom of speech 
 and press, 340. Incendiary Publica 
 tion, lost in Senate, 342. To secure 
 trial by jury for one restrained of lib 
 erty, 371. Recognizing property in 
 man, passed by Congress, 543. 
 
 Birney, James G., 275. Emancipates 
 his slaves, 276, 407. Endorses politi 
 cal action, 413, 418, 420, 436, 545. 
 Candidate for the presidency, 549. 
 
 Black, of Ga., 454, 455. 
 
 Blanchard, Eev. Jonathan, 293. 
 
 Bloomfield, General Joseph, of N. J., 
 president of Convention of Abolition 
 Societies, 80. 
 
 Boiling, of Va., 196. 
 
 Bond, George, of Mass., 337. 
 
 Borden, Nathaniel B., of Mass., 622. 
 
 " Boston/' ship, with slave secreted, 473. 
 
 Botts, of Va., 398, 430, 449, 481. 
 
 Boutwell, George S., of Mass., 486. 
 
 Bowditch, Henry I., of Boston, 479, 498. 
 
 Bowditch, William I., of Mass., 640. 
 
 Bradburn, George, of Mass., 489, 490, 
 572, 573. 
 
 Bradford, Dr. Gamaliel, of Mass., 337. 
 
 Bradish, Luther, of N. Y., 546. 
 
 Briggs, George N., of Mass., 309, 344, 
 534, 578, 585, 622. 
 
 British governor, spirited reply of, to 
 U. S. government, 121. 
 
 Brodnax, of Va., 192. 
 
 Brooks, Nathan, of Mass., 546. 
 
 Brougham, Lord, of England, 566, 597. 
 
 Brown, David Paul, of Phila., 266, 294. 
 
 Brown, John L., sentenced to death, 565. 
 
 Brown, Milton, of Pa., 614. 
 
 Brown, of Ky., 160. 
 
 Brown, of Miss., 543. 
 
 Brown, of R. I., 73, 84. 
 
 Brownson, Orestes A., of Boston, 388. 
 
 Bryant, William C., of N. Y., 451, 596. 
 
 Buchanan, James, of Pa., 315, 343, 393, 
 402. 
 
 Buffum, Arnold, 226, 295, 571. 
 
 Burgess, Tristam, of R. I., 530. 
 Burleigh, Charles C., of Conn., 244, 294, 
 
 295, 416, 574. 
 Burr, of Va., 204. 
 Burrill, of R. I., 104, 106, 155. 
 Burrows, Thomas K., of Pa., 327. 
 Burt, Armistead, of S. C., 543. 
 Butler, of S. C , 53, 398. 
 
 C. 
 
 Cabot, of Mass., 69. 
 
 Calderon, Mr., Spanish minister, 458. 
 
 Calhoun, John C., of S. C., 314, 315, 
 324, 397, 440, 445, 590, 595, 599. Re 
 port on incendiary publications, 340 - 
 342, 390. Resolutions of, 39 1 . Secre 
 tary of State, 600. 
 
 Cambreleng, Churchill C., of N. Y.,329. 
 
 Campbell, of S. C., 352, 533. 
 
 Campbell, of Tenn., 104. 
 
 Canning, Stratford, 108. 
 
 " Carter, Robert," schooner, 474. 
 
 Cass, Lewis, 515. 
 
 Castlereagh, Lord, proposition of, to con 
 cede right of search, 108. 
 
 Causin, of Md., 455. 
 
 Chandler, Elizabeth M., assistant editor 
 with Lundy and Garrison, 173. 
 
 Chandler, of Va., 193. 
 
 Channing, Rev. William Ellery, of Bos 
 ton, 337, 383, 640. 
 
 Channing, William F., of Boston, 479. 
 
 Channing, William Henry, of Mass., 643. 
 
 Chapman, of Mass., 413. 
 
 Chapman, Mrs. Maria W., of Boston, 
 281, 296. 
 
 Chase, of Maryland, 15, 32. 
 
 Chase, Salmon P., 477, 551, 553. 
 
 Child, David Lee, 223, 229, 482, 538, 
 571. 
 
 Child, Linus, of Mass., 486, 622. 
 
 Child, Mrs. Lydia Maria, 236, 419, 561. 
 
 Choate, Rufus, of Boston, 371, 403, 485, 
 615. 
 
 Christie, of Md., 73. 
 
 Claggett, of N. H., 75. 
 
 Clarkson, Thomas, of England, 399. 
 
 Clay, Cassius M., of Ky., 628, 630-635. 
 
 Clay, Henry, of Ky., 110, 130, 137, 13<\ 
 
656 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 145, 160, 342, 394, 396, 423, 442, 445, 
 451, 604, 607. 
 
 Clay, of Ala., 308. 
 
 Clarkson, Thomas, received an impulse 
 from writings of Benezet, a Huguenot, 
 10. 
 
 Clayton, John M., 345. 
 
 Cleaveland, Professor Charles D., of 
 Philadelphia, 553. 
 
 Clergy of South, not opposed to slavery 
 or slave-trade, 63. Their course before 
 and during the Rebellion, 63. Sanc 
 tion mob violence, 323. 
 
 Clifford, Governor, of Mass., 497. 
 
 Clinch, Colonel, blows up fort, 130. Or 
 dered to attack Fort King, 516. 
 
 Coates, Lindley, of Pa., 421. 
 
 Cobb, Howell, of Ga., 75, 138, 542. 
 
 Cobb, William R., of Ala., 543. 
 
 Cockburn, Admiral, refuses to surrender 
 slaves under Treaty of Ghent, 120. 
 
 Colden, of N. Y., 78. 
 
 Coleman, Elihu, pamphlet against mak 
 ing men slaves, 9. 
 
 Coles, Governor, of HI., 163. 
 
 Collegiate school for colored people, 238. 
 
 Colonies, articles of association, 18. 
 
 Colonization Society, organization and 
 inconsistencies of, 208. Objects fa 
 vored by Rev. Dr. Hopkins, 209. 
 Encouraged by Mr. Jefferson, 209. 
 Its principles indorsed by Virginia 
 legislature, 210. Characterized by 
 hostility to free blacks, 212, 214. Real 
 intent of its leaders to render slavery 
 more secure, 214. Distrusted by free 
 people of color, 216, 217. Mr. Web 
 ster's opinion of, 219. Rum, pow 
 der, and arms sent with negroes to 
 Liberia, 220. Mr. Garrison sent to 
 England to unfold real character of 
 the society, 220. Protest of Wilber- 
 force and others against it, 221. 
 
 Colored people, ejected from cars, 493, 
 494. Children of, excluded from pub 
 lic schools, 495 - 497. Legislation in 
 their behalf, 497. 
 
 Colored soldiers, at Boston Massacre, 
 18. At Bunker Hill, 19. Regiment 
 of, in Rhode Island, 19. Notice of, by 
 
 Governor Eustis, 19. By Tristam 
 Burgess, 19. By Arnold in " History 
 of Rhode Island," 19. Battalion of, in 
 Connecticut, 19. Right to bear arms 
 disputed, 20. Reduced to slavery in 
 Maryland and Virginia, 20. 
 
 Colston, of Va., 138. 
 
 Colver, Rev. Nathaniel C., of Boston, 
 414, 480. 
 
 Columbia, District of. See Slave-trade. 
 
 Confederation, obstacles to, 15. Discus 
 sion resumed in 1777, 16. No power 
 to regulate commerce, 16. Plan of, re 
 turned to Congress with recommenda 
 tion, 16. Convention called to revise 
 its articles, 40. 
 
 Congress, first, met in New York, 57. 
 Its powers enunciated, debated, and de 
 fined, 67. Its right to prohibit slavery 
 in new States affirmed by Northern 
 legislatures, 151. 
 
 Compromises, etc. See Constitution. 
 
 Connecticut. Colony of, made man-steal 
 ing capital offence, 6. Disgraceful 
 law of State of, 242. Legislature of, 
 repeals black law, 372. Resolutions 
 of, against annexation of Texas, 373. 
 
 Conrad, Charles M., of La., 402. 
 
 Constitution, reasons for, 39. Difficul 
 ties in the way of, 40-42. Slavery 
 the great obstacle, 41 . Basis of repre 
 sentation in, 42 - 44. Southern threats, 
 44. " Religion and humanity " and 
 the "morality" of the question ig 
 nored, 49. A "bargain" proposed 
 and accepted as a compromise, 53, 54. 
 Decisive victory of the Slave Power, 
 54 - 56. 
 
