Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1850-1854, 1850-12-06
CAUSE AND CURE OF AGITATION.

Rev. Henry Ward Beecher has long article
in the New York Independent, which SO ably and
eloquently explains the causes, progress, and
prospects of the Anti-Slavery movement, that we
copy large portion of it entire. After showing
that the elements of the present controversy are
to be found, if not in the United States Constitu.
ton, at least in the construction which has been
given to it, he proceeds:
Here then we are. Our people of the North
and South have not arrayed their institutions
against each other, but the institutions of the
North and of the South have brought the people
into collision. This state fittings has been grad
ually developing its fruits for now many years
Is it not worth our while to look at the progress
and results of this collision? Perhaps past ten
denotes may be prophetic.
Immediately after the adoption of the Consti-
tuition there sprung up in the free States combi-
nations calling themselves Societies for the Abb
clifton of Slavery-for the Manumission Of
Slaves, &c. Their work was to diffuse a leav-
en-. They spread information They induced
rejecting men to think, and know not that they
attempted or effected much except this prepara-
tory work. Theirs was the office of preparing
seed.
Some twenty-five years ago things had come
to pass that required only leader to make a
development. Events make Garrison leader
Wei never thought, and we do not now think, that
Garrison deserved the one half of the bitter re-
proaches that have been heaped upon him. His
worst faults have been the reaction, in him, of
the opposite faults, of men favoring Slavery or
Indifferent to it. But we regard him as one of
the most unfortunate of all leaders for the best
development of anti-slavcry feeling. He is a
man of no mean ability, of interchangeable industry,
of the most unbounded enterprise andeagerness,
of perseverance, which pushes him like law of
nature; and of courage which amounts to reck-
lessness. These are the qualifications which
make a man powerful for stimulation. Had he,
possessed as a balance to these, Cancellation.
good-natured benevolence-or even "a certain
popular mirthfulness--hadh he possessed the mod
Grafton and urbanity of Clarkson, or the deep pie
ty of Wilberforce, he had been the one man of
our age. These all he lacked. And the disease
of America needed only counter-irritation, no
better blister could have been applied.
Garrison did not create the anti-slavery spirit
of the North. He was the offspring of it. 1t
existed before he was born. But he at one time
more powerfully developed and organized it than
any other one mind;-and developed it in modes
and spirit, as we think, most unfortunate. Anti
slavery under his influence was all teeth and
claw. 1t thought. 1t never conciliated. 1t gain
ed not one step by kindness. 1t won not sin
gle fort by surrender. 1t bombarded everything
it met, and stormed every place which it won
We do not deny that Garrison and his early fol-
lowers did great work. Another generation
will divide praise and blame, as no one is fitted
to do the heats of the present day. But when
bare Justice shall be done, we believe that it will
be found that noble soul, deeply and truly be-
nevolent, who sought the trnest interests of his
age, yet, sought them with such fierceness and
such hard and relentless courage, as constant
w reused up in his path the worst feelings of
man, and heaped obstacles before him TO such
degree, that, at length, in combating them, his
sympathies for good seemed swallowed up in a
bitter hatred of evil. The result of the agitation
inspired largely with this feeling, was, that al
most every interest in the nation rose up against
the movement with which he was identified
Churches dreaded abolitionism, parties hated alb
olitionism, commerce abhorred aboitionsm.-
Mobs roted around the meetings, and threatened
the dwellings, the stores, and the very persons
of abolitionists.
There was odium and influence enough array
cd against the anti-slavery movement, under the
form of early abolitionism, to have sunk ten en-
terprises which depended on men for existence.
But there was q spirit in this cause, there was a
secret strength, which nerved it and it lived on,
and grew, and trampled down opposition, and
came forth victorious? There was an irrestbi-
ity in it which made it superior to the faults of
it's friends and the deadly hatred of its enemies.
What have been the results /?
Bnta few years ago mo5s tore down printing
presses if they dared boldly to proclaim anti-sla-
very doctrine, and dragged them to The river;
now, almost every press in the North is as anti
slavery as those were which mobs demolished
Once, the suspicion of abolition would bring any
man home from Congress and keep him there.
Now, for the most part no one can 90 who can
not show some zeal for anti-slavery doctrine
Once, legislatures resisted every mention of the
subject; and he was deemed scarcely less than a
maniac who in the legislatures of free States
dared introduce the iufammatory topic. Now
legislatures are anti-slavery batteries, and give
annual broadsides of anti-slavery resolutions
Once, pulpits dreaded and defied the dangerous
doctrine! but now the pulpit, to great ex-
tent, is the exponent of liberty, and therefore the
odium and hatred of all who dread the advance
OF freedom. In other days, mobs broke up anti
slavery meetings, destroyed the houses of color
ed men; but now mobs defend fugitive slaves
| and grid about their hiding-places with sure de,
tense. All things are changed. All things are
| still changing, and in one direction
There are few exclusive abolition presses, be.
cause the work which they once did is done BY
religious newspapers, by commercial papers, by
political papers. There arefew abolition meet
| ings-for what need is there of exclusive meet
| ings, when every meeting for politics, every con-
vention, every synod, conference, assembly, ev'
ely caucus, mass meeting, and legislature, is OBJ
liged to discuss the great topic of Liberty anc
Slavery?
And while steady growth has been made in
that direction, there has been no falling off,
Anti-slavery has not taken one step backward,
Politicians have; parties have. But everything
done to Withstand the movement has only con-
spired in the end to augment its influence, and
give strength to its tread. Mobs made its men
heroes. Black laws were irresistible sermons
to Just consciences. Concessions to the South
opened blind eyes in the North. The league &c
prevent agitation in Congress increased it. The
assaults upon the right of petition established
that right upon impregnabe grounds. The at
tempt to resist this growing liberty naamed the
South to tighten the bonds of Slavery. Thi S
has caused the slaves to run away. The mas
ter came bounding through our cities, feeling
miserable servitors, and arresting, claiming, and
dragging back the wretched victims This was
brave preaching to the North. Timid and mod
crate men had refused to believe abolition iectu.