Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1853-08-06
Progress.

legations OF American citizens, 10 slavery and
slave catching, has continued long and waxcd
warm between the different schools of abolition
ists. II has not been convenient for any other
class Of citizens to look at this question at ALL
A blind, headlong determination to 20 it, any
how, has better suited them. And to magnify
the Shareholders constitution and his interpre-
tation into the "higher" and the highest "law,"
has been vastly more convenient, than any in
quiry as to what that law was, or what the
Constitution actually taught.
The fugitive law has been condemned as uncon.
stitutioral by Wings and Democrats, though
never because It was n slare catching lato, but
only because in securing that Constitutional
object, it most unceremoniously overran, and
overthrew jury trial-habeas corpus and other
matters, in which white folks were interested.
This discussion of abolitionists, however, is
now bearing rich fruit. 1t is bearing fruit
among political abolitionists abundantly, in
changing their Interpretation of the instrument.
This work is rapidly progressing. Let it go on.
1t is q change for the better--a change in the
nti-slavery voter so far as the result is con-
cerned (whether his logic will bear him out in IL
is another question:, from pro-slavery to an
anti-slavery position. 1t gives him, therefore,
the advantage of consistency, and enables him
to strike far heavier blows than from his old
stand point. 1t is a real progress-forced on
by an anti-slavery heart and purpose. That
it triumphs over logic and well established
and popular interpretation -disregarding facts,
and making a new Constitution without the
trouble oil the prescribed process, is only owl
dencc of the strength of the impolling senti-
ment, and adds the moro to our courage and
and nope.
But this is not all. The last mail has brought
us new evidence of progress, in this particular.
Horace Greeley, at length has spoken out. The
Tho example of abOlitionsts in the discussion
has had its encouraging effect. lie has conned
the arguments of Spooner, and Goodale,
and Smith and the monstrositcs of United
States Kidnapping, have compelled him to adopt
and assert those opinions, and vindicate them so
tar as the fgtire clause is concerned. Thanks for
this evidence of advancing public sentiments.
When those who arc now Wings and Democrats
discuss the question as Horace Greeley docs in
the last Mondays Tribune, and with the same
result, the days of slavery will be numbered
We would rejoice in this result and in the means,
even, though argument and conclusion may be
altogether different from that which we have
received and urged.
We would give Mr.. Greeley's article, though
we believe it contains nothing new, but that 1t
came 10 hand too late for this number Of our
paper. We have only room for the statement of
his views and his introduction, before going into
the historical evidence of its truth. 1t headed
THE KIDNAPPING CLAUSE.
Gas the United States, Ingraham, Albert, &
Co., have again been at work in Philadelphia,
saving the Union, perhaps it will not danger
ously increase tho agitation to inquire how tho
United States came to be tho senior in this
how it operates amicably with !
in committing the very crime for
which one of them has already suffered in the
There is no dispute among de-
cont people about the criminality of tearing
such a man as George Smith, alias Bill Fisher,
mum llNdhlu uHu MS lhtnliy ana
him to chattle slavery in Maryland,
whether it be under master whose veins purple
with the blood of the Howards, or with sim
liar liquid which has 'crept through scoundres
ever since the food No one justifies it, even
to save the integrity of this great Republic, if
it were not solemnly prescribed and enjoined in
the fundamental law received from the fathers
thereof. The creed from which it results that
the United States must stoop to the ineffablc
degradation of becoming particeps crin,inis with
such ruthless villains as Alberti, is this That
the Constitution, the handiwork of Washington,
Jefferson, Adams. Wilson, Sherman, Franklin,
and other revolutionary peers, solemnly adopted
by the people of these States in Convention
assembled, or ordained that the Federal Gov
ernment, in acknowledgement of the right of
which one man may hold in the body
ana soul of another, shall, by its mighty power
all the machinary of its Justice, and the slare-
holder in recovering his fugitive siave, who may
have escaped since the date of the SAID Const-
tuition, into any other State.
"This is a very hard curd to swallow, for
men who respect either themselves or their
Even if the language of the Consti-
tuition seemed plainly to express It, such men
would naturally believe, from their faith in the
history of their country's heroes. that it must
be capable of more decent Interpretation, recon-
Cling it to the known principles of the trainers
of tho Constitution. But the language of the
Constitution, it is notorious, does not plainly,
nor at all, express any such thing. For the
honor of the Constitution we love to quote the
very words, honorable and pure words as can
anywhere be found. They are these
"'No person held to service or labor in one
State under the laws thereof, escaping into an
other, shall in consequence of any law or reg
ulation therein, be discharged from such service
or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of
the party to whom such service or labor may
be due
Gas question of words, govorerned by tho
laws of English grammar and standard diction-