 Continental Congress signed "Articles 
 of Association," 13. Pledged united 
 colonies not to import or purchase any 
 slave, 13. Slaveholding threat in, 15. 
 Articles adopted, and other proceed 
 ings, 14. Theory of human equality 
 enunciated, 41. 
 
 Cook, of 111., 144, 157. 
 
 Cooper, James, of Pa., 532. 
 
 Cooper, Mark A., of Ga., 398, 450, 532. 
 
 Corey, trainer of Douglass, 501, 510. 
 ! Corwin, Governor, of Ohio, 476. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 657 
 
 Cox, Dr. Abraham L., of N. Y., 260. 
 
 Crandall, Miss Prudence, her" colored 
 school in Conn., 240. Persecution 
 and imprisonment of, 241. Subse 
 quent proceedings, 242 - 247. Public 
 morality at a low ebb, 246, 247- 
 
 Crandall, Dr. Reuben, imprisoned in 
 Washington, 306. 
 
 Crapo, Judge, of Mass., 492. 
 
 Crawford, William H., 532. 
 
 Creeks and Seminoles, treaty with, 525. 
 
 " Creole," brig, seized by slaves, 443. 
 
 Crittenden, John J., of Ky., 77, 451, 616. 
 
 Crothers, Dr. Samuel, of Ohio. His ac 
 tion in Cincinnati Synod, 178. 
 
 Gushing, Caleb, of Mass., 344, 536, 546. 
 
 D. 
 
 Dade, Major, shot in Florida, with his 
 
 command, 517. 
 Daggett, Judge, of Conn., decision of, in 
 
 Crandall case, 245. 
 Dallas, George M., of Pa., 604. 
 Dane, Nathan, 32. 
 Davie, General, of N. C., 44. 
 Davis, George T., of Mass., 489. 
 Davis, John, of Mass., 340, 341, 393, 442. 
 Dawson, of La., 455, 537. 
 Dawson, William C., of Ga., 351. 
 Dayton, William L., of N. J., 615. 
 De Argaiz, Spanish minister, 460. 
 Denison, Rev. Charles W., 231, 232, 250, 
 
 252, 419. 
 
 Dew, Professor, 100. 
 Dexter, Franklin, of Mass., 489. 
 Dickey, of Pa., 543. 
 Dickson, John, of N. Y., 311. 
 Dillett, of Ala., 431. 
 Doddridge, of Va., 308. 
 Douglas, Stephen A., of 111., 610. 
 Douglass, Frederick, 493, 499-511. 
 Drayton, of S. C., 529. 
 Dresser, Amos, 357. 
 Dutch ship entered James River with 
 
 slaves 1620, same year with ''May 
 flower," 2. 
 Dutch West India Company offered to 
 
 supply New York with slaves, 5. 
 Duty on slaves imported, debated in first 
 
 Congress, 57. 
 
 83 
 
 E. 
 
 Earle, Thomas, of Pa., 549, 569, 571. 
 
 Eaton, of Tenn., 105, 154. 
 
 Edmond, of Conn., 73. 
 
 Edwards, Jonathan, his proclamation in 
 1791 concerning slavery and freedom, 
 27. Address of national convention to 
 South Carolina written by him, 28. 
 
 Eliot, Rev. John, his memorial to the 
 governor and council against enslav 
 ing Indians, 7. 
 
 Elliot, of Ga., 141. 
 
 Ellsworth, Oliver, of Conn., 35, 50. 
 
 Ellsworth, Hon. William W., of Conn., 
 counsel for Miss Crandall, 243. 
 
 Emerson, Ralph Waldo, of Mass., 641. 
 
 Evans, George, of Me., 350. 
 
 Everett, Edward, of Mass., 328, 329, 
 445, 530, 597. 
 
 Everett, Horace, of Vt, 429, 448, 524. 
 
 Exiles, Florida, 127 - 134. 
 
 F. 
 
 Fairs, antislavery, their success and im 
 portance, 561. 
 
 Faulkner, Charles J., of Va., 199. 
 
 Fessenden, of Me., 448. 
 
 Fillmore, Millard, 308, 402, 546. 
 
 Finley, Rev. Robert, of Va., 211. 
 
 Fitzsimmons, Thomas, of Pa., 33. 
 
 Fletcher, Richard, of Boston, 281. 
 
 Florida, introduction of slaves into, in 
 1558, 124. Law for annexation of, 
 128. Georgia sends armed force into, 
 128, 129. Fort in, blown up and de 
 struction of life, 130. War in, cause, 
 duration, cost, etc., 512 - 525. 
 
 Floyd, Governor, of Va., 191. 
 
 Follen, Professor Charles, of Mass., 333, 
 335, 545. 
 
 Foot, Solomon, of Vt., 455. 
 
 Foote, of Conn., 158. 
 
 Forsyth, John, of Ga., 462, 590. 
 
 Fort Jupiter, Florida, 522. 
 
 Fort King, in Florida, Major Dade or 
 dered to attack it, 516. 
 
 Forward, Walter, of Philadelphia, 294. 
 
 Foster, E. H., of Tenn., 616. 
 
658 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Foster, S. S., 552, 564, 570, 625. 
 
 Foster, Stephen, of N. H., 65. 
 
 Franklin, Benjamin, of Pa., president of 
 Pennsylvania Abolition Society, 23. 
 His proposition on basis of represen 
 tation, 42. Author of memorial to 
 Congress, 62. Last and wisest of his 
 counsels, 62. 
 
 Frelinghuysen, Theodore, 235. 
 
 Friends, society of, early antislavery ad 
 vocates, 9. 
 
 Fugitive slaves, demand of Butler of 
 S. C., that they be delivered up like 
 criminals, 53. His amendment agreed 
 to, 54. Provision for the rendition of, 
 inserted in Constitution, 54. Argu 
 ments of Southern members for rendi 
 tion of, 54. Bill of 1 793 for rendition of, 
 passed both Houses, 69. Committee of 
 House appointed to provide more effec 
 tual means for rendition of, 74. Bill 
 for rendition of, reported in House 
 and fiercely debated, 74-77. Further 
 measures in the House for securing 
 rendition of, 78. Bill for rendition of, 
 reported and debated, 78. Demanded 
 of British government, 120. Paid for 
 by England under decision of Em- ' 
 perorof Russia, 121. Treaty stipula 
 tion in 1790 for return of, 125. Span 
 ish refuse to surrender them, 126. | 
 Rendition of, sought by various meas- 1 
 ures, 127. Their recovery sought by 
 annexation of Florida, 128. War on 
 Florida for recapture of, 128, 129. 
 Pursued by slave-hunters among In 
 dians, 134. Decision of Supreme ' 
 Court on rendition of, 471. Act of 
 New York legislature concerning 
 them, 474. Action of Gov. Seward in 
 relation to, 475. Mr. Wilson's motion | 
 in Massachusetts Senate for their pro- j 
 tection, 637. 
 
 Fuller, James C., of N. Y., 413. 
 
 G. 
 
 Gaines, General, 129, 540. 
 Gallatin, Albert, 37, 80, 601. 
 Garland, Rice, of La., 398. 
 
 Garnettj James M., 33. 
 
 Garrison, William Lloyd, his birth and 
 early labors, 176. In Baltimore pris 
 on, 180. His assertion of principles 
 and purposes, 180, 181. Establishes 
 " Liberator" in Boston, 182. A price 
 put upon his head by slaveholders, 
 186. His influence, 183 - 186. Mission 
 of, to England, 220. Connection with 
 New England Antislavery Society, 224. 
 In other relations, 250, 252. 260, 284, 
 295, 332, 358, 388, 435, 545, 557, 563, 
 570, 574, 639, 643. 
 
 Gayle, Governor, of Ala., 326. 
 
 Georgia, settled by colonies under James 
 Oglethorpe, 4. He opposed slavery, 4. 
 Slaves introduced into, from Africa, 
 4. Claimed territory forming States 
 of Alabama and Mississippi, 35. 
 Ceded her territory in 1 802, on condi 
 tion that slavery be not prohibited, 
 35. Sends forces into Creek country 
 to burn and murder, 126. Governor 
 of, sends military forces into Florida, 
 128, 129. Fort in, destroyed, and 
 terrible massacre, 130. Paid by gov 
 ernment for wanton outrages in Flori 
 da, 132. 
 
