# The Collected Works of Theodore Parker/Volume 06/Discourse 8

THE PRESENT ASPECT OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA, AND THE IMMEDIATE DUTY OF THE NORTH.
A SPEECH
DELIVERED IN THE HALL OF THE STATE HOUSE, BEFORE THE MASSACHUSETTS ANTI-SLAVERY CONVENTION, ON FRIDAY, JANUARY 29, 1858.
Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen:— I shall not hold you long to-night. There are others to speak after me who have better claims to your attention—the one (Mr. Remond) for his race, the other (Mr. Phillips) for the personal attributes of eloquence which, in America, have never reached a higher height, or exhibited themselves in so fair a form. The hand of the dial shall pass round once, and I leave this spot, to be filled more worthily. During these sixty minutes, I ask your attention to some thoughts on the "Present Aspect of Slavery in America, and the immediate Duty of the North."
Mr. Guizot—one of the most learned and humane of the European statesmen—prefaced one edition of his History of Representative Government, by stating that the conditions of national welfare were far more difficult than the too sanguine hopes of mankind had ever led them to expect. If that were so m Europe, where centuries of bitter experience have taught men to be cautious in their hopes, how much truer it is in America, where we think liberty is so natural to the soil and congenial to man, that it needs no support from the people, but will thrive of its own sweet accord!
In some respects, our experiment is simpler than the great attempts at freedom made before us in the Old World; in some others it is more complex and difficult. All the old ​ forms of civilization were based on unity of race. It was so with the Romans, Greeks, Persians, Hebrews, Egyptians, East Indians. The same holds good of the Moors, who mark the transition from ancient to modern times. All the mediæval attempts at improvement had the same character —in Spain, Italy, France, Germany, England itself. Civilization hitherto has belonged only to the Caucasian race. The Africans have remained strangers to it in all times past; they could not achieve it for themselves at the time, hitherto never rising above the savage or the barbarous state; no other people brought it to them, or them to it, save in small numbers.
It was left for America to begin a new experiment in the history of civilization—to bring divers races into closest contact. The Catholic Spaniard began the experiment: he mixed his blood with the red man, whose country he subdued; he brought hither also the black man. Thus the African savage, the American barbarian, and the civilized Caucasian of Spain, became joint stockholders in this new coparceny of races. The Protestant Briton continued what his Catholic predecessor had begun; and, while the Puritan was painfully voyaging to Plymouth, in the wilderness seeking an asylum where the Apocalyptic woman might bear her manchild to grow up in freedom, other Saxons were bringing a ship-load of negroes to the wilderness, to become slaves for ever. Thus the African came to British and Spanish America. Out of the 60,000,000 inhabitants of this continent, I take it about 9,000,000 are of this unfortunate race.
In the United States to-day, four of the five great races live side by side. There are some 60,000 or 80,000 Mongolian Chinese in California, I am told; there are 400,000 American Indians within our borders; perhaps 4,600,000 Africans; and 26,000,000 Caucasians. The union of such diverse ethnological elements makes our experiment of democracy more complex, and perhaps more difficult than it would otherwise be.
The Mongolians are few in numbers, and so transient in their stay that nothing more need now be said of them.
It is plain where the red man will go. In two hundred years, an Indian will be as rare in the United States as now in New England. Like the bear and the buffalo, he ​ perishes with the forest, which to him and them was what cultivated fields, towns, and cities are to us. Our fathers tried to enslave the ferocious and unprogressive Indian; he would not work—for himself as a freeman, nor for others as a slave: he would fight. He would not be enslaved—he could not help being killed. He perishes before us. The sinewy Caucasian labourer lays hold on the phlegmatic Indian warrior; they struggle in deadly grasp—naked man to naked man, hand to shoulder, knee to knee, breast to breast; the white man bends the red man over, crushes him down, and chokes him dead. It is always so when the civilized meets the savage, or the barbarian—naked man to naked man: how much more fatal is the issue to the feeble when the white man shirted in iron has the smallpox for his ally, and rum for his tomahawk! In the long run of history, the race is always to the swift, and the battle to the strong. The Indian will perish—utterly and soon.
The African is the most docile and pliant of all the races of men; none has so little ferocity : vengeance, instantial with the Caucasian, is exceptional in his history. In his barbarous, savage, or even wild state, he is not much addicted to revenge; always prone to mercy. No race is so strong in the affectional instinct which attaches man to man by tender ties; none so easy, indolent, confiding, so little warlike. Hence is it that the white men have kidnapped the black, and made him their prey.
This piece of individual biography tells us the sad history of the African race. Not long since, a fugitive slave told me his adventures. I will call him John—it is not his name. He is an entire negro—his grandfather was brought direct from the Congo coast to America. A stout man, thick-set, able-bodied, with great legs and mighty arms, he could take any man from this platform, and hurl him thrice his length. He was a slave—active, intelligent, and much confided in. He had a wife and children. One day his master, in a fit of rage, struck at him with a huge club, which broke both of his arms; they were awkwardly set, and grew out deformed. The master promised to sell the man to himself for a large sum, and take the money by instalments, a little at a time. But, when more than half of it was paid, he actually sold him to a trader, to be taken further South, and there disposed of. The appeals of the ​ wife, the tears of the children, moved not the master whom justice had also failed to touch. As the boat which contained poor John shot by the point of land where he had lived, his wife stood upon the shore, and held her babies up for him to look upon for the last time. Descending the Mississippi, the captain of the boat had the river fever, lost his sight for the time, and John took the command. One night, far down the Mississippi, he found himself on board a boat with the three kidnappers who had him in their power, and intended to sell him. They were asleep below—the captain still blind with the disease—he watchful on deck. "I crept down barefoot," said John. "There they lay in their bunks, all fast asleep. They had money, and I none. I had done them no harm, but they had torn me from my wife, from my children, from my liberty. I stole up noiselessly, and came back again, the boat's axe in my hand. I lifted it up, and grit my teeth together, and was about to strike: and it came into my mind, 'No murderer hath eternal life.' I put the axe back in its place, and was sold into slavery. What would you have done in such a case?" I told him that I thought I should have sent the kidnappers to their own place first, and then trusted that the act would be imputed to me for righteousness by an all-righteous God! I need not ask what Mr. Garrison would do in like case. I think his Saxon blood would move swift enough to sweep off his non-resistant creed, and the three kidnappers would have started on their final journey before he asked, "Where shall I go?"
John's story is also the story of Africa. The stroke of an axe would have settled the matter long ago. But the black man would not strike. One day, perhaps, he will do what yonder monument commends.
At this moment, we have perhaps 4,500,000 men of African descent in the United States; say 4,000,000 slaves, 500,000 free. They are with us, are of us; America cannot be rid of them if she would. Shall they continue slaves, or be set free? What consequences will follow either result? This is the great question for America. It is the question of industry, of morals, of religion; it is the immediate question of politics. It does not concern the 4,000,000 slaves alone, but also each of the 26,000,000 Caucasian freemen. On it depends the success or the ​ failure of our experiment of Democracy. The bondage of a class may continue in a despotism; there it is no contradiction to the national idea. It is different in a Democracy which rests on the equality of all men in natural rights. So here the question of Slavery is this: "Shall we have an industrial Democracy, or a military despotism?" If you choose Slavery, then you take the issue of Slavery, which can no more be separated from it than cold from ice. No nation can escape the consequences of its own first principle of politics. The logic of the idea is the "manifest destiny" of the people. If Slavery continues, Democracy goes down; every form of republicanism, or of constitutional monarchy, will perish; and absolute military despotism take their place at last. From despotism, as seed reared in the national garden, comes despotism, as national crop, growing in the continental field.
This question of Slavery does not concern America alone; all Christendom likewise is party to the contest. To all men it is a question of industry, commerce, education, morals, religion; to the civilized world, it is the great question of civilization itself. Shall this great continent be delivered over to ideas which help the progress of mankind, or to those which only hinder it?
Every year brings America into closer relations with the rest of mankind. Our Slavery becomes, therefore, an element in the world's politics. See, then, for a moment, how the various Christian nations stand affected towards it.
