Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1857-10-10
Yours, &c,
GERRIT SMITH.

"You ask whether it is right for fugitive slaves
to marry again. Pardon me for taking exception
to your word again. | an yet to be convinced that
they have ever been married The parties to a
marriage, give themselves away to each other
But slaves do not own themselves; and how, then,
can they give themselves away? May it not as
well be said that horses marry, that slaves mar
Try?
One Of the numberless and stupendous crimes
of slavery, is not merely that it f rbds marriage
to its Victims but that it makes their marriage alb
soutey impossible. A slave man and a slave wo-
man may live together in many respects as hus-
band and wife do and their love for each other as
pure and hOl J,as ever rociprocated by husband
and wife. Nevertheless, they are not husband
and wife; and they cannot be, until they have the
ability to take each other as husband and wife,
But neither this ability, any other which in
cludes the right to their own persons, can they have
whilst in slavery.
Again, is it not absurd to call that marriage, the
parties to which have no more right to their off
spring than horses have to their colts sheep to
thoir lambs? The parties to marriage own their
children, and have the care and training of them
and this is the great end of marriage. But moth
ing of all this is true in the case of slavery.
Many of the fugitive slaves would, if they could,
marry the beloved ones whom they have lett be-
hind them, with whom they cohabited for years,
and by whom they had children. Bnt this privi.
lego slavery denies them. Let them, then. if they
nave the neart 10 90 So marry others.
Is il said that my view Of the matter, stamps as
concubinage or adultery, the 0nnections between
slaves called marriage? Far be it from me to
characteize those connections harshy To expect
that they should be entered into is to expect quite
too much from human nature in such circumstances.
Nevertheless to enter into them, is contrary to the
requirements of Christianity. The slaves, having
no power TO marry, can have right to such rela-
tions and responsibilities as belong alone to marri-
age. The sin of the fugitive slaves in question, is
not N their marrying, now that they have the
ability to marry, by having the disposal of their
own persons, Their sin is in the past. 1t is in
their having attempted relations and responsible
ties, which their enslavement made impossible, /
doubt not that for this sin of these poor, benight-
ed, outraged ones, the passionate God will make
every just allowance. But what shall be said of
the sin of that system which denies marriage to
its millions of victims, and in such denial exposes
them to wellngh Irresistible temptations p
And what shall be taid of the sin Of those who
uphold the system? What shall be said of the
guilty South, and of the guilty north What too
shall be said of the sin of the ant-slavery men,
the great mass of whom defer to this system of
law and dare not sssail it the most devilish out
law and who instead Of uprooting it without de.
lay, waste the precious opportunity for doing so,
in the idle and fruitless plans for arresting the
tension of slavery"