 Gentry, Meredith P., of Tenn., 398. 
 
 Gerry, Elbridge, of Mass., 51, 65. 
 
 Ghent, Treaty of, provided for restora 
 tion of slaves, 120. 
 
 Gholson, of Va., 100. 
 
 Giddings, Joshua R., 425, 442, 447, 448. 
 Is censured by the House and resigns, 
 re-elected and returns, 451, 452, 454, 
 467, 484, 532-534, 537, 543, 614, 
 620. 
 
 Gilbert, of N. J., 72. 
 
 Giles, of Va., 36. 
 
 Gillette, Francis, of Conn., 372. 
 
 Gilmer, Thomas W., of Va., 428, 592. 
 
 Goddard, Hon. Calvin, of Conn., coun 
 sel for Miss Crandall, 243. 
 
 Goldsborough, of Md., 103. 
 
 Goode, William O., of Va., 73. 
 
 Goodell, William, 232, 234, 250, 260, 332, 
 336, 408, 421, 436, 545. 
 
 Gorham, of Mass., 42. 
 
 Gouveneur, Samuel L., of N. Y., 323. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 659 
 
 Goran, of S. C., 107. 
 
 Gorernment, powers of, in regard to 
 slavery defined, 65. Humiliating po 
 sition of, 1 1 2. Want of sympathy with 
 other republics, 113-118. Signal 
 injustice towards Indians, 127-134, 
 514 - 527. Seat of, on slave soil, 
 299. 
 
 Granger, Francis, of N. Y., 347, 398. 
 
 Grantland, of Ga., 347. 
 
 Green, Beriah, of N. Y., 249, 250. 
 
 Green, Duff, 596. 
 
 Green, William, Jr., of N. Y., 250. 
 
 Griffin, John K., of S. C., 351. 
 
 Griffith, Admiral, refuses to surrender 
 fugitive slaves to United States, 121. 
 
 Grimke, Miss Angelina, 296, 372. 
 
 Grundy, Felix, Attorney-General, U. S., 
 in " Amistad" case, 459, 468, 515. 
 
 Gunn, James, of Ga., 113. 
 
 H. 
 
 Hale, John P., of N. H., 432, 610, 624, 
 626, 627. 
 
 Hall, Robert B., 225, 359. 
 
 Hallett, Benjamin F., 384. 
 
 Halsey, of Ga., 352. 
 
 Hamilton, of N. Y., 26. 
 
 Hamlin, Hannibal, of Me., 432, 610. 
 
 Hamlin, of Ohio, 613. 
 
 Hammet, of Miss., 603. 
 
 Hammond, James H., Governor of S. 
 C., 309, 313, 579. 
 
 Harding, John J., of 111., 613. 
 
 Hardin, of Ky., 145. 
 
 Harper, of S. C., 35. 
 
 Harrison, William Henry, president of 
 convention in 1802 to memorialize 
 Congress, 33. Elected President, 423. 
 Death of, 423. 
 
 Hartley, of Pa., 61, 65. 
 
 Hayne, R. Y., of S. C., speech of, on 
 Haytien independence, 117. 
 
 Haynes, of Ga., 347. 
 
 Hayti, government organized by negroes, 
 114. Surrender of Napoleon to ar 
 mies of, 114. Congress suspended 
 commercial intercourse with, 114. 
 Speech of Mr. Hayne on indepen 
 
 dence of, 117. Petition in 1838, for 
 recognition of independence of, 117. 
 
 1 Hazard, of R. I., 322, 326. 
 
 Hemphill, of Pa., 157. 
 
 Henshaw, Daniel, of Mass., 493. 
 
 1 Hernandez, General, 521. 
 
 j Heyrick, Elizabeth, pamphlet, 178. 
 
 Hicks, Elias, Quaker, 166. 
 
 Hildreth, Richard, 572. 
 
 Hill, Isaac, of N. H., 317. 
 
 Hill, John, of N. C., 85. 
 
 Hillard, George S., of Mass., 338, 366, 
 384, 479. 
 
 Hillhouse, of Conn., 83. 
 
 Hoar, E. Rockwood, of Mass., 642. 
 
 Hoar, Samuel, of Mass., sent to Charles 
 ton in behalf of colored seamen, his 
 treatment and return, 578 - 582. 
 
 Holabird, of Conn., his connection with 
 the " Amistad " case, 458. 
 
 Holley, Myron, 545, 547. 
 
 Holmes, Isaac E., of S. C., 448, *82, 
 612. 
 
 Holmes, John, of Mass., afterwards of 
 Me., 75, 77, 156. 
 
 Hopkins, of Va., 428. 
 
 Hopkins, Dr. Samuel, distinguished for 
 advocacy of human rights, 11. His 
 noble act praised by Whittier, 12. In 
 1776 published "Dialogue" on slav 
 ery, 12. Dedicated it to Continental 
 Congress, 12. Action of his church 
 against slavery, 12. Characterized 
 slave-trade as sevenfold abomination, 
 47. Sympathy with Colonization So 
 ciety, 209. 
 
 Hopkinson, of Pa., 75. 
 
 Hopper, Isaac T., 232. 
 
 Houston, Samuel, of Tenn., 589. 
 
 Howe, General Appleton, of Mass., 490. 
 
 Howell, John R., killed on board " Crcs 
 ole," 443. 
 
 Howell, of R. I, 32. 
 
 Hubbard, of N. H., 391. 
 
 Hubbard, of Vt, 292. 
 
 Hubbard, Henry, of Mass., agent to New 
 Orleans in behalf of colored seamen, 
 582. 
 
 Hudson, Charles, of Mass., 455. 
 
 Hunt, of N. Y., 310. 
 
660 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Hunt, General, Texan minister, proposes 
 
 annexation, 590. 
 
 Hunt, Rev. Samuel, of Mass., 642. 
 Hunter, R. M. T., of Va., 398. 
 Huntington, Elisha, of Mass., 642. 
 Huntington, of Conn., 65. 
 Hurlburt, Rev. Mr., 292. 
 
 Ide, Rev. Dr. Jacob, 262. 
 
 Illinois, conspiracy to make her a slave 
 State, 161. Constitution of, limiting 
 suffrage to free white persons and for 
 bidding slavery, 62. Legislature of, 
 enacts code of black laws, 162. Fail 
 ure of efforts to make it a slave State, 
 164. 
 
 Independence, Declaration of, clause re 
 probating slavery struck out, 15. Of 
 thirteen Colonies acknowledged, 31. 
 
 Indiana, action of her Territorial legis 
 lature concerning negroes or mulattoes, 
 162. 
 
 Indians, strange and cruel conduct to 
 wards, 123-126. 
 
 Ingersoll, Charles J., of Pa., 424, 466, 
 467. 
 
 Ingersoll, Ralph I., 461. 
 
 Ingham, of Pa., 530. 
 
 Intermarriage, petitions to Massachusetts 
 legislature for repeal of law against, 
 489. Law against, repealed, 492. 
 
 Isaac, a negro, claimed as slave, 474. 
 
 J. 
 
 Jackson, General Andrew, President, his 
 act of outrage on Seminoles, 132. 
 His message on closing mails against 
 antislavery publications, 324, 339. 
 His action on occasion of freeing of 
 slaves by British government at Nas 
 sau, 440. His efforts to purchase 
 Texas, 589. Urges annexation of 
 Texas, 592. 
 
 Jackson, of Ga., 58, 62. 
 
 Jackson, Francis, of Boston, 285, 559. 
 
 Jackson, William, of Mass., 309, 420. 
 
 Jarvis, Leonard, of Me., 312. 
 
 Jay, Judge William, his antislavery acts 
 
 and writings, 267, 268, 420, 566. His 
 
 reply to President Jackson, 271, 272. 
 Jay, John, Commissioner to Paris, 113. 
 Jefferson, Thomas, branded traffic in men 
 
 as an "execrable commerce," etc., 15. 
 
 Presents deed of lands claimed by 
 
 Virginia, 32. His action on the 
 
 Louisiana boundary question, 588. 
 Jessup, General, commands in Florida 
 
 war, 517, 520, 526, 538. 
 Jocelyn, Rev. S. S., 239, 250, 458. 
 Johnson, Andrew, of Tenn., 612. 
 Johnson, Cave, of Tenn., 584. 
 Johnson, Mr. Justice, declares laws of 
 
 South Carolina unconstitutional and 
 
 void, 577. 
 
