Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1854-09-09
oBERLIN ANTI-sLAvERY PLATFORM

The following preamble nd resolutions,
adopted at n recent meeting at Oberlin, arc per-
tinently denominatcd the Orbcrlin Anti-Slayery
Platform -
PREAMBLE.
Recent developments in Congress, and in the
country at large, have proven that the contest be-
tween Slavery and Freedom, in the L. States, is n
war of determination. Either Slavery must pre-
vail throughout the land. or it must be entirely
abolished. Slavery and Freedom are antagonistic
principles, between which there can be no harmony,
no common interest, no compromise. In efforts to
divide our country between these contening pow
ers, we have no sympathy and no confidence. The
time has come when the people of the North should
rally and combine their energies, not only to pre-
vent the spread OF Slavery, but to crush the system
itself. To do our part towards the accomplishment
Of this end, we, the people of Oberlin, unite in the
following declara ton of
PRINCIPLES.
]. American Slavery is n system of unparallel-
ed wickedness. Itdeprives its victims of every dig
nifty and every right it undermincs the principles
Of universal liberty it denies the supreme authori-
ty Of the Divine law; it openly proclaims the VIC
lation OF the public faith it menaces the entire
overthrow Of liberty, and it aims to establish its
dominion over all the western Continent. There
fore, not only sympathy with the slave, thedoctrine
of human brotherhood, and loyalty to the govern
mcnt of God, but also the law of self-preservation
demands that we seek the destruction of the insti-
tuition itself.
ii. Our war, then, is with Slavery itself, as we'll
as all its usurpations and aSgressions. We aim
to bring it to an end where it is, as we'll as to op-
pose its extension over territory where it is not
Where we have not political power to rs sail it d.
rectly, We will use all the agences which may be
justly employed, to arouse the nation to a sense of
its wickedness, its c%ruelties, and the dangers to
which it exposes US. Wherever we have such pow
err, we hold it to be our solemn duty to use it all
for the turtherance of liberty and the destruction
of slavery throughout the land. In the language
of one Of our revolutionary fathers, we will Ego
to the very verge of our constitutional power" for
this end. In the language of another of them, we
twill study the instrument" anew, to learn what
rights and duties it teaches in regard to universal
liberty, which the sophistries of slavery may have
hitherto concealed.
III Among the powers which the constitution
%confcrs on the General Government for the further
ance of universal liberty, are the following: To
prohibit slavery and the slave-trade in the District
of Columbia, and in all territories and places I'M
der the exclusive jurisdiction of the General Gov,
eminent; to repeal all laws for the rendition of flu
gitiye slaves to prohibit the coast-wise and
Interstate slave-trade to admit no State to the
confederacy whose constitution does not prohibit
slavery within its borders to withdraw totally all
government support to slavery, in whatever form,
and to use the entire moral power of the Govern.
ment, at home and abroad, in favor of universal
emancipation. These powers we believe it to be
| tut luiDClhliNO uuty VI tHO oNiCldi iCh "
exercise in favor Of Universal liberty and such
exercise we shall always and earnestly demand.
". All compromises, ancient and modern, tC
support slavery, are an agreement to support a sys
tenn of wickedness; and if they had once beer
binding, las they never were and never could be-,
the nation is released from all obligation to observe
them, since the propagandists of slavery have beer
guilty of the most fragrant violation of them when.
ever their interest or caprice has prompted such
violation. We shall therefore hold all these com
promises null and void, as far as they require u:
to support slavery, or restrain us from doing any
thing which just men may do for its overthrow.
V. With those, and only those who cordially
make the spirit of these principles the basis o
their political action, and who will demand of al
candidates for Office a distinct avowal of the same
or a character and past history which evince un
doubted and answering devotion to liberty ant
hostility to slavery, we can join in a political or
ganization which shall steadily pursue these ends
till by the union of good men and the blessing o
Almighty God ''thc letters shall be broken and tn,
slave shall be a man."