The voice of freedom. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1839-1848, 1839-03-30


very natures must be changed before we be
brought tamely to submit to this doctrine The
evil will be remedied and, to use the language
of Jefferson again, this people will yet be free. :
The Senator finds consolation, however, in the
midst of this existing evil, in color and caste The
black (says hey is the strong ground of slave
ry in this country. Yes, it is COLOR not right and
justice, that is to continue forever slavery in our
country. 1t is prejudice against color, which is
the strong ground of the shareholders hope. Is
that prejudice founded in nature or is it the effect
OF base and sordid interest? Let the mixed race
which we see here, from black Ito almost perfect
white, sprnging from white fathers, answer this
question. Slavery has no Just foundation in CO.
lor; 1t rests exclusively upon usurpaon, tyranny,
oppressive fraud, and force. These were its pa
rents in every age and country of the world.
The Senator says, the next or greatest Difficult
ty to emancipation, is the amount of property 1t
would take from the owners All ideas OF right
and wrong are COMPOUNDED in these words: eman-
cipate property, emancipate horse, or an OK
would not only be an unmeanln9, but Iudlcrous
expression. To emancipate, is to set free from
slavery. TO emancpate, is to set free man, not
property. The Senator estimates the. number of
saves-nsen now held in bondage-at three mil
Lions in the United States Is this statement made
here by the same voice which was heard in this
the emancipation of our South American brethren
from political thradom? 1t is. And has all its
fervor in favor Of liberty been exhausted upon for
eign countries, so not to leave single whisper
in favor of three millions of men in our own coun-
try, now groaning under the most CALLING oppres-
sion the world ever saw? No, sir Sordid inter-
est rules the hour. Men are made property, and
paper is made money, and the Senator, no doubt,
sees in these two peculiar institutions a power
which, if united will be able TO accomplish all his
wishes. He informs us that some have computed
the slaves to be worth the average amount of
$500 each. He will estimate within bounds at
$4OO each. Making the amount twelve hundred
millions of dollars worth ofslave property. heard
this statement Mr. President, with emotions of
the deepest feeling. By what rule of political or
commercial arithmetic does the Senator calculate
the amount of property in human beings? Can
1t be fancy or fact, that hear such calculation,
that the people of the United States own twelve
hundred millions double the amount of all the
specie in the word) worth of property in human
flesh And this property is owned, the gentleman
informs u.s. by all classes of society, forming part
of all our contracts within our own country and in
Europe. | should have been glad, sir, to have
been spared the hearing of declaration of this
kind especially from the high source and the place
from which it has emanated But the assertion
has gone forth that we have twelve hundred mil |
lions Of slave property at the South and can any
man so close his understanding here as not plainly
TO perceive, that the power Of this vast amount of
property at the South is now uniting itself to the
banking power of the North, in order to govern
the destinies of this country? Six hundred mil
lions of banking capital is to be brought into this
coalition, and the slave power and the bank power
thus to unite In order 10 break down the pres
ent Administration. There can be no mistake, as
believe, in this matter The aristocracy of the
North, who, by the power of corrupt banking
system, and the aristocracy of the South, by the
power of the slave SYSTEM both fattening upon
the labor of Others are now about to unite in Or
der to make the reign of each perpetual. Is there
an independent American to be found, who will
become the recreant slave to such an unholy COM
binaton9 Is this another compromise to barter
the Liberties ofthe country for personal aggrandise
ment? Resistance to tyranls is obedience to
God
The Senator further insists, that what the law
makes property is property This is the predi-
cate of the gentleman; he has neither facts nor
reason to prove it; yet upon this alone does he S
rest the whole case, that negroes are property q
deny both the predicate and the Argument b
Suppose the Legislature of the Senator's own a
State should pass law declaring his wife, his V
children his friends, indeed, any white citizen OF u
heutuChy properly, anu shoud lney De SOld ana D
as such, would the gentleman fold his
arms and say, Yes, they are property for the |
law has made them such? No, sir he would n
denounce such law with more yehemence than he ii
now denounces abolitoniss, and would deny the Il
authority of human legislation to accomplish an f
object so clearly beyond its power. h
Human laws, contend, cannot make human Il
beings property, if human force can do it. If it tc
is competent for our Legislatures to make black G
man property, it is competent for them to make
white man the same ; and the same objection en- e
lists to the power of the people in an organic law Il
Tor their own government they cannot make h
property of each other, and in the language of h
the constitution of Indiana, such an act can only b
originate in usurpation and tyranny" Dreadful, b
indeed, would be the condition Of this country, il
these principles should not only be carried into h
the ballot-box, but into the Presidential chair d
The idea that abolitionists ought to pay for the
slaves they set free, and that they ought to
thnN OF this, is addressed to their fears, and not
to tnelr Judgment There is no principle of NOR /
amy or justice that should require them or our a
citizens generally to do So TO free slave is to O
take from usurpation that which it has made c