Just now, there are but five great national powers in the civilized or Christian world. Spain, Italy, and Greece pass for nothing—they have no influence in the progressive movements of mind, are no longer a force in the world's civilization. They are not wholly dead; but so far as they affect other peoples, it is only by the thought of past generations, not the present. I pass those three decaying nations by, and look at the live peoples. There is (1) the Russian power—a great Slavic people holding Mongolians in subjection; (2) the French power—a great Celtic people variously crossed with Basque, Roman, and Teutonic tribes; (3) the German power—a great Teutonic people, in many nations or States, with Slavic and Celtic elements mixed in; (4) the English power—a great Saxon-Teutonic people, with Celtic annexations; and (6) the American power— ​ a great English-Saxon-Teutonic people, with diverse mixtures from the rest of mankind. All the four act on the fifth, and influence our treatment of this question of Slavery.
I. Russia is mighty by itsv ast territory, its great natural resources, its immense population, its huge army—appointed and commanded well—its strong central government, its diplomatic talent, and the people's ability to spread. The Government is despotic, but yet one of the most progressive in Christendom. With the bondage of Africans, Russia has no direct concern; she has much to do with that of white Caucasians. She is rapidly putting an end to Slavery in her own borders. Not many years ago, the late emperor Nicholas emancipated the serfs he had inherited as his own private property. They amounted to more than 7,500,000 men; he established over 4000 schools for the education of their children. Alexander, his son, had not been in the imperial seat three years before he published a decree for the gradual and ultimate emancipation of all the serfs in the empire. Their number must exceed the entire population of the United States. Here is the decree, dated the 20th of last November—the 2nd of December by our New Style calendar. The proprietors of two large provinces—St. Petersburg and Lithuania (containing nearly three million souls) some weeks since asked permission to emancipate their serfs at once. Yesterday's steamer brings also the welcome news that the proprietors of Nishni-Novogorod have just done the same. This province is as large as Virginia, with a population of 1,500,000, and, with the exception of the capital and its environs, is the richest and most intellectual part of the empire. It abounds with manufactories; every year, 300,000 strangers from Asia and elsewhere trade in its fairs. You would expect the most enlightened population to demand the immediate freedom of the serfs. Russia has become an ally on our side. Her example favours freedom. So you will find a change in the Southern newspapers, and in the American Government, which they direct and control. In the Crimean war, when Russia fought for injustice, they sustained her as the ally of their own despotism, and fought against England as their foe. All that will soon change; and already Southern papers denounce the enfranchisement ​ of the Russian serf: "The example is dangerous;" "the condition of the British West Indies, and of Hayti, might have taught Alexander a better lesson."
II. The French are powerful through the character of the people—the most military in the world—their science, letters, art, the high civilization of the land. France has had a long and sad connection with African Slavery. Once she was the most cruel of cruel masters. In her first Revolution, of 1789, the chain was broken, but its severed links united again. In the last Revolution, of 1 848, at the magic word of Lamartine, expressing the revolutionary thought of the people, the fetters were not only broken off, but cast into the sea. France, for a moment, was the ally of Freedom—and of course encoimtered the noisy wrath of the Southern States. But the Celtic French, the most fickle people in the world, revolution their normal State, perpetually turning round and round, have elected a tyrant for their master, and now worship the Emperor. He has "crushed out" Freedom from the French press as completely as our own Mr. Gushing wished to do in America. The new tyrant attempts to revive the African slave trade, and has already made arrangements for kidnapping 5,000 savages in Africa, and. sending them as missionaries to Christianize the West Indies! What will come of this scheme, I know not. But just now the political power of France is hostile to Freedom everywhere. When the Emperor has padlocked even the French mouthy no wonder he finds it easy to chain the negro's hands* No doubt the intellectual and moral power of France are on our side as before; but both are silent and of no avail. The French Emperor is the "little Napoleon" of the African slave trade. Great is the joy thereat in the Southern States: already their newspapers glorify the "profound policy," "the wise and humane statesmanship of the great Emperor."
"A fellow feeling makes us wondrous kind."
III. The Germans are of our blood and language—bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh—with the same blue eyes, the same brown hair and ruddy cheek, and instinctive love of individuality. The people which began the civilization of modern times by inventing the Press, and originating ​ the Protestant Reformation, can it ever be false to Freedom? Germany acts on mankind by thought—by great ideas. What France is for war, England for commerce, and Russia for the brute power of men, that is Germany for thought. The Germans have had connection with African Slavery, but have ended it. Sweden begun the work some years ago; then Denmark followed; now, within the last few months, Holland has finished it. Here are the documents. Soon the last footsteps of German oppression will be covered up by the black man rejoicing in is freedom. Though their rulers are often tyrants, our German kinsfolk are on our side—God bless them!
IV. England has great influence by her political institutions, her army and navy, her commerce and manufactures, her power of practical thought, her large wealth, her mighty spread. She and her children control a sixth part of the globe, and nearly a fourth part of its people. No tribe of men has done such service for Freedom as the Anglo-Saxons, in Britain and America. England has had connection with African Slavery, her hand has been dyed deep in the negro's blood. She planted Slavery in her provinces throughout the continent and its many islands; the ocean reeked with the foul steam of her slave-ships. She was a hard master, and men died by millions under her lash. But nobly did the dear old mother put this wickedness away. She abolished the slave trade, making it piracy; at length, she repudiated Slavery itself, and in one day threw into the sea the fetters of 800,000 men. Well did Lord Brougham say—it was "the greatest triumph ever won over the foulest wrong man ever did against man." England need hot boast of Agincourt, Cressy, Poitiers, and many another victorious fight, at Waterloo, Sebastopol, or Delhi; the most glorious victory her annals record was achieved on the 1st of August, in the first year of Victoria, when justice triumphed over such giant wrong. Nobly has she contended against the slave trade, rousing the tardy conscience of Brazil, and not quite vainly galvanizing Spain into some show of humanity. She has shamed even the American Government—and I think we have a sloop-of-war on the African coast, which we yearly hear of in the annual appropriation bill!
But this nobleness is exceptional even in England; the world had seen no such example before. That emancipa​ tion was not brought about by the privileged class, the royal and nobilitary, who officially reign, or the commercial class, who actually govern the nation; but by the moral class, whose conscience stirred the people, and constrained the Government to do so just a deed. Of course a reaction must follow. We see its effect to-day. There is a party which favours African Slavery. Mr. Carlyle is the heroic representative thereof. Personally amiable, in his ideas he is the Goliath of Slavery. Just now, the London Times appears to favour this reactionary movement, and its powerful articles are reprinted with great jubilation in the American newspapers, which hate England because they love the Slavery which she has hated so long. There is no time to inquire into the cause of this reaction. It affects the political class, and still more certain commercial classes to whom "cotton is king." Great is the delight of the South; the slave power sings Te Deums to its God. A bill was before the Senate, not long since, appropriating $3750 to pay the masters for twelve slaves who ran away and were carried off by the British in the war of 1812, whom the captors, even then, refused to deliver up to "democratic bondage." Mr. Hale opposed the bill, because it recognised the doctrine that there may be property in human beings, declaring that neither by vote nor by silence would he ever recognise so odious and false a doctrine. Mr. Seward joined in the opposition. But Mr. Fugitive Slave Bill Mason came to the rescue ; and after referring to the anti-Slavery opinions of the British, declared he was "gratified to see those opinions are rapidly undergoing a change." What signs of such a rapid change he may have seen, I know not ; nor what sympathies with the slave power the accomplished British minister, new in this field, may have expressed to him: "Diplomacy is a silent art." But I think Mr. Mason greatly mistakes the British public, if he believes they will be fickle in their love of right. The Anglo-Saxon has always been a resolute tribe. I believe John Bull is the most obstinate of all national animals. When his instinctive feelings and his reflective conscience command the same thing, depend upon it he will not lack the will.
There may have been a change in the British Government, though I doubt it much; there has been in the ​ London Times. In the "cotton lords," I take it, there is no alteration of doctrine, only an utterance of what they have long thought. The opinion of the British people, I think, has only changed to a yet greater hatred against Slavery. The anti-Slavery party in England has immense power—not so much by its numbers, or its wealth, as by its intelligence, and still more by that justice which, in the long run of time, is always sure of the victory. At the head of this party I must place Lord Brougham, now drawing near the end of a long and most laborious life, not without its eccentricities, but mainly devoted to the highest interests of the human race. Within the four seas of Britain, I think there lives no man who has done so much to proclaim ideas of justice and humanity, and to diffuse them among the people. If he could not oftener organize them into law, it was because he took too long a step in advance of public opinion; and he that would lead a child must always keep hold of its hand. Nearly fifty years ago (June 14, 1810) he fought against the slave trade, and drew on him the wrath of men "who live by treachery, rapine, torture, and murder, and are habitually practising the worst of crimes for the worst of purposes." Long ago he declared—"There is a law above all the enactments of human codes—the same throughout the world, the same in all times; it is the law written by the finger of God on the heart of man; and by that law, unchangeable and eternal, while men despise fraud, and loathe rapine, and abhor blood, they will reject the wild and guilty phantasy that man can hold property in man." When the little tyrant of France revives the slave trade, the great champion of human right roused him once more for battle, and the British Government has taken the affair in hand. The British love of justice will triumph in this contest. Why, the history of England is pledged as security therefore.