 Johnson, Oliver, 225, 409, 414. 
 Johnson, of La., opposition of, to Hay- 
 
 tien independence, 117. 
 Johnson, R. M., of Ky., 143. 
 Johnson, William Cost, of Md., 425. 
 Johnston, of N. C., 89. 
 Jones, of Va., 73. 
 Judson, Andrew T., 241. 
 Judson, Judge, of Conn., 458. 
 
 K. 
 
 Keith, George, Quaker, 8. 
 
 Kelley, Miss Abby, of Mass., 296, 411, 
 419, 569. 
 
 Kendall, Amos, of Ky., 323. 
 
 Kentucky, carved out of territory claimed 
 by Virginia, 34. 
 
 Kitchell, of N. J., 72. 
 
 Kidnapping, of free negroes under Fugi 
 tive Slave Act, 70. Protection against 
 it asked by legislature of Delaware, 
 70. Free negroes taken from ships, 
 70. Exciting debate, 70, 71. Report 
 of committee, 71. 
 
 King, Charles, of N. Y., 321. 
 
 King, Daniel P., of Mass., 490. 
 
 King, of Ga., 340, 341. 
 
 King, Rufus, of N. Y., 32, 47, 51, 104, 
 105, 143. 
 
 King, William R., of Ala., 444, 445, 484. 
 
 Knapp, Chauncey L., of Vt., 291. 
 
 Knapp, Isaac, 184. 
 
 Knox, General, 126. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 661 
 
 Lambert, colored soldier, 19. 
 
 Lane Seminary, antislavery debate in, 
 264. 
 
 Langdon, of N. H., 51. 
 
 Latimer, George, a fugitive, seized in 
 Boston, and proceedings in his case, 
 477-480. 
 
 Laurens, Colonel John, of S. C., sought 
 to fill ranks with emancipated slaves, 
 20. 
 
 Laurens, Henry, of S. C., one of com 
 mission to Paris, 113. 
 
 Lawler, Joab, of Ala., 346. 
 
 Lawless, Judge, 376. 
 
 Lawrence, Abbott, of Mass., 638, 646. 
 
 Lawrence, of N. Y., 65. 
 
 Lay, Benjamin, 9. 
 
 Leavitt, Rev. Joshua, 231, 232, 234, 260, 
 420, 428, 458, 466, 479, 545. 
 
 Ledyard, Colonel, killed, and his death 
 avenged by Lambert, 19. 
 
 Lee, Benjamin Watkins, of Va., 318. 
 
 Lee, Henry, of Va., 73. 
 
 Legare, Hugh S., of S. C., 451, 592. 
 
 Legislation, Northern, demanded, 339 - 
 343. 
 
 Lewis, Dixon H., of Ala., 346, 342. 
 
 Lewis, slave of Antonio Pacheco, guide 
 to Major Dade in Florida, 516, 543. 
 
 Liberty party, its formation and candi 
 dates, 549 555. National convention 
 of, 552. Acts against Texas annexa 
 tion, 605. 
 
 Lincoln, William, of Mass., 489. 
 
 Linder, W. F., of 111., 379. 
 
 Linn, Lewis F., of Mo., 340. 
 
 Livermore, Arthur, of N. H., 76, 137. 
 
 Livermore, Isaac, of Mass., 497. 
 
 Livingston, of La., 529. 
 
 Livingston, of N. Y., 82. 
 
 Loring, Ellis Gray, of Mass., 285, 331, 
 357, 371, 414, 569, 571, 644. 
 
 Loring, Mrs. Ellis Gray, of Boston, 
 561. 
 
 Louisiana, acquisition of, 135. Pur 
 chase, how divided, 136. Imprisons 
 free colored seamen, 577. Boundaries 
 denned, 588. 
 
 Lovejoy, Rev. Elijah P., 362, 374, 377, 
 378, 381, 382. 
 
 Lowndes, William, 157. 
 
 Lowrie, Walter, of Pa., 106, 141. 
 
 Lucas, of Mass., 330, 331. 
 
 Lumpkin, of Ga., 392, 397. 
 
 Lundy, Benjamin, his origin and early 
 labors, 167. Mr. Garrison's tribute 
 to him, 167, 168. His paper, first 
 public lecture, and formation of so 
 cieties, 169. His appeal to Mr. Garri 
 son, 172. Removes paper to Wash 
 ington, 174. Starts "National In 
 quirer," 174. His death, 174. Char 
 acter and services, 174, 175. 
 
 Lunt, George, of Mass., 330, 332. 
 
 M. 
 
 Macon, Nathaniel, of N. C., 81, 116. 
 
 Madison, declaration of, that slavery 
 formed line of discrimination between 
 States, 41 . His plan of slave represen 
 tation, 43. On taxation of slaves im 
 ported, 59. 
 
 Magrath, of S. C., 58. 
 
 Maine, bill for admission of, and con 
 ference committee, 147. 
 
 Mallory, of Vt, 157. 
 
 Mangum, Willie P., of N. C., 340. 
 
 Mann, Abijah, of N. Y., 348. 
 
 Mann, Dr. Daniel, of Mass., 493. 
 
 Mann, Horace, remarks on slave-traffic, 3. 
 
 Marcy, of Mass., 491. 
 
 Marcy, Governor William L., of N. Y., 
 326. 
 
 Marshall, of Va., 201. 
 
 Marshall, Thomas F., of Ky., 425, 428. 
 
 Martin, Luther, of Maryland, 48. 
 
 Martineau, Harriet, 285. 
 
 Maryland, prohibited introduction of 
 slaves, 33. 
 
 Mason, John Y., of Va., 309. 
 
 Mason, Jonathan, of Mass., 76. 
 
 Massachusetts, adopted measures in 
 1771 for abolition of slave-trade, 4. 
 Enacted "Body of Liberties," for 
 bidding slavery, 5. Affixed death 
 penalty to man-stealing, 6. Adopted 
 constitution, 20. Declaration in Bill 
 
662 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 of Rights, 20. Bill to extirpate slav 
 ery, 20. Letter to Continental Con 
 gress urging freedom, 21. Clause in 
 Bill of Rights and Supreme Court 
 decision on, 21. Became a free State, 
 22. Hearing of Abolitionists before 
 her legislature, 331. Resolutions of 
 legislature on slavery in the District, 
 
 370. Hall of Representatives gran ted to 
 Massachusetts Antislavery Society, 
 
 371. Proposes amendment to Consti 
 tution, basing representation on free 
 persons, 482. Action of, concerning 
 intermarriage, caste, etc., 488-492. 
 Act of legislature concerning colored 
 seamen in Southern ports, 578. Her 
 declaration concerning the treatment 
 of Mr. Hoar by South Carolina, 585. 
 Her position among the States, 621. 
 State convention of, on Texas ques 
 tion, 623. Public meetings against 
 Texas annexation, 639. 
 
 Massacre, Boston, 18. 
 
 Matthews, General, 128. 
 
 May, Rev. Samuel J., 241, 250, 260, 291, 
 330, 331, 334, 357, 358, 577, 639. 
 
 McCrummell, James, of Philadelphia, 
 251. 
 
 McDowell, James, of Va., great speech 
 of, 205, 206. 
 
 McDuffie, Governor, of S. C., 324, 610. 
 
 McKay, James J., of N. C., 352. 
 
 McKim, J. Miller, 250. 
 
 McKrum, John, of 111., 380. 
 
 McLane, Louis, of Del., 140, 145, 157. 
 
 McLean, Justice, 476. 
 
 Memorial of abolition societies, 67. Of 
 legislature of Delaware, 70. Of Con 
 vention of Abolition Societies, of Quak 
 ers at Yearly Meeting, and of the Provi 
 dence society for abolition of slave- 
 trade, 80. Of Quakers in behalf of 
 slaves made free and enslaved again, 
 80. From North and South Carolina, 
 setting forth dangers of immigration 
 of blacks from San Domingo, 85. Of 
 Friends to Congress for suppression of 
 domestic slave-trade, 103. To restrain 
 increase of slavery in new States, drawn 
 up by Daniel Webster, 150. 
 
 Mercer, Charles F., of Va., 105, 106, 211. 
 
 Merrill, Amos B., of Boston, 477. 
 
