Burlington free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1827-1865, 1842-04-22

cling him in the State, lies at the foundation
of despetism. The nation is too often the
grave of the man. This is the more mons
trous, because the very end of the State, OF
the organization of the nation, is to secure
the individual in all his rights, and especial
ly to secure the rights of the weak. Here is
the fundamental idea ofpolitca association.
In an unorganized society, with no legsla-
ton, no tribunal, no umpire, rights have no
security. Force predominates over right
This is the grand evil of what is called the
state of nature. To repress this, TO give
right the ascendency over force, this is the
grand idea and end of government, of country
of political constitutions. And yet we are
taught that it depends on the law ola mans
country, whether he shall have rights, and
whether other states shall regard him as man.
When cast on a foreign shore. his country,
and not his humanity, is TO be inquired in
lc, and the treatment he receives is to be pro-
portioncd to what he meets at home.
"
repeat it, for the truth deserves reter-
Grafton, that all nations are bound to respect
the rights of every human being. This is
Gods law, as old as the world. No local
law can touch it. No ordinance of a partc-
ular state, degrading set ofmen to chattcls,
can absolve all nations from the obligation Of
regarding the injured beings as men, or bird
them to send back the injured to their chairs.
/ The character of slave, attached to a man
by local government, is not and cannot be
incorporated into his nature. 1t does not
cling TO him, 90 where he will. The scar of
slavery on his back does not reach his soul.
The arbitrary relation between him and his
master cannot suspend the primitive hides
tructihlc relation by which God binds him to
his kind
The idea that particular state may fix,
cndurngly, this stigma on human being,
and can bind the mostju just and generous men
10 respect it, should lie rejected with scorn
and Indignation. 1t reminds us of those
horrible fctlons, in which some demon is de-
scrbcd as stamping an indclible mark ofhcl
on his helpless victims. 1t was the horrible
peculiarly of the world in the reign of Tib-
crils, that it had become one vast prison.
The unhappy man, on whom the blightins
suspicion of the tyrant had fallen could fine
no shelter or escape through the whole civ.
IllEcu ICGiUIS vi tiIc SIODt. LNcly NHCIC HE
sentence followed him like fate. And car
the law ola despot or Of chamber Of DIES.
pots, extend now the same fearful doom &c
the ends of the earihl Can little State a
the South spread its web of cruel, wrongful
legislation over both continents Do al
communities become spell-bound by a law il
a single country creating slavery! Mus
they become the slaves jailers ! Must they
be less merciful than the storm which drive
off the bondman from the detcsted shore o
servitude and casts him on the soil of free
dom! Must even that soil become taintet
by an ordinance passed perhaps in anothe
hemisphere? Has oppression this terrible
omnipresence! Must the whole earth regis
ter the ve.holders' decree ! Then TIT
earth is blghted indeed. Then, as som'
ancient sects taught, it is truly the empire o
the Principle of Evil, of the power of Dark
ness. Then God is dethroned here 70
where injustice and oppression are omnpo
tent, God has no empire.