Such to-day is the opinion of the four great nations of Christian Europe. What if the despotic power of the French Emperor be against us ; what if, for a moment, the cotton lords of England lead a few writers and politicians to attempt the restoration of bondage; the conscience of England and her history, the intelligence of France and Germany, the example of Russia are on our side. Yes, ​ the teachings of universal human history. All these come with their accumulated force to help the moral feeling of America sustain the rights of man.
The American Government has long been on the side of Slavery. The present administration is more openly hostile to Freedom than any of its predecessors. Mr. Buchanan is no doubt weak and infatuated, strong only in his wrong-headedness; his cabinet is palsied with Slavery. But he has done one service which was thought hopelessly difficult,—he has already made President Pierce's administration respectable. We complain of the New Hampshire general, but the little finger of Buchanan's left hand is thicker than Pierce's whole loins.
Since we met last the Federal Government has committed two outrages more.
I. The first is the Dred Scott decision. The Supreme Court is only the dirty mouth of the slave power, its chief function to belch forth iniquity, and name it law. Of the decision itself, I need not speak. It is the political opinion of seven partisans appointed to do officially that wickedness which their personal nature also no doubt inclined them to. That Court went a little beyond itself,—out-Heroding Herod.
Two Northern judges, only two, McLean and Curtis, opposed the wrong. I think nobody will accuse me of any personal prejudice in favour of Judge Curtis, or any undue partiality towards him. His conduct on other and trying occasions has been justly condemned on the anti-Slavery platform, and is not likely to be soon forgot, hor should it ever be. But I should do great injustice to you and him, and still more to my own feelings, if I let this occasion pass without a word of honest and hearty praise of that able lawyer and strong-minded man. He opposed the "decision," with but a single Northern judge to support him, with two Northern judges to throw technical difficulties in his way and oppose him by coward treachery, with five Southern judges openly attacking and browbeating him, with both the outgomg and incoming administration to oppress and mock at him, with subtle and treacherous advisers at home to beguile his steps and watch for his halting, did Judge Curtis stand up at Wash​ ington, amid those corrupt and wicked judges, and in the name of history which they falsified, of law which they profaned, of justice which they mocked at, with a manliness which Story never showed on such occasions, he pronounced his sentence against the wicked Court. I remember his former conduct with indignation and with shame; but no blackness of the old record shall prevent me from turning over a new leaf, and with golden letters writing there—In the Supreme Court Judge Curtis defended once the higher law of right.
I am truly sorry his manhood did not stay by him and continue his presence in that Court. The defence of his resignation is found in the inadequacy of the salary. It was M500 when he took it, *6000 when he left it. A pitiful reason—by no means the true one. Samuel Adams was a poor man ; I do not think he would have left his seat in the revolutionary Congress because more money could be made by the cod-fishery or by privateering.
II. The Dred Scott decision was the first enormity. The next is General Walker's filibustering expedition. I regard this as the act of the Government. "What you do by another, you do also by yourself," is a maxim older than the Roman law which preserves it. I am not inclined generally to place much confidence in Walker's word, but he sometimes tells the truth. In a recent speech at Mobile, he says he had an interview with the President, last summer, and declared his intention of returning to Nicaragua: his (filibustering) letter was published with the President's consent. A member of the cabinet sought a confidential interview with him, told him where he might go with safety, where only with danger; and added, "You will probably sail in an American vessel, under the American flag. After you have passed American limits, no one can touch you but by consent of this Government." A cabinet minister told one of Walker's friends, if he made an alliance with Mexico, and attempted the conquest of Cuba, "means shall not be lacking to carry out the enterprise." Walker says the Government arrested him, not because he attacked Nicaragua, but because he did not attack Mexico! I hold the Federal Government responsible alike for the conduct of Walker and the Supreme Court.
But omitting particulars, looking only at the general ​ course of the Government, you find it favours Slavery with continued increase of intensity. Let not this rest on my testimony alone, or your judgment. Here is "An Address delivered before the Euphemian and Philomathean Literary Societies of Erskine College, at the Annual Commencement, Wednesday, August 12th, 1857, by Richard Yeadon, Esq., of Charleston, S. C." Mr. Yeadon is a representative man, editor of the Charleston Courier, and a staunch defender of the peculiar institution. He tells us he comes "rather to sow the good seed of truth, than to affect the arts or graces of oratory; to teach the lessons of history, and impress the deductions of reason, than to twme the garlands of science, or strew the roses of literature;" he would "combine the didactic in large measure with the rhetorical." He discusses the character of the Federal Government and its relation to Slavery, "on which rest the pillars of the great social fabric of the South." He attempts to show that the Constitution was so framed as to uphold Slavery and check Freedom ; and that the Federal Government has carried out the plan with such admirable vigour, that now Slavery can stand by its own strength. But you must have his own words:—
"The new Constitution not only recognised, sanctioned, and gaaranteed it [Slavery] as a State institution, sacred within State limits from Federal invasion or interference, but also so far as to foster and expand it, by Federal protection and agency, wherever it was legalized, within State or territorial limits ; to uphold it by Federal power, and the Federal arm against domestic violence or foreign invasion; and, to make it an element of Federal organization and existence, by adopting it as a basis of Federal representation, and a source of Federal revenue."
"From that day to this, the institution of domestic Slavery, within the several States, has been regarded and held sacred as a reserved right, exclusively within State jurisdiction and beyond the constitutional power of Congress or of the general Government, except for guarantee, protection, and defence; it being one and the chief of those 'particular interests' which the Convention had in view, as enhancing the difficulty of their work."
"The general Government and the co-States are bound by constitutional duty and Federal compact to uphold and defend the institution, whereever it lawfully exists, in any of the States."
"Indeed, so unquestionable is the exclusive jurisdiction of State sovereignty, except in the way of guarantee and protection, over the institution of Slavery within State limits, that even the high-priest and arch-fiend of political free-Boilism, William H. Seward, in his speech in Congress, on the admission of California into the Union, thus conceded it—’No free State claims to extend its legislation into a slave State. None ​claims that Congress shall usurp power to abolish Slavery in the slave States;' and the wildest fanatics of abolitionism, of the Parker and Garrison school, acknowledge that their atrocions crosade against the South can only achieve its nnhallowed aims by trampling as well on the Constitution of their country, as on the oracles of God."
He has admiration for one Northern man who has been remarkably faithful to the ideas and plans of the slave power. He says it is the duty of the General Government to protect Slavery by suppressing insurrectionary movements, or attempts at domestic violence, and to turn out the whole force of the Republic, regular and militia:—
"It was in contemplation of such a contingency, such a casus fœderis, that the eloquent, accomplished, and gifted Everett (now dedicating his extraordinary powers of composition and elocution, under the auspices of the Southern Matron, a patriot daughter of the Palmetto State, to the purchase and consecration of the home and the grave of Washington, as the Mecca of America), in his maiden speech as the representative in Congress of the city of Boston, in 1826, then firesh from the pulpit, in honourable contrast with the dastardly Sumners and bullying Burlingames of the present day, thus patriotically and fervently spoke—’Sir, 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 shoulder, than that of putting down a servile insurrection in the South.'"
The newspapers say, with exquisite truth, that Mr. Everett is "the monarch of the platform," the "greatest literary ornament of the entire continent of America." So he is: but to Mr. Yeadon, he is also a great hero, the iron man of courage, unlike the "dastardly Sumners," and "the dishonoured and perjured miscreants, Seward, Sumners, et id omne genus, who advocated the 'higher law doctrine.'"
He thus sums up the whole of our history:—
"The American Union … has been the great bulwark of … Southern Slavery, and has, in fact, nursed and fostered it, from a feeble and rickety infancy, into a giant manhood and maturity, and self sustaining power, able to maintain itself either in the Union or out of the Union, as may best comport with the future policy and welfare of the Southern States."