 Meriwether, Mr., of Ga., 431. 
 
 Mexico, her President abolishes slavery, 
 589. 
 
 Michigan, applies for enabling act, 343. 
 
 Mid, slave child brought to Massachu 
 setts and freed by Supreme Court, 370. 
 
 Middleton, 102, 105. 
 
 Miller, Colonel, of Vt., 292. 
 
 Miller, of N. J., 616. 
 
 Miner, of Pa., 303, 531. 
 
 Missouri, petition of, and debate on ques 
 tion of slavery in, 136. Bill prohibit 
 ing slavery in, lost in Senate, 139. Bill 
 in House to exclude slavery from, 
 passed after a protracted and fierce 
 debate, 147. House bill taken up in 
 Senate and prohibition clause stricken 
 out, 147. Compromise bill debated 
 and passed both Houses, 148. Consti 
 tution of, subjected to searching and 
 extended debate, modified by joint 
 committee, adopted by both Houses, 
 and debate of two years closed, 1 53 - 
 160. Comments on the great contro 
 versy, 161. 
 
 Mob, attacks house of Lewis Tappan, 
 267. Destroys Mr. Birney's press in 
 Cincinnati, 278. Outrages of, in New 
 York, 279. Assaults Rev. Orange 
 Scott and Rev. George Storrs, 280. 
 Breaks up meeting of ladies in Bos 
 ton, 284. Seizes and drags Mr. Gar 
 rison through the streets of Boston, 
 284. Brutal violence in Utica, 289. 
 Outrages of, at Montpelier, 291. Meet 
 ings of H. B. Stanton broken up, 293. 
 Burning of Pennsylvania Hall, 297. 
 Forces open and robs post-office at 
 Charleston, 322. Hangs Mclntosh, a 
 mulatto, and enters and destroys office 
 of Lovejoy, in St. Louis, 376. Twice 
 seizes and destroys his press at Alton, 
 Illinois, 376, 377. His murder, 381. 
 Riot and destruction of property in 
 Cincinnati, 556. Assails negroes and 
 burns buildings in Philadelphia, 557. 
 Breaks up antislavery meetings in 
 New Bedford and Nantucket, 558. As- 
 
INDEX. 
 
 663 
 
 sails Stephen S. Foster in Portland, 
 558. 
 
 Monroe, President, announces policy of 
 United States, 115. Signs bill, forever 
 prohibiting slavery north of the paral 
 lel of 36 30', 149. Opposes the Mis 
 souri restriction, 149. 
 
 Moore, of Va., 195. 
 
 Morgan, Margarette, of Md., an escaping 
 slave, 471. 
 
 Morpeth, Lord, of England, attends anti- 
 slavery fair in Boston, 562. 
 
 Morrill, of N. H., 104. 
 
 Morris, Gouverneur, 47, 48. 
 
 Morris, Thomas, of Ohio, 294, 314, 320, 
 343, 392, 397, 420, 476, 553. 
 
 Morsell, Judge, District of Columbia, 
 charge of, 101, 302. 
 
 Moseley, of Mass , 331, 337. 
 
 Mott, Mrs. Lucretia, 255, 562. 
 
 N. 
 
 Napoleon, failure of, to subdue Hay- 
 tiens, 114. Demands of United States 
 to cease trading with Hayti, 1 14. 
 
 Negroes, free, laws to prevent their en 
 tering new State of Missouri, 153. 
 Presumed to be slaves in the District 
 of Columbia, 301. Testimony of, not 
 allowed, 301 . In Ohio, and laws con 
 cerning them, 363. Driven by mob 
 violence from Cincinnati, 365. Seek 
 refuge in Canada, 365. Ejected from 
 cars, 493. Stolen from Florida, and 
 sold, 515. Forbidden to enter South 
 Carolina, 576. Seized from vessels in 
 Southern ports and imprisoned, 576 - 
 578. England protests against their 
 imprisonment, 577. Conflict concern 
 ing, 576 - 586. 
 
 Nelson, of Va., threatening remarks of, 
 139. 
 
 New Hampshire, became free State in 
 1784, 22. Her fight against Texas 
 annexation, 626 - 628. 
 
 New Haven Colony enacted death pen 
 alty for man-stealing in 1650, 6. Anti- 
 slavery Society of, one of the oldest, 25. 
 Leader of antislavery movements, 25. 
 
 New Jersey, land bounty offered for every 
 slave introduced there, 5. Abolition 
 Society of, and its influence, 27. 
 
 New Orleans expels agent of Massachu 
 setts, 583. 
 
 New York, Abolition Society of, 26. 
 Act of legislature concerning fugitive 
 slaves, 474. 
 
 Nicholas, of Va., 84. 
 
 Nisbet, E. A., of Ga., 427. 
 
 Niles, John M., of Conn., 393. 
 
 Norris, Moses, of N. H., 612. 
 
 North Carolina, settled by colonies from 
 Virginia, 4. Take slaves with them, 4. 
 
 Norvell, John, of Mich., 391. 
 
 Noyes Academy, in N. H., opened for 
 colored students, 239. Opposition, and 
 building removed by force, 240. 
 
 0. 
 
 Ogden, David B., 235. 
 
 Oglethorpe, James, founding colonies in 
 Georgia and forbidding slavery, 4, 14. 
 
 Ohio, black laws of, exhibit the barba 
 rism of slavery, 365. 
 
 Ordinance of 1787, 33. 
 
 Osceola, Seminole chief, 576. 
 
 Osborn, Charles, publishes " Philanthro 
 pist," 168. 
 
 Otis, Harrison Gray, of Mass., 36, 142, 
 156, 280. 
 
 P. 
 
 Palfrey, John G., of Mass., 645. 
 
 Palmerston, Lord, 597. 
 
 Panama, Congress of, 115. 
 
 Park, John C., of Mass., 491. 
 
 Parker, Isaac, of Mass., 82. 
 
 Parker, Josiah, of Va., 57, 65. 
 
 Parliament seeks co-operation with Unit 
 ed States to suppress slave-trade, 108. 
 
 Parmenter, William, of Mass., 546. 
 
 Parsons, Theophilus, of Mass., 490. 
 
 Patterson, William, of N. J., 43. 
 
 Patton, John M., of Va., 310, 347. 
 
 Paulding, his description of a slave- 
 gang, 99. 
 
 Pennington, Governor, of N. J., 400. 
 
664 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Pennsylvania, act of legislature in 1712 
 to prevent increase of slaves, 3. Act 
 annulled by British crown, 4. In 
 1780 passed act of gradual abolition, 
 22. Abolition Society of, resuscitated, 
 22. Oldest Abolition society in the 
 world, 22. Petitioned legislature for 
 law to prevent slave-trade, 24. Abo 
 lition Society of, memorializes Con 
 gress in 1790, 62. Her law against 
 kidnapping, 471. 
 
 Petition, right of, denied in the XXIId 
 and XXIIId Congresses, 307-309. 
 Petitions presented, discussed, and re 
 jected in the XXIVth, 309 - 320. Fi 
 nally vindicated, 432. 
 
 Phelps, Eev. Amos A., 236, 251, 261, 
 388, 411, 414, 415, 419. 
 
 Phelps, Charles A., 498. 
 
 Philip, King, Indian chief, 521. 
 
 Phillips, Jonathan, of Boston, 384. 
 
 Phillips, Stephen C., of Mass., 495, 623, 
 643. 
 
 Phillips, Wendell, of Boston, 372, 385, 
 386, 479, 494, 569, 574, 639, 644. 
 
 Pickens, of S. C., 312, 533. 
 
 Pierce, Franklin, of N. H., 311, 393, 625, 
 626. 
 
 Pillsbury, Parker, 566. 
 
 Pinckney, Charles, of S.C., 45, 51, 159. 
 
 Pinckney, Thomas, of S. C., 313. 
 
 Pinkney, William, of Md., 143. 
 
 Pindall, James, of Va., 74, 105. 
 
 Plummer, William, of N. H., 146. 
 
 Poinsett, of S. C., 106, 542. 
 
 Political action, debate and division on, 
 407 - 410. Early Abolitionists pledged 
 to it, 545. Party demanded, 546. 
 
 Polk, James K., of Tenn., 351, 400. 
 Nominated for President, 604. 
 
 Porter, A. S., of Mich., 442. 
 
