Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1859-09-17
SPEECH OF HENRY G. WRIGHT
{ the Anniversary of the Western A. S. Socie

~
THE following remarks were offered upon a res
%olution read by Mr.. Wright, and which he after
ward handed to the Business Committee.
Mr.. CHAIRMAN: This resolution sweeps the
whole ground and covers the whole subject. 1t
forever cuts of all necessity for quoting texts from
the Bible to sanction