"Finally, to crown all, comes, in august majesty, the decision of the Supreme Judicatory of the United States in the case of Dred Scott, pronouncing the Missouri restriction unconstitutional, null and void, and declaring all territories of the Union, present and future, when acquired by purchase or conquest, by common treasure or common blood, to be held by the General Government, as a trustee for the common benefit of all the States, and open to every occupancy and residence of the citizens ​of every State, with their property of every description, including slaves reposing under the aegis of the Constitution."
"The cheering result, then, is, that the Southern States stand now on stronger and higher ground than at any previous period of our history; and this, under the progressive and constitutional action of the General Government, blotting out invidious lines, establishing the broad platform of State equality, demolishing squatter sovereignty, retrieving the errors of the past, and furnishing new securities for the future."
"The number of slave-holding States has been increased to fifteen, out of an aggregate of thirty-one States, with a fair prospect of further increase in Texas, and in other territory, acquired or to be acquired from Mexico, in the Carribean Sea, and still further south."
The slave States, he says, no longer "conceding domestic Slavery to be a 'moral, social, and political evil,' any more than any other system of menial and praedial labour, but able … to defend it as consistent with scriptural teachings, and as an ordinance of Jehovah for the culture and welfare of the staple States, and the civilization and Christianization of the African." To them he says, "Cotton is king, and destined to rule the nations with imperial sway."
The slave-holders feel stronger than ever before. This privileged class, the " Nobility of Democracy," counts only 350,000 in all. Feeble in numbers, the slave power is strong in position—holding the great federal offices, judicial, executive, and military, stronger in purpose and in will. "The hope, the courage of assailants, is always greater than that of those who act merely on the defensive." At the South, it rules the non -slaveholders, as at the North it has had also the Democratic party under its thumb. There is a secret article in the creed of that party which demands unconditional submission to the infallibility of the negro-driver. Senator Toombs has no slaves in Georgia who yield to his will more submissively than to the whim of the Southern master crouches Hon. Mr. Gushing, whose large intellectual talents, great attainments, and consummate political art, in this hall, so fitly represent the town of Newburyport. It is the glory of the Northern Democratic party that it has been the most cringeing slave to the haughtiest and unworthiest master in the world. All individuality seemed "crushed out," to use Mr. Cushing's own happy phrase. Within eight months every Northern State has had a State Democratic Convention, each of which has passed resolutions endorsing the Dred Scott decision. This act implies no individuality, of thought or ​ of will. The Southern master gave command to each Northern squad of Democrats — "Make ready your resolutions in support of the Dred Scott decision!" They "make ready." "Consider resolutions!" They "consider." "Vote aye!" They "vote aye."
The slave power, thus controlling the slaves and slave-holders at the South, and the Democratic party at the North, easily manages the Government at Washington. The Federal officers are marked with different stripes—Whig, Democrat, and so on. They are all owned by the same master, and lick the same hand. So it controls the nation. It silences the great sects, Trinitarian, Unitarian, Nullitarian: the chief ministers of this American Church—threefold in denominations, one in nature—have naught to say against Slavery; the Tract Society dares not rebuke the "sum of all villanies," the Bible Society has no "Word of God" for the slave, the " revealed religion" is not revealed to him. Writers of school-books "remember the hand that feeds them," and venture no word against the national crime which threatens to become also the national ruin. In no nation on earth is there such social tyranny of opinion. In Russia, Prussia, Austria, France, Italy, and Spain, the despotic bayonet has pinned the public lips together. The Democratic hands of America have sewed up her own mouth with an iron thread—that and fetters are the only product of the Southern mine. In Washington not a man in the meanest office dares open his lips against the monster which threatens to devour his babies and his wife. No doctor allows himself a word against that tyrant—his business would forsake him if he did. In Southern States, this despotism drives off all outspoken men. Mr. Underwood, of Virginia, made a speech against the extension of Slavery into Kansas,—he must take his life in his hand, and flee from his native State. Mr. Helper, of North Carolina, writes a brave, noble book, ciphering out the results of freedom and of bondage,—even North Carolina is too hot to hold him. Mr. Strickland, at Mobile, sells now and then an anti-Slavery book,—the great State of Alabama drives him out, scares off his wife, and will not allow him to collect his honest debts! At the North, you know the disposition of men who hold office from the Federal Government, or who seek and expect it: the Federal hand ​ is raised to strangle Democracy. They never give the alarm: it would be to "strike the hand that feeds them." Nay, they crouch down and "lick the hand just raised to shed our blood." Even at Washington, Slavery has sewed up the delegated Northern mouth, else so noisy once. It is nearly two years since a Southern bully, a representative man of South Carolina, stole upon our great senator, with coward blows felled him to the ground, and with his bludgeon beat the stunned and unconscious man. He meant to "silence agitation:" he did his work too well. Excepting the discussion which followed that outrage, do you remember an anti-Slavery speech in the Senate since Charles Sumners', in May 1856? Can you think of one in the House? If such have been spoken, I have not heard either, though I have listened all the time. Now and then some one has made an apology for the North, promising not to touch Slavery in the part most woundable. But I believe there has been no manly anti-Slavery speech in House or Senate till Mr. Hale broke the silence with a noble word.
The slave power dealt the blows upon one Northern man, and nearly silenced all the rest!" The safer part of valour is discretion!" The South has many slaves not counted in the census. Ought they to represent the North? The slave power is conscious of strength, and sure of victory. It never felt so strong before. Look at this: the Treasury Department has just instructed the collectors not to permit a free negro to act as master of a vessel,—he is not a citizen of the United States! See what the Southern States are doing. A bill has been reported in the Senate of Louisiana, authorizing that State to import five thousand African slaves. If it becomes a law the Government will not prevent the act; our worst enemy, the Supreme Court, is ready to declare unconstitutional the law which forbids the African slave trade. The South may import as many slaves as she likes; the Government is for her wickedness, not against that—only against justice and the unalienable rights of man. Another bill pending before the Virginia Legislature to banish or enslave all the 75,000 free coloured persons in that State, where more than one President has been the father of a mulatto woman's child. The law to enslave them all may pass; the Federal Government cares nothing about it. African Rachel may mourn ​ in vain for her first-born, and refuse to be comforted, because the Virginian Jacob chains the parti-coloured Joseph that she bore to him; let her mourn! What does the Federal Herod care that in all Virginia there is a voice heard of lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning from the poor Rachel of Africa?
Stronger than ever before, at least in fancy, and yet more truly impudent than fancied strong, the slave power proposes two immediate measures:—
I. To pass the Lecompton Constitution through Congress, and force Slavery into the laws of Kansas, against the oft-repeated vote of the people.
II. To add seven thousand men to the standing army of the United States. They are nominally to put down the polygamous Mormons in Utah—Satan contradicting the lies he is the father of—but really to support the more grossly polygamous slave-holders ; to force the Lecompton Constitution upon Kansas with the bayonet; in all the North, to execute the Fugitive Slave Bill, and the Dred Scott decision, already made, and the Lemmon decision, about to be made, and establish Slavery in each free State; and also to put down any insurrection of the coloured people at the South. The Mormons are the pretence no more; the army is raised against the Democracy of Massachusetts, not the Polygamy of Utah.
Ladies and gentlemen, both of these measures will pass the Senate, pass the House. If it were the end of a presidential term, I should expect they would be defeated. But men worship the rising sun, not the setting, who has no more golden light for them. A Boston merchant, with but $87,000, could bribe men enough to pass his tariff bill! The new Presiden, the has more than $887,000,000—offices for three years to come. The addition to the army wiU cost at least $5,000,000 a year, and the patronage that gives will command votes enough. I know how tender are the feelings of Congress; I know how politicians reject with scorn the idea that money or office could alter their vote; but we all know that a President, his pocket full of public money, his hands full of offices, can buy votes of honourable senators and honourable representatives just as readily as you can buy peanuts of the huckster down stairs. I need not go from this hall, or its eastern neighbour, I need not ​ go back seven years to find honourable members of the "Great and General Court of Massachusetts" who were bought with a price. I shall tell no names, though I know them only too well. Peter did repent and Judas may—I will give him a chance. I expect, therefore, that both these measures will pass. Then you will find the Northern "Democracy" supporting them; future conventions will ring with resolutions in favour of the Lecompton Convention, and a great standing army will be one of the acknowledged "principles" of the Democratic party—a toast on Independence Day.