 Portuguese and Spanish, introduced 
 slaves into Europe half a century be 
 fore discovery of America, 2. 
 
 Powell, of Va., 199. 
 
 Press, Southern, demands Northern legis 
 lation, 325. 
 
 Preston, William B., of Va., 202. 
 
 Preston, William C., of S. C., 393, 444. 
 
 Prentiss, Samuel, of Vt., 397. 
 
 Prigg, Edward, case of, 471. 
 Property in slaves, question of, struggle 
 on, 528-544. 
 
 Q. 
 
 Quakers, their protest against slavery, 
 8. Of New England, message to breth 
 ren in Rhode Island, 9. Of Nantucket, 
 their declaration and appeal, 9. Peti 
 tion of, to first Congress, and debate, 
 61, 62. Petition of Mifflin, a Dela 
 ware Quaker, denounced and returned 
 to petitioner, 67. Memorial of, in be 
 half of the re-enslaved, 80. Of Vir 
 ginia, petition for removal of slavery, 
 192. 
 
 Queen Anne, her stock in Koyal African 
 Company, and instructions to gover 
 nors, 4. Orders constant supply of ne 
 groes for New Jersey, 5. 
 
 Quincy, Edmund, of Mass., 371, 388, 
 405, 644. 
 
 Quincy, Josiah, speech of, on the slave- 
 trade, 92. 
 
 R. 
 
 Randolph, John, of Va., 33, 86, 97, 118, 
 
 146, 302, 529. 
 Randolph, Thomas J., of Va., denounces 
 
 domestic slave-trade, 100. His plan for 
 
 extinction of slavery in Virginia, 194. 
 
 Takes strong antislavery ground in 
 
 Virginia legislature, 196. 
 Rankin, John, 166, 178. 
 Rantoul, Robert, Jr., of Mass., 338. 
 Rathbun, George, of N. Y., 612. 
 Rayner, Kenneth, of N. C., 425, 426, 456, 
 
 619. 
 
 Read, George, of Del., 69. 
 Reid, Robert R., of Ga., 145. 
 Remond, Charles L , of Mass., 493, 494, 
 
 569. 
 
 Rencher, Abraham, of N. C., 352. 
 Representation, plan of, discussed in 
 
 Congress, 42. Proposition of Frank 
 lin, 42. Of slaves, 43. 
 -Republic of United States, how com* 
 
 menced, 18. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 665 
 
 Revolution, French, consequences of, to 
 blacks of San Domingo, 113. 
 
 Rhett, R. B., of S. C., 352, 612. 
 
 Rhode Island, act for suppression of in 
 voluntary servitude in 1652, 6. Passed 
 
 . law in 1774 against importation of 
 negroes into the State, 12. Abolition 
 Society of, formed, 26. 
 
 Rich, Charles, of Vt., 75. 
 
 Richardson, of Mass., 486. 
 
 " Richmond Inquirer," its portrayal of 
 the perils of slavery, 206. 
 
 Ritner, Governor, of Pa., 325, 327. 
 
 Rives, William C., of Va., 193. 
 
 Roane, of Va., 201. 
 
 Roberts, Jonathan, of Pa., 103, 141. 
 
 Robertson, George, of Ky., 139. 
 
 Robinson, John P., of Mass., 492. 
 
 Rochester, of N. Y., Secretary to Pana 
 ma Congress, 115. 
 
 Rockwell, Julius, of Mass., 647. 
 
 Rodney, Cesar, of Del., 33. 
 
 Root, Rev. Mr., of N. H., 358, 418. 
 
 Ross, John, Cherokee, 521, 524. 
 
 Ruggles, Benjamin, of Ohio, plea of, for 
 prohibition of slavery in Missouri, 142. 
 
 Ruggles, David, of Mass., colored, ex 
 cluded from cars, 492. 
 
 Rush, Dr. Benjamin, his " Address " in 
 1773, 12. Author of address of Con 
 vention of Abolition Societies to citi 
 zens of United States in 1794, 80. In 
 structed to make slave-trade piracy, 
 108. 
 
 Rutherford, of Va., 72. 
 
 Rutledge, John, of S. C., 46, 49, 72, 81. 
 
 S. 
 
 Saltonstall, Leverett, of Mass., 486. 
 
 Saniford, Ralph, his " Mystery of Ini 
 quity," 9. 
 
 San Jacinto, battle of, 590. 
 
 Santa Anna, President Mexican Repub 
 lic, taken prisoner, 590. 
 
 Scott, General, superseded, 517. 
 
 Scott, John, of Mo., 138. 
 
 Scott, of Pa., 64. 
 
 Scott, Rev. Orange, 280, 357, 415. 
 
 Seamen, free colored, their seizure and 
 84 
 
 imprisonment in Southern ports, 576 - 
 580. 
 
 Sedgwick, Theodore, Jr., 458. 
 
 Seminoles, treaty with, at Camp Moul- 
 trie, 133. Driven from homes and 
 property, 133. Slaves and free negroes 
 among them seized by Georgia planters, 
 515, 516. 
 
 Sergeant, John, of Pa., urges prohibition 
 of slavery in Missouri, 144. Speech of, 
 against constitution of Missouri with 
 slavery clause, 156. 
 
 Sewall, Justice Samuel, 7. 
 
 Sewall, Samuel E., 223, 335, 477, 577. 
 
 Seward, W. H., of N. Y., 408. His de 
 cision concerning fugitive slaves, 475, 
 545. 
 
 Shaw, Chief Justice, 371. 
 
 Sherman, Roger, of Conn., 48, 57, 69. 
 
 Sinnickson, Thomas, of N. J., 65. 
 
 Sitgreaves, Samuel, of Pa., 83. 
 
 Slave Power. Origin of, 2. Rapid 
 growth and increasing influence of, 
 30,38. Signal victory of, 53 - 56. Hu 
 miliating attitude of nation by, 112- 
 122. Its means of control, 152. De 
 mands Northern legislation, 339 - 343. 
 Subserviency of Mr. Van Buren's ad 
 ministration to, 590. 
 
 Slaves, African, introduced in to Europe, 2. 
 Brought into the thirteen colonies un 
 der British legislation, 3. Two brought 
 into Massachusetts Colony from Africa, 
 6. Action of General Court thereon, 
 6. Question of counting and taxing 
 them, 15. Number of, in United States 
 when independence declared, 18. 
 Emancipated on condition of entering 
 army, 20. Introduction of, prohibited 
 by Maryland and Virginia, 22. Debate 
 on importation of, 49. Number of, at 
 declaration of war, 118. Absconding, 
 demanded of British squadron and re 
 fused, 120. Question of surrender of 
 fugitives referred to Emperor of Russia, 
 121. Landed in Nassau from wrecked 
 slavers and made free by British gov 
 ernment, 441 . Of brig " Creole " seized 
 vessel and ran into Nassau, 443. Mr. 
 Giddings's resolutions, 447-449. Of 
 
666 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 the "Amistad," proceedings in their 
 case, 457 -469. Surrender of by the 
 Seminoles demanded, 512. Question 
 of property in, debated, 528 - 544. 
 
 Slave representation, debate on, 43. 
 Plantation whip employed by South 
 ern members, 44. Proposition of Ran 
 dolph to count slaves as three fifths, 45. 
 His proposition carried, 45. Vote of 
 the States on, 45. Influence and re 
 sults of the measure, 45. 
 
