The Kansas herald of freedom., 1855-09-15
WORTHY of Consideration.


the 1st day of March. 1880, while the
revolutionary struggle was still pending,
passed an act making provision for the
gradual abolition of slavery in that prov
ince. The act was drawn up by the i'm
mortal FRANkL1S, who, if we recol-
lect Alright, was Speaker of the House on
that occasion. The preamble is as fol-
lows, and should have been consulted by
the self-styled Legislature of Kansas" "
when the 'Aet to punish offenses against
slave property" was pending before
them:-
"When we contemplate our abhor-
renee of that copdition, to which the arms
and tyranny of Great Britain were exert
ed to reduce US, when we look back up
on the variety of dangers to which we
have been exposed, and how miraculous
iy our wants in many instances have been
supplied, and our deliverance wrought,
when even hope and human fortitude have
become unequal to the conflict, we are
unavoidably led to serious and grateful
sense of the manifold blessings, which
we have undeservedly received from the
hand ofthat Being from whom every good
and perfect gift cometh. Impressed with
these ideas, we conceive that It's our du-
ty, and we rejoice thatit is in our power,
to extend portion of that freedom to
others, which hath been extended to us,
and release from that state of thraldom,
to which we ourselves were tyrannicaily
doomed, and from which we have now
every prospect of being delivered. tits
not for us to inquire why, in the creation
of mankind, the inhabitants of the sew
eral parts of the earth were distinguished
by difference in feature or complexion.
1t is sufficient to know, that all are the
work of an Almighty hand. We find,
in the distribution of the human species,
that the most fertile as well as the most
barren parts of the earth are Inhabited
by men of compilations different from
we may reasonably, as well as religious
ly, infer, that He, who placed them in
their various situations, hath extended
equally his care and protection to all, and
that it becometh not us to eounteract his
mercies. We esteem it a peculiar bless
ing granted to US, that We are enabled
this day to add one more step to univef-
sal civilization, by removing, as much as
possible, the SORROWS of those, who have
lived in undeserved bondage, and from
which, by the assumed authority of the
kings of Great Britain, no efectual, legal
relief could be obtained. Weaned, by a
long course of experience, from those
narrow prejudices and partialities we had
imbibed, We find our hearts enlarged with
kindness and benevolence towards men
of all conditions and nations; and we
conceive ourselves at this particular Pc
riod extraordinarily called upon, by the
blessings which we have received, to man.
ifest the sincerity of our profession, and
TO give substantial proof of our graft
tude.
Sand whereas the condition of those
persons, who have heretofore been denom-
mated negro and mulatto slaves, has been
attended with circumstances, which not
only deprive them of the common bless
ings that they were by nature entitled to,
but has cast them into the deepest affiic
tiens, by an unnatural separation and sale
of husband and wife from each other and
from their children, an injury, the great
ness of which can only be conceived by
supposing that we were in the same un
happy case. In justice, therefore, to
persons so unhappily eircumstaneed, and
who, having no prospect before them
whereon they may rest their sorrows and
their hope, have no reasonable induce
meut to render their service to society,
which they otherwise might, and also in
grateful commemoration of our own hap
py deliverance from that state of uncon-
ditional submission, to which we were
doomed by the tyranny of Britain"
Then follows the enactment, which we
omit as unimportant, perhaps, to the
Kansas reader.