When the two immediate measures are disposed of, there are three others a little more remote, which are likewise to be passed upon.
I. The first is to establish Slavery in all the Northern States—the Dred Scott decision has already put it in all the territories. The Supreme Court will make a decision in the Lemmon case, and authorize any one of the Southern masters of the North to bring his slaves to any Northern State, and keep them as long as he pleases. Coloured men "have no rights which white men are bound to respect"—so says the Supreme Court, which is greater than the Constitution; and if that be true generally, everywhere, then it will be true specially in Massachusetts. I have no doubt the Supreme Court will make the decision. We have no Judge Curtis to sit in that Court, and give his verdict for law and justice; his place is occupied by Hon. Nathan Clifford—a very different man, if I am rightly informed. When his nomination was before the Senate, Mr. Hale opposed it, and said Mr. Clifford was not reckoned a first class lawyer in his own district—which comprises the greater part of New England; nor in his own State—the State of Maine; nor in his own country; nor even in his own town!
Then, after Mr. Hale had reduced this vulgar fraction of law to his lowest terms, the Senate added it to the sum of the Supreme Court. He is strong enough for his function—to create new law for Slavery. His appointment must needs cause a Judgment against him, but let us give him a fair trial. When the Court has given the expected decision in the Lemmon case, then this new article will be voted into the apostolic creed of the Demo​ cratic party, published by authority, and appointed to be read in caucuses and conventions. It may be "said or sung," as follows:—"I believe in the Fugitive Bill; I believe in the Kansas-Nebraska Bill; I believe in the Dred Scott decision; I believe in the Lemmon decision. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen."
II. The next measure is to conquer Mexico, Central America, and all the Northern Continent down to the Isthmus; to conquer Cuba, Hayti, Jamaica, all the West India Islands, and establish Slavery there. This conquest of the Islands might seem rather a difficult work — it might require some fighting; but the late Hon. Senator Butler, of South Carolina, was very confident it would be done. You remember how he spoke of those islands in a rambling speech that he once made, which was truth-telling, because drunken. You smile; but if in vino Veritas be good Latin, à fortiori is it good American to say, there is more truth in whisky, which is stronger? In one of his fits of "loose expectoration," that distinguished senator, a representative man, like Bully Brooks, instantial and typical of his State, spoke of "our Southern Islands," meaning Cuba, San Domingo, Jamaica, Trinidad, St. Thomas, and the rest. He called them our islands, not that they were so then, or because he had any personal knowledge that they ever would be; but "being in the spirit" (of Slavery), and the spirit (of whisky) being also in him—imperium in imperio—by this twofold inspiration (of Slavery from without and whisky from within), and from this double consciousness (out of the abundance of the stomach the mouth also speaking), he prophesied (this medium of two spirits), not knowing what he said.
That is the second measure,—to re-annex the West Indies and the Continent.
​ To carry all these measures, the slave power depends on the Federal Government. But it never pesters the Government with petitions on paper; it sends its petitions in boots. They are not referred to Committees in House or Senate; the petitions in boots are themselves the Committee of House and Senate. Gentlemen, the slave power has got the Federal Government, especially the Supreme Court—a constant power.
It relies also on the Democratic party North for its aid in this destruction of Democracy. Gentlemen, it has got that party—will it keep it? Heretofore the two have seemed united, not for better but for worse, "so long as they both do live." Witness the arguments of Mr. Cushing, yesterday, in this hall, against the personal liberty law; and he faithfully and consistently represents the Northern Democratic party as it was.
The slave power depends on the four great commercial cities of the North—Cincinnati, Philadelphia, New York, and Boston. Gentlemen, it has the support of these four cities, and will continue to have it for some time to come. If the two immediate and the three remote aggressive measures I have just mentioned were to be passed on by the voters of these four towns, I think they would vote as the slave power told them. They did so for the Fugitive Slave Bill, for the Kansas-Nebraska Bill;—they will vote for the Lecompton Bill, the Army Bil; and when their help is wanted for the Americanization of the rest of the continent, by filibustering; for the Southernization of the North, by the Lemmon decision ; for the Africanization of America, by restoring the African slave trade, they will do as they are bid.
If these five measures were left to the voters of Boston alone, the result might be doubtful,—nay, I think it would be adverse to the South. But look at the matter a little more nicely. Divide the Boston voters into four classes:—the rich—men worth $100,000 or more; the educated—men with such culture as pupils get at tolerable colleges; the poor—the Irish, and all men worth but $400 or less; the middling class—the rest of the male citizens. If the question were submitted to the first three, I make no doubt the vote would be for the South, for the destruction of Democracy. The educated and the poor would do as the ​ rich commanded them—they would not "strike the hand that feeds them," for they know how
"To crook the pregnant hinges of the knee,
Where thrift may follow fawning."
I speak of the general rule, and do honour to the exceptions. I hope you think me harsh in this judgment. Many of you, I see, are members of this House, and do not Know exactly the city you are strangers in. I believe it the best city in the world; but it has some faults which warrant my conjectural fear. Two things have happened, Mr. President, since our last annual meeting, which show the proclivity of the controlling class in Boston to support Slavery. The first took place on the 17th of June. One or two haberdashers and the hotel-keepers of Boston were anxious to celebrate the eighty-second anniversary of the battle of Bunker Hill. The State and the City united in that good work. There was a Committee of the Massachusetts Legislature, joined with a Committee of the City Council. Here is the book, "printed by authority," giving an account of some of the proceedings. The Committee invited distinguished champions of Slavery to come and consecrate the statue of Warren. Here is the reply of Governor Wise, of Virginia. It contains an admirable hint. He hopes the Revolutionary times will return.
So Here are letters from the Hon. Mr. HiUiard, of Alabama, from ex-President Tyler, and from similar people, too numerous to mention in an anti-Slavery speech. There is a bill to be paid by the Commonwealth by and by, and some of you, gentlemen, will have an opportunity to vote the money of Massachusetts to pay for the liquor which intoxicated some of the great champions of Slavery whom the Committee invited to do honour to Bunker Hill by their bodily presence, and to Boston by their subsequent carouse. There will be a bill amounting to $1067.04 which I would advise the legislators to look at carefully, and see what the "items" are, and ascertain who consumed the "items" But let me return to the "great celebration,"—almost equal in glory to the battle itself.
The Committee invited the author of the Fugitive Slave Bill to partake of their festivities. Yes, ladies and gentle​ men, they invited the Hon. Mr. Mason, of Virginia, the most insolent man in the American Senate, the most bitterly and vulgarly hostile to the Democratic institutions of the North, the man who had treated your own senator with such insolence and abuse; Mr, Keitt, of South Carolina, also should have been included! I shall not now speak of the men who outraged the decency of New England by asking such a man to such a spot on such a day,—they were types of a class of men whom they too faithfully serve. But on that occasion, "complimentary flunkeyism" swelled itself almost to bursting, that it might croak the praises of Mr. Mason and his coadjutors.
When the coward blows of Mr. Brooks—one of that holy alliance of bullies who rule Congress—had brought Charles Sumner to the ground, and he lay helpless between life and death, you know the people of Boston proposed to have a meeting m Faneuil Hall to express their indignation, A Committee, appointed at a previous meeting, had the matter in charge. They invited Hon. Mr. Winthrop to attend. "No," he "could not come." They asked Mr. Everett. "No," he too was "unable." It was reported at the time, and I thought on good authority, that when the Committee asked Hon. Mr. Choate, he asked " if blows on the head with a gutta-percha stick would hurt a man much?" These three were ex-senators. They all refused to attend the meeting and join in any expression of feeling against the outrage upon Mr. Sumner. Gentlemen, I respect sincerity, and I was glad that they were not hypocrites on that occasion. Twice the Committee waited on the first two gentlemen, offering the invitation, which was twice refused. But Mr. Winthrop and Mr. Everett were both at Charleston to pay that feudal homage to Mr. Fugitive Slave Bill Mason, which Northern vassals owe the slave power. With their "flunkeyism," they tainted still worse the air of that town which has a proverbial repute and name.
Then was fulfilled that celebrated threat of Senator Toombs, of Georgia. On thife eighty-second anniversary of New England's first great battle, at the foot of Bunker Hill monument, the author of the Fugitive Slave Bill, the most offensive of all his tribe, called over the roll of his slaves; and men, their names unknown to fame, their ​ personalities too indistinct for sight, at least for memory, with the City Government of Boston, the authorities of Harvard College, two ex-senators, one ex-governor, the Governor of Massachusetts (spite of the " certainty of a mathematical demonstration," now also an ex), answered to their names!