 Slavery, its source, 1. American, to 
 what it reduced man, 1. Antagonistic 
 to reason and conscience, 2. Its friends 
 dictated policy of England from 1620 
 to Revolution, 3. Planted in America 
 by British avarice, 4. Increase at 
 South before Revolution, 5. Its oppos- 
 ers in England and America, 5. De 
 nounced by popular leaders of New 
 England, Middle Colonies, and Vir 
 ginia, 13. Believed by leaders of Rev 
 olution to be inconsistent with doctrines 
 they were proclaiming, 17. Statesmen 
 expected it would pass away, 17. 
 Fostered by England and by individ 
 ual indolence and pride for a hundred 
 and fifty years, 17. Incorporated into 
 social life of the people, 17. Excluded 
 from Vermont, 20. Massachusetts 
 sought to extirpate it, 20. Bill in legis 
 lature forbidding it, 21. Excluded 
 from territory ceded by Virginia in 
 deed drawn by Jefferson, 32. Exclud 
 ed from territory northwest of Ohio, 
 33. Power of Congress to prohibit it 
 in Territories conceded by statesmen of 
 South as well as North, 38. Incorpor 
 ation of concessions to, into fundamen 
 tal law, gave new life to system, 55. 
 Memorials against, presented to first 
 Congress, 60. Its early extinction ex 
 pected by authors of compromises of 
 Constitution, 86. Mischievous influ 
 ences of, 112. Prohibition of, in Mis 
 souri and Arkansas debated, 137 -141. 
 Bill for restriction of slavery in Mis 
 souri, supported by Morrill of N. H., 
 Mellen of Mass. 1 , and Burrill of R. I., 
 and opposed by Walker of Ga., Ma- 
 
 con of N. C., and Pinckney of Md., 
 
 142. Bill for prohibition of, defeated, 
 
 143. Excluded from territory north of 
 36 30', 148. Power of Congress to pro 
 hibit it in new States affirmed by many 
 legislatures, 151. Extended debate on, 
 in Virginia legislature, 192-207. 
 Power of Congress to abolish it in the 
 District admitted by Calhoun, 391. 
 
 Slave-trade, African, early introduced in 
 to the colonies, 2. Their efforts to 
 check t defeated by British legislation, 
 3. "V irginia attempted to check it by 
 tax in 1726, 3. Efforts of Pennsylva 
 nia to prevent it, 3. Abolition of, 
 sought by Massachusetts in 1771 and 
 1774, 4. Death penalty passed on it 
 by Massachusetts and Rhode Island, 
 6. People in favor of putting an end 
 to it at time of Declaration of Inde 
 pendence, 16. Leaders of Revolution 
 opposed it, 17. Permitted till 1808, 
 51. Strictures on the twenty years' 
 extension of, 52. Gathered fresh life 
 from compromises of Constitution, 
 79. South Carolina and Georgia open 
 to fresh cargoes from Africa, 79. Con 
 gress memorialized by Convention of 
 Abolition Societies in 1794 to prevent 
 it, 80. South Carolina, in 1803, re 
 pealed law prohibiting importation of 
 slaves, 86. Mr. Jefferson's reference, 
 in message, to time fixed for prohibi 
 tion of, 89. Referred to committee, 
 90. Bill in Senate to prevent importa 
 tion of, 90. Extended debate on bills 
 relating to, 90-96. Extent of, and 
 how stimulated, 97. Increase of both 
 foreign and domestic, 98. Prosecuted 
 with fresh vigor after peace of 1815, 
 98. Demoralization produced by, 100, 
 101. Insincerity and inconsistency of 
 this government concerning, 109-111. 
 Debate on Quintuple Treaty for sup 
 pression of, 402. 
 
 Slave-trade, domestic, seat and head 
 quarters of, 98. Denounced by John 
 Randolph, 99, 101. Arguments and 
 measures for abolition of, 102-104. 
 President calls attention to it, 106. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 667 
 
 Report on, by Eandolph, 302. Termed 
 " brutal commerce " by Judge Morsell, 
 302. Resolutions concerning it in the 
 District, 303. Presented to Congress 
 by grand jury as " disgusting traffic," 
 304. Whipping of slaves in District 
 authorized by Congress, 304. Petitions 
 for abolition of, in District, 307. Peti 
 tions and discussions on, 307 - 320. 
 Interference with, through press and 
 speech, enrages South, 324-338. Right 
 of petition for abolition of, denied, 353. 
 Debate on, in Congress, 390-394. 
 Illustrated by scene in Washington, 
 395. Congress petitioned to suppress 
 all agitation concerning it in the Dis 
 trict, 396. Petitions for its abolition, 
 397. Gag law repealed, 432. Coast 
 wise slavers wrecked and slaves made 
 free by British power, 439. Slaves of 
 the " Hermosa," 442. 
 
 Slade, William, of Vt., 312, 350, 396, 398. 
 
 Slater, Mrs., of New Orleans, 370. 
 
 Smith, Gerrit, of N. Y., 289, 408, 545, 
 573. 
 
 Smith, Oliver H., of la., 442. 
 
 Smith, of N. J., 70. 
 
 Smith, William, of S. C., 64, 66, 70, 106, 
 142, 155. 
 
 Smythe, General, of Va., 145. 
 
 South Carolina, though early opposed, 
 soon encouraged slave-trade, 14. Del 
 egation of, declared their State not 
 come into Union if slave-trade prohib 
 ited, 50. Statesmen of, demanded 
 slave representation, continuance of 
 slave-trade, and rendition of slaves, as 
 conditions of joining Union, 53. Re 
 pealed her law prohibiting importation 
 of slaves, 86. Passes an act to re 
 strain emancipation, and to prevent 
 free persons of color from entering the 
 State, 576. 
 
 Southard, Samuel L., of N. J., 442. 
 
 Southgate, W. W., of Ky., 476. 
 
 Southwick, Joseph, of Boston, 571, 572. 
 
 Spaight, Richard D., of N. C., 32. 
 
 Spear, John M., of Mass., 492. 
 
 Spencer, Joshua A., of Utica, N. Y., 288. 
 
 Sprague, Peleg, 281. 
 
 Sprague, Seth, of Mass., 490, 494. 
 
 St. Clair, Alanson, 295, 415. 
 
 Stanton, Henry B., 262, 264, 293, 357, 
 
 366. Brilliant speech of, 367 - 369, 
 
 373, 407, 413, 420. 
 Staples, Seth P., 458. 
 Starbuck, Mrs. Nathaniel, Quaker 
 
 preacher, declaration of, 9. 
 Steele, John, of N. C., 68. 
 Stetson, Rev. Caleb, of Mass., 640. 
 Stevenson, Andrew, of Va., 440. 
 Stewart, Alvan, of N. Y., 295, 373 545, 
 
 548, 550. 
 
 Stiles, Dr. Ezra, 26. 
 Storrs, Rev. Charles B., 251. 
 Storrs, Rev. George, mobbed, 280. 
 Storrs, Henry R., of N. Y., 75, 157. 
 Story, Judge, 101. His decision in 
 
 " Amistad " case, 465 - 471. 
 Sturgis, William, of Boston, 386. 
 Strong, Hon. Henry, of Conn., 243. 
 Strother, of Va., opposes bounties for 
 
 crews capturing slave- vessels, 105. 
 Stuart, Alexander H., of Va., 427, 537. 
 Suffrage, right of, a source of contention, 
 
 407. 
 
 Sullivan, William, of Mass., 322. 
 Summers, George W., of Western Va., 
 
 203. 
 
 Sumner, Charles, of Mass., 645. 
 Sutherland, Joel B., of Pa., 310. 
 Swanwick, John, of Pa., 71, 82. 
 Swift, Benjamin, of Vt., 343. 
 
 T. 
 
 Tallmadge, J., Jr., of N. Y., amendment 
 of, concerning slavery in Missouri, 
 136, 139. 
 
 Taney, Chief Justice, 472. 
 
 Tappan, Arthur, 231 - 233, 243, 244, 
 259, 260, 263, 419, 420. 
 
 Tappan, Lewis, 231 - 233, 249 - 251, 260, 
 263, 266, 267, 289, 413, 414, 417, 420, 
 458, 466, 597. 
 
 Tax, by Virginia, on slaves imported, 
 early repealed, 3. Vote in Congress 
 not to tax slaves, 16. On imported 
 slaves, moved by Martin of Md., 48. 
 Of ten dollars, proposed by Mr. Par- 
 
668 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 ker of Va. in first Congress, 57. Pro 
 posed in 1804, by Mr. Bard of Pa., 86. 
 Warm debate on Bard's bill, 85 - 88. 
 
 Taylor, General, 524, 541. 
 
 Taylor, John W., of N. Y., 106, 136, 
 138, 139, 141. 
 
 Taylor, of Va., 69. 
 
 Tennessee, territory of, ceded by North 
 Carolina, 34. 
 
 Territory. Measures of Congress to fix 
 its condition, 31 . Portions of it claimed 
 by several States, 31. Deed of cession 
 excluding slavery presented by Jeffer 
 son, 31 . Freedom clause struck out, 32. 
 Bill to exclude slavery from, northwest 
 of Ohio River, 32. Ordinance passed 
 July, 1787, excluding slavery from 
 territory covered by five Western 
 States, 33. Act passed prohibiting 
 slavery northwest of Ohio, 33. Fail 
 ure of efforts to repeal act prohibiting 
 slavery in northwest, 34. Great bene 
 fits of the ordinance of 1787, 34. Of 
 Tennessee, ceded by North Carolina 
 on condition that no regulation be 
 made tending to emancipation, 34. 
 Power of Congress to prohibit slavery 
 in, admitted by South as well as North, 
 38. Of Arkansas and Michigan, ap 
 ply for enabling act, 343. 
 
 Texas, a portion of, ceded to Spain by 
 United States, 588. Attempt to re 
 purchase, 589. Independence of, pro 
 claimed, 590. Independence recog 
 nized by United States, 590. Annex 
 ation of, proposed, 590. Address to 
 the people against annexation of, 593. 
 Emancipation in, sought by compen 
 sation, 597. Southern cry of " Texas 
 or Disunion," 599. Treaty of annexa 
 tion, 600. Treaty of annexation de 
 feated, 602. Extended debate on an 
 nexation, 609-620. Convention in 
 Massachusetts to resist it, 642. Anti- 
 Texas meeting in Faneuil Hall, 645. 
 Admitted to the Union, 648. Ad 
 dress to the public by Anti-Texas Com 
 mittee of Massachusetts, 649. Causes 
 of this victory of the Slave Power, 650. 
 
 Thacher, Ilev. Moses, 225. 
 
 Thatcher, George, of Mass., 36, 71, 82. 
 
 Thayer, Minot, of Mass., 489. 
 
 Thomas, Francis, of Md., 310. 
 
 Thomas, Jesse B., of 111., 143. 
 
 Thomas, Seth J., of Mass., 491. 
 
 Thome, James A., of Ky., 264. 
 
 Thonfpson, Indian agent, 515. 
 
 Thompson, Justice, of N. Y., 460, 462. 
 
 Thompson, Waddy, of S. C., 347, 398, 
 534. 
 
 Thurston, Rev. David, of Me., 250, 419. 
 
 Torrey, Charles T., 411, 415. 
 
 Treaty of Peace, signed in 1782, 31. 
 With England, for suppression of 
 slave-trade, 109. 
 
 Treaty, Quintuple, between European 
 powers for suppression of slave-trade, 
 401. Ashburton, its provisions con 
 cerning slave-trade, 401. 
 
 Trimble, William A., of Ohio, 143. 
 
 Troup, of Ga., ready to enforce abolition 
 of African slave-trade, 104. 
 
 Tuck, Amos, of N. H., 626, 628. 
 
 Tucker, Thomas T., of S. C., 63. 
 
 Turner, Nat, insurrection, trial, and exe 
 cution of, 190, 191. 
 
 Twiggs, General, 523. 
 
 Tyler, John, of Va., advocates slavery 
 in Missouri, 145. Becomes President, 
 423. Ultra slaveholder, 424. Urges 
 Texas annexation, 609, 617. 
 
 U. 
 
 Underwood, Joseph R., of Ky., 350, 430. 
 Union, dissolution of, advocated, 568 - 
 
 575. Protests against the doctrine, 
 
 571-574. 
 Upshur, A. P., of Va., 592, 594, 597. 
 
 V. 
 
 Van Buren, Vice-President, gives cast 
 ing vote for Incendiary Publication 
 bill, 342. His connection with the 
 slavers " Comet " and " Encomium," 
 and the " Amistad " case, 468. Rejects 
 Texas annexation, 590, 603. 
 
 Van Dyke, Nicholas, of Del., 142. 
 
 Van Zandt, of Ohio, tried and punished 
 for assisting fugitive slaves, 475. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 669 
 
 Vance, Governor, of Ohio, 542. 
 
 Varnum, Joseph B., of Mass., 35, 72. 
 
 Vermont framed constitution excluding 
 slavery, 20. Legislature of, adopt 
 resolutions on slavery in the District, 
 370. 
 
 Virginia, prohibits introduction of slaves, 
 22. Kepeals statute forbidding eman 
 cipation, 22. Her plan of representa 
 tion, 42. Convention of, for revision 
 of Constitution, 189. Insurrection in, 
 190. Great debate in legislature of, 
 194-207. Act touching fugitive 
 slaves, 474. 
 
 W. 
 
 Wakefield, Horace P., of Mass., 252. 
 
 Walker, of Ala., 106. 
 
 Walker, Jonathan, of Mass., 640. 
 
 Walker, of N. C., 139. 
 
 Walker, Robert J., of Miss., 316, 608. 
 
 Wall, Garrett D., of N. J., 392. 
 
 Wain, Eobert, of Pa., 72. 
 
 Walworth, Chancellor, 235. 
 
 Ward, Aaron, of N. Y., 448. 
 
 Washington, his letter to Lafayette, 
 30. 
 
 Washington, Judge Bushrod, of Va., 
 first president of Colonization Society, 
 212. 
 
 Washington, Madison, a slave, seized 
 brig " Creole " with slaves, 443. 
 
 Webster, Daniel, of Mass., 342, 445, 446, 
 591, 592, 648. 
 
 Weems, John C., of Md., 304. 
 
 Weiss, Rev. John, of Mass., 640. 
 
 Weld, Theodore D., 262, 264, 273, 275, 
 293, 428. 
 
 Weller, John B., of Ohio, 449, 476. 
 
 Wesley, John, his characterization of 
 slavery as the " sum of all villanies," 
 11. 
 
 Wetmore, Rev. Mr., of Utica, N. Y., 
 288. 
 
 Whig party, defections from, 622. Di 
 vergence of views in, concerning slav 
 ery, 637. Development of proslavery 
 sentiments in, 646. 
 
 White, John, of Ky., 449. 
 
 White, Hugh L., of Tenn., 316. 
 
 White, William A., of Mass., 571, 572, 
 643, 644. 
 
 Whitefield, Rev. George, travelled in 
 Southern States, 11. His "Letter" 
 to them in 1739, 11. 
 
 Whitman, Ezekiel, of Mass., 77. 
 
 Whitmarsh, Seth, of Mass., 337. 
 
 Whitridge, Dr., of S. C., 580. 
 
 Whittier, John G., 7, 236, 250, 260, 294, 
 418, 643, 645. 
 
 Whittlesey, Elisha, of Ohio, 529. 
 
 Wild Cat, Indian chief, 521, 526. 
 
 Williams, of Conn., 77. 
 
 Williams, John M., of Mass., 623. 
 
 Williams, of N. Y., Agent of American 
 Antislavery Society, demanded for trial 
 in Alabama, 326. 
 
 Wilson, Henry, of Mass., 485, 491, 496, 
 622, 636, 637, 640, 641, 643, 645. 
 
 Wilson, James, of N. H., 543. 
 
 Wilson, J. J., of N. J., 154. 
 
 Winslow, Rev. Hubbard, 387. 
 
 Winthrop, Robert C., of Mass., 584, 613, 
 638. 
 
 Wii% William, pronounces imprison 
 ment of colored seamen unconstitu. 
 tional, 577. 
 
 Wise, Henry A., of Va., 309, 312, 344, 
 350, 395, 398, 424-426, 428, 482. 
 
 Wolcott, Governor, of Conn., address of, 
 to legislature on deplorable effects of 
 slavery extension, 152. 
 
 Woman question, debate and action on 
 it, 410. Protest against their public 
 speaking, 411. Women admitted as 
 delegates by American Antislavery So 
 ciety, 414. Many delegates retire and 
 form Massachusetts Abolition Society, 
 414. Miss Kelley put upon committee 
 by American Antislavery Society, 
 419. 
 
 Wood, of Va., 202. 
 
 Woodbury, Justice, decision in Van 
 Zandt case, 477. 
 
 Woods, Leonard, Jr., of Mass., 322. 
 
 Woolman, John, travelled South in 
 1746 to 1767, proclaiming liberty, 9. 
 
 World's Convention, letter of, 399. 
 
670 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Wright, Albert J., of Mass., 498. 
 Wright, Elizur, Jr., 232, 250, 259, 407, 
 
 412. 
 
 Wright, Henry C., 565, 569. 
 Wright, Robert, of Md., 77. 
 Wright, Silas, of N. Y., 342, 604, 608. 
 
 Y. 
 
 Yancey, William L., of Ala., 611. 
 Yates, of N. Y., cast the only vote against 
 
 bill to exclude slavery from northwest 
 
 territory, 33. 
 
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