That was not all. The next day, at the public cost, in a steam-boat chartered expressly for the purpose, the City Government took Mr. Mason about the harbour, showing to him the handsome spectacle of nature, the green islands, then so fair; and you saw, a hideous sight, the magistrates, of this town doing homage to one of the foulest of her enemies, who had purposely incited a kindred spirit to deal such blows on the honoured head of a noble senator of this State.
Nor was that all. The next night, one of the Professors of Harvard College, both a learned and most genial man, but at that time specially representing the servility of his institution, better even than his accomplishments generally represent its Greek scholarship, invited the author of the Fugitive Slave Bill to an entertainment at his house.
So the magistrates of Boston, the authorities of Harvard College, the "respectabilities of the neighbourhood," the Committee of the Legislature, the Governor of the Commonwealth, and its ex-senators said in their acts, and their words too, "Thus shall be done unto the man whom the slave power delighteth to honour."
Here is the other act. Mr. Alger, a young Unitarian minister of this town, had been invited to deliver the annual Fourth of July Address before the city authorities; and he, good honest man, in the simplicity of his heart, like Horace Mann and Charles Sumner, long before, thought that one day in the year was consecrate to Independence, and an orator might be pardoned if, on Independence Day, he said a word in behalf of the self-evident truths of the old Declaration, and spoke of the natural and unalienable right of all men to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Mr. Alger's grandfather fought in the battle of Bunker Hill, and it was not surprising that the "spirit of '75," speaking through such a "medium," should be a little indignant at the spirit of '57! He spoke as he ought. The City Government refused to print his speech—which, however, printed ​ itself. The act was consistent. They who had crouched to Senator Mason, and answered at the roll-call of his slaves, how could they publish a manly speech rebuking their "complimentary flunkeyism!"
These two acts may make you doubt what would be the fate of the slave power's measures if left to Boston alone; but they make me sure what it would be if left to the three classes I have just now named.
But will these measures succeed, even with such help? If I had stood in this spot on the 29th of January, 1850, and foretold as prophecy what is history to-day, would you have believed me, Mr. President? Ladies and gentlemen, you could not credit it: that Mason's Bill, proposed the week before, would become a law; that Boston would ever be the haunt of man-stealers, her Court-House a barracoon, Faneuil Hall crammed with soldiers hired to steal a negro boy; that her Judge of Probate would forego the benevolence of his nature, or at least of his office, and become a kidnapper, and even a pretended anti-Slavery Governor keep him in office still! No, you could not believe that Wendell Phillips would ever be brought to trial for a "misdemeanor," because, in the cradle of liberty, he declared it wrong for a Judge of Probate to turn kidnapper! No, you would not hear the prediction that the Missouri Compromise would be repealed, the Kansas-Nebraska Act be passed, and the military arm of the United States, lengthened out with Border ruffians, would be stretched forth to force Slavery into Kansas with the edge of the sword. You would have said, "The Dred Scott decision is impossible; the Supreme Court cannot declare that no coloured man is a citizen of the United States,—that the Constitution itself puts Slavery into every territory, spite of local legislation, spite of Congress itself, spite of the people's will! Should they attempt so foul a wrong, the next Convention of the Northern Democrats would rend the Court asunder! Caleb Cushing would war against it!" "What have we seen abroad ; what do some of you hear in this hall, day out, day in? On the 29th of January, 1858, is it more unlikely that the Federal Government will decree these three new measures,—to establish Slavery in all the North, to conquer and enslave the Southern part of the continent, to restore the slave trade? The ​ past is explanation of the present, as the present also of the past.
There are two things you may depend on: the impudent boldness of your Southern masters ; the thorough corruption of their Northern slaves. These two are "sure as death and rates."
But opposition is made against Slavery,—some of it is quite remarkable. I begin with mentioning what comes from quarters which seemed least promising.
1. A Northern Democrat enters on the stage,—an unwonted appearance. But it is no "infant phenomenon," no stripling, "who never appeared on any stage before," making his first essay by venturing on an anti-Slavery part. It is an old stock actor—the little giant of many a tragedy. Mr. Douglas has broken with the Administration; the author of the Kansas-Nebraska Act is now undoing his own work; the inventor of "squatter sovereignty" (or, if Cass be the inventor, Douglas has the patent) turns round and strikes the hand that fed him with honours and applause. He has great personal power of work, of endurance, immense ability to talk; all the arts of sophistry are at his command; adroit, cunning, far-sighted, for an American politician—no man, I think, better understands the strategy of politics, and no man has been more immoral and shameless in its use. He has long been the leader of the Northern Democracy, and knows its instincts and its ideas; his hand is familiar with the strings which move the puppets of the party. Amongst men not clerical, I have heard but one speaker lie with such exquisite adroitness, and make the worse appear the better reason. He is a senator, still holding his place on important committees; he is rich, in the prime of life, ambitious of power: he has abandoned drunkenness, and his native strength returns to his stout frame once more. Let us not disguise it,—no mere politician in America can do the slave power such harm.
But I have no more confidence in Mr. Douglas now than in 1854. The nature of the man has not changed, nor can it change; even his will is still the same. No man has done us such harm. You know his public measures, his public speeches—the newspapers report all ​ that; but his frauds, his insolent demeanour, his brow-beating and violence towards the Republican senators, you do not know—only the actual spectators can understand such things. Do you remember that, after Mr. Sumner had made his last great speech, Mr. Douglas said,—"Does the senator want us to kick him ?" You have not forgot that when Brooks made his attack upon Sumner, Douglas also was there, and did not interfere to prevent a continuance of the blows. He also was a part of that outrage. The man has not changed. If he were President, he would do as Buchanan does, only more so. If he were sure of his senatorial office for six years to come, I think we should hear no words from him in behalf of Kansas. But his term expires in March, next year. He knows he cannot be re-elected, unless he changes his course. So he alters his measures, and provisionally favours Freedom; not his principles, which are the loaves and fishes of power. I am sorry to hear Republicans express their confidence in him, and give him praise which leaves nothing to add to such men as Hale, Seward, and Chase. I know it is said, "Any stone is good enough to throw at a dog;" but this is a stone that will scale in its flight, veer off, and finally hit what you mean not to hurt, but to defend. Yet it is unexpected to find any individuality of conduct or opinion in the party. It is pleasant to see what a train of followers he has already, and to think that Democracy is not quite dead among "Democrats." He is fighting against our foes — that is an accident; he is not fighting for us, but only for Stephen A Douglas, and if he wins that battle, he cares not who his allies are, nor who his foes.
2. The next help comes from a slave State. Here is the valuable speech of Hon. F. P. Blair, from Missouri. "The civilized world," says he, "is at war with the propagation of Slavery, whether by fraud or by the sword; and those who look to gain political ascendancy on this continent by bringing the weight of this system, like an enormous yoke, not to subject the slaves only, but their fellow-citizens and kindred of the same blood, have made false auguries of the signs of the times."
Significant words — doubly important when coming from a slave State. Do not think he is alone. He has a con​ stituency behind him not of doughfaces. Here is the speech of Mr. James B. Gardenhire, lately made in the House of Representatives at Jefferson City, Missouri. It is of the same tenor as Mr. Blair's, and advocates the abolition of Slavery in Missouri itself.
3. Here is something from Republican Members of Congress. Not to mention others from New England, or elsewhere, here is a speech from Hon. Eli Thayer, ironical, sometimes, I take it, but plain and direct in substance. He would have the free States send settlers to Northenize the South—already he has a colony in Virginia—and New Englandize Central America! "The Yankee," says Mr, Thayer, "has never become a slave-holder, unless he has been forced to it by the social relations of the slave State where he lived; and the Yankee who has become a slave-holder has every day of his life thereafter felt in his very bones the bad economy of the system." "Why, sir, he can buy a negro power in a steam-engine for ten dollars, and he can clothe and feed that power for one year for five dollars; and are we the men to give ^1000 for an African slave, and $150 a year to feed and clothe him?"
This is an anti-Slavery argument which traders can understand. Mr. Thayer is not so much a talker as an organizer; he puts his thoughts into works. You know how much Kansas owes him for the organization he has set on foot. One day will he not also revolutionize Virginia? There is a to-morrow after to-day.
Here is a speech from Hon. John P. Hale. I think it is the ablest he ever made,—the first any one has made, I think, since the discussion caused by the assault on Mr. Simmer. It relates to Kansas and the Dred Scot decision. Hear what he says of the latter:—
"If the opinion of the Supreme Court be true, it makes the immortal authors of the Declaration of Independence liars before God and hypocrites before the world; for they lay down their sentiments broad, full, and explicit, and then they say that they appeal to the Supreme Ruler of the universe for the rectitude of their intentions > but, if you believe the Supreme Court, they were merely quibbling on words. They went into the courts of the Most High, and pledged fidelity to their principles as the price they would pay for success, and now it is attempted to cheat them out of the poor boon of integrity; and it is said that they did not mean so; and that when they said all men, they meant all white men; and when they said that the contest they waged was for the rights of mankind, the Supreme Court of the United States would have you believe ​that they mean it was to establish Slavery. Against that I protest, here, now, and everywhere; and I tell the Supreme Court that these things are so impregnably fixed in the hearts of the people, on the page of history, in the recollections and traditions of men, that it will require mightier efforts than they have made or can make to overturn or to shake these settled convictions of the popular understanding and of the popular heart.
"Sir, you are now proposing to carry out this Dred Scott decision by forcing upon the people of Kansas a Constitution against which they have remonstrated, and to which there can be no shadow of doubt a very large portion of them are opposed. Will it succeed? I do not know; it is not for me to say ; but I will say this: if you force that—if yon persevere in that attempt—I think, I hope, the men of Kansas will fight. I hope they will resist to blood and to death the attempt to force them to a submission against which their fathers contended, and to which they never would have submitted. Let me tell you, sir, I stand not here to mse the language of intimidation or of menace; but you kindle the fires of civil war in that country by an attempt to force that Constitution on the necks of an unwilling people; and you will light a fire that all Democracy cannot quench— ay, sir, there will come up many another Peter the Hermit, that will go through the length and the breadth of this land, telling the story of your wrongs and your outrages; and they will stir the public heart; they will raise a feeling in this country such as has never yet been raised; and the men of this country will go forth, as they did of olden time, in another crusade; but it will not be a crusade to redeem the dead sepulchre where the body of the Crucified had lain from the profantion of the infidel, but to redeem this fair land, which God has given to be the abode of freemen, from the desecration of a despotism sought to be imposed upon them in the name of ’perfect freedom’ and ’popular sovereignty.’"
This is a little different from the speeches made in Congress last winter. There is nothing apologetic and deprecatory this time. Mr. Seward said, long ago, "The time for compromises has passed by."
Mr. Sumner's chair is vacant still—and yet it speaks with more power than any senator can bring to defend Slavery with. In the long line of men Massachusetts has sent to do service in the halls of Congress, there has been none nobler than Charles Sumner, none more faithful. I know how dangerous it is to praise a living man, especially a politician; to-morrow may undo the work of half a century. But here I feel safe; for, of all the men I have known in political life, he is the only one who has thereby grown stronger in the noblest qualities of a man. Already his integrity has been tried in the severest ordeal; I think hereafter it will stand any test. Massachusetts has had three great Adamses—Samuel, John, John Quincy. In their graves, they are to her what "the three Tells" are ​ to Switzerland. Here is a man equally noble, perhaps with a nicer culture than any of them. He has now the same firmness, the same integrity—faithfulness to delegated trust, allegiance to the higher law of right. His empty chair is eloquent.
4. Then there are Republicans out of Congress, in official station, who are at work. All the New England States, New York, Michigan, Ohio, Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin, have governors and legislatures, I think, hostile to Slavery—after the "Republican" way. The election of Mr. Banks was a triumph in Massachusetts. In fifty years past, no Northern State has sent a man to the House of Representatives, who in twenty-five years acquired as great influence there as Mr. Banks in four. He has many qualities which fit him for eminence in American politics—if he only be faithful to the right. I hear loud condemnation of him from anti-Slavery men, because, say they, "he will do wrong by and by." Our sentence will be in season if it comes after the crime ; and the actual offences of Republican politicians are so numerous that I will not condemn conjectural felonies before they are committed. I hear it said he will not remove Judge Loring. Wait and see. This I know, that a good deal within twelve months, he said he wished him removed, by the address of the Legislature; and if he (Banks) were Governor, he (Banks) would do it! If he try to ride a compromise, he may depend on it he will not ride far, however long! "The day of compromise is past." I remember the speech he made in Wall-street, New York ; also the one at Salem. I have no defence to make for them, no excuse to offer for him. I felt astonished and ashamed. But to exchange his predecessor for him seemed a triumph of freedom in 1857; I hope it will prove so in years to come.
The Republican party has done considerable service, but it does not behave very well. It is cowardly; a little deceitful; "making I dare not wait upon I would." Coloured waiters at public festivals say, "the Democrats treat us better than the Republicans." Events have clearly shown that the party did not deserve to gain the Federal power in 1856; that it would have been ruinous to the party could they then have taken the great offices, and disastrous to the cause of freedom, which they would compromise. ​ Yet, as it is the best political party we have, I would not be over-nice in criticising it. I like not to pick holes in the thin spots of the only political coat we have in this stormy weather, I know the difficulties of the party, and have pity for its offenders—none for its mere hunters after place.
I have spoken of the services of these classes of political men. There is one trouble which disturbs all four. They are liable to a certain disease of a peculiar nature. I have a good copy of Galen, but he does not mention it; the last edition of Hippocrates, but neither he nor his commentator, though both well-lettered men, makes any reference thereto. Hence I suppose it is a new disease, which, though not exactly a doctor of medicine, perhaps I am the first to describe. So I will call it the presidential fever; or, in Latin, Typhus infandus Americanus, I will try to describe the specific variety which is endemic in the Northern States, the only place where I have studied the disease. I may omit some symptoms of the case, which other observers will supply. At first the patient is filled with a vague longing after things too high for him. He gazes at them with a fixed stare; the pupils expand. But he cannot see distinctly; crooked ways seem straight; the shortest curve he thinks is a right angle; dirty things look clean, and he lays hold of them without perceiving their condition. Some things he sees double—especially the number of his friends; others with a semi- vision, and it is always the lower half he sees. All the time he hears a confused noise, like that of men declaring votes. State after State. This noise obscures all other sounds, so that he cannot hear the still small voice which yet moves the world of men. He can bear no "agitation;" the word "Slavery" disturbs him much; he fears discussion thereof as a hydrophobiac dreads water. Yet he is fond of the " rich brogue" of the foreign population. His sense of smell is so morbid that an honest man is unbearably offensive. His tongue is foul, but he has an irresistible propensity to lick the hands of those he thinks will give him what he seeks. His organ of locality is crazed and erratic in its action ; the thermometer may ​ stands at 20 below zero—even lower, if long enough—the Mississippi may be frozen over clear down to Natchez, Hellgate be impassable for ice, and the wind of Labrador blow for months across the continent to the Gulf of Mexico—still he can't believe there is any North! Combativeness is irregularly active; he fights his best friends and clings to his worst enemies. Destructiveness is intense; he would abolish the negroes, enforce the Fugitive Slave Bill, and hang the abolitionists. Benevolence is wholly inert. Casuality has become idiotic; he looks into the clockwork of the State, and everywhere finds "a little nigger has got into the machinery," which he would set right by "crushing out" the intruder. Ideality fills him with the foolishest of dreams. The organ of self-esteem swells to a monstrous size—like a huge wen on the top of the head, "a sight to behold." He talks about himself excessively, ad nauseam; and "makes a noise town-meeting days," and is always "up" in the Legislature. Vanity is im- mense; he would be before the people continually; no place is too small, if only public; he lives in the eye of the people, greedv of praise. Hope is in a state of delirious excitement; no failure disconcerts him, no fall abates desire to rise. Veracity is in a comatose state; "he will lie like Governor ——." Conscientiousness has "caved in," and in its place there is "a hole in his head." He knows no higher law above his own ambition, for which all means seem just. He often speaks of "the father of his country," but never tells his noblest deeds. His reverence is delirious in its action; he worships every graven or molten image that faces South, and lies prostrate before the great ugly idol of Slavery, rending his garments, and cries, "Bafil help us! Baal help us!" Disease incurable; yields to no medicine; not hellebore enough in all Anticyra to affect the case.
I need not speak of the old anti-Slavery Society. It is not ​ necessary I should criticise their action—I have done that often enough before. If we deserve any praise, let others give it, or give it not, as suits them best.
There has been a great change in the people of the North—else, Mr. President, we were not here to-night. You remember the Legislatures of 1850, 1851, 1852—what if you had asked them for this hall! In 1851, even Faneuil Hall could not be had for a Convention of fifteen hundred as respectable and intelligent men as ever assembled in the United States, with Horace Mann at their head. We are here to-night by the will of the people of Massachusetts. For many years we have come up before the Legislature of this State ; it has always heard us patiently, and I think at length has always done what we asked. Former Legislatures have done all in their power to remove the only Massachusetts Judge of Probate that ever kidnapped a man. I make no doubt this Legislature will as faithfully represent the conscience of the State.
I say there has been a great change in the people. Compare the old Daily Advertiser with the new, which I think one of the humanest as well as ablest newspapers in New England.
I recall the fate of the Northern men who voted for the Kansas-Nebraska Bill. There were thirteen Northern senators who did so. The official term has expired for ten of them. Nine of the ten lost their election — veteran old Mr. Cass at their head ; the Camden and Amboy Hailroad sent back Mr. Thompson to represent their rolling-stock. Stuart of Michigan, Jones of Iowa, and Douglas of Illinois, abide their time.
Forty-two Northern representatives were equally false to Democracy. Thirty-nine of them have gone to their own place, only three returned to their seats: J. Glancey Jones, and T. B. Florence of Pennsylvania, and W. H. English, of Indiana, alone remain.
If the South is more confident of victory than ever, the North is also more determined to conquer. The late elections show this: that of Mr. Banks is a very significant sign of the times. The "rebellion" of Mr. Douglas, so his old masters call it, is popular at the North. He could be elected to the Senate to-morrow by a vote of the people of Illinois. I do ​ not say I would vote for him; that State will. All the West is on his side. See how many tender-footed Democrats there are who cannot walk over a majority of legal voters in Kansas ten thousand strong, and force Slavery on that State, eyen at the command of the old master. Soon there will be conscience Democrats, as once conscience Whigs. The Administration party may carry their measures; it will be as of old, "the counsel of the froward is carried headlong." In 1860, the Northern Democratic party will be where the Whig party was in 1856. There will be a pack of men about the Federal offices in all the great towns, united by common desire for public plunder; but the party will be as dead as Benedict Arnold. If Mr. Gushing will "crush out" all individualism from the Democracy he will leave no life there!
Such is the aerpect of Slayery now. It is clear what duty the North has to do. She must choose either Freedom of the black man, with an industrial Democracy gradually spreading over all the continent, diffusing everywhere the civilization of New England ; or else the Slavery of the black man, with a military despotism certainly overspreading the land and crushing down the mass of men, white and black, into Asiatic subjection. The choice is between these two extremes.
There are 18,000,000 in the North, all free. The power of numbers, wealth, industry, education, ideas, institutions, all is on our side. So are the sympathies of the civilized world, the hopes and the primal instincts of mankind; "the stars in their courses light against Sisera." The Federal Government is against us—we might have had it on our side if we would.
The last Presidential election showed who in the North were the allies of the South. They dwell mainly in the four great cities, and in that debatable land which borders on the slave States, a strip of territory 200 miles wide, reaching from New York harbour to the Mississippi. I trust the anti-Slavery Society will send out its missionaries to arouse and instruct the people in that border land. There is a practical work to be done—to be attempted at once.
Slavery is a moral wrong and an economical blunder; ​ but It is also a great political institution. It cannot be put down by political economy, nor by ethical preaching; men have not only pecuniary interests and moral feelings, but also political passions. Slavery must be put down politically, or else militarily. If not peacefully ended soon, it must be ended wrathfully by the sword. The negro will not bear Slavery for ever ; if he would, the white man will not.
If the Republican party behave wisely, there will never be another inch of slave soil added to the national domain, nor another slave State admitted to the Union: but Slavery will be driven out of all the territories. Look at this fact. There are now fifteen slave States, sixteen free. Minnesota and Kansas will soon be admitted, Washington and Oregon ere long—four new free States. Missouri may abolish Slavery within four years. Then, in 1864, we shall stand twenty-one free States to fourteen slave States. Nay, perhaps Utah will repudiate both forms of polygamy, the voluntary and the forcible, and be an ally in our defence. It is easy to conquer the Southern part of the continent; it is not easy to establish African Slavery there, in the midst of a population made up of Africans or Indians ready to shelter the slave, and also much more dense than that in the Gulf States from Georgia or Florida to Texas.
If the North is wise and just, we shall choose an anti-Slavery President in 1860, and on March 4th, 1861, incorporate the principles of the Declaration of Independence and of the Constitution's preamble into the Federal Government itself. And on the 4th of July, 1876, there will not be a slave within all the wide borders of the United States! For that service, we do not want a man like Colonel Fremont, who has had no political experience; we want no Johnny Raw for the most difficult post in the nation. It must not be a man broken down with the Presidential fever.
But much is to be done before that result is possible. The whole policy of the Republican party must be changed. We must attack Slavery—Slavery m the territories. Slavery in the district, and, above all, Slavery in the Slave States. Would you remove the shadow of a tree? Then down with the tree itself! There is no other way. To get rid of the accidents of a thing, you make way with its sub​stance. Does not the Constitution guarantee a Bepublican form of government to every State ? South Carolina has a Republican form of government, has she ? We must be aggressive, and kill the trunk, not maim the branches. When you attempt that, depend upon it the South will know you are in earnest. The Supreme Courtis our worst enemy. I should attack it carefully by regular siege. Conquer and re-construct it.
If I were Republican Governor of Massachusetts, or a senator of the State, I should make it a part of my duty to attend every anti-Slaveiy Convention, and to speak there. Such men go to Cattle Shows, and Mechanics' Fairs, and meetings of Bible Societies^ to show that they are at least officiallv interested in farming, manufacturing, and religion. So would I go to the other place, to show that I really took the deepest, heartiest interest, in the great principles of Democracy, and wished to see justice done to the humblest of human kind.
The Daily Advertiser gives us good counsel. In the editorial of the 26th, I find these words: "The enemies of Slaverv and its extension have hitherto occupied too exclusively a defensive attitude ; its friends, by venturing on bold courses of aggression, have continually been gaining groimd. If they did not carry their whole point, they always gained something by compromise. It is right to learn from one's enemy, and it will be fortunate if our friends in Congress have really learned the valuable lesson of refusing to be kept on the defensive."
I know how anxious men are for office. I take it there are 20,000 candidates for the Presidency now Kving. I wish they were enumerated in the census — ^they might come after the overseers of slaves. Certainly no man is too small for the place.. The experience of Europe shows that little men may be born to high office ; America proves that they can be chosen — and Democratic election is as good as royal fore-ordination. But no man is likely to gain that high office by compromise. Webster tried it, and failed ; Clay also failed. If Seward, Chase, or Banks attempt the same thing, they also will come dishonoured to the ground. It is always hard to ride two horses. What if, as now, both be swift, and North runs one way, and South the other? Anti-Slavery is a moveable stone—he ​that falls on it will be broken, but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder!
I know men say, "If you attack Slavery, the South will dissolve the Union." She dissolve the Union? She does not dare. Without commerce, manufactures, schools, with no industry but Slavery, more than one-third of her population bondmen, their interest antagonistic to hers, let her try if she will. Her threat-I will tell you what it is like.
"Mamma," said a spoiled boy to a mother of ten other and older children, "Mamma, I want a piece of pickled elephant." "No, my dear, he can't have it. Johnny must be a good boy." "No, I won't be a good boy. I don't want to be good. I want a piece of pickled elephant." "But aint he mother's youngest boy? When we have some pickled elephant, he shall have the biggest piece!"
"Ma'am, I don't want a piece! I want a whole pickled elephant! I want him now! If you don't let me have him now, I'll run right off and catch the measles. I know a boy that's got 'em first rate."
LONDON: WILLIAM STEVENS, PRINTER, 37, BELL YARD, TEMPLE BAR.
* ↑ It may be the same Herod, is said to have died of. From Sallust's description, it would seem that Cataline had a slight touch of it.—Bell. Cat. ch. i.
* ↑ "Fidenamin Gabionimqne esse potestas, Et de mensura jus dicere, vasa minora Frangere, pannosus vacuis Ædilis Ulubris ; —— qui nimios optabat honores" The Latin is only for doctors, who know the local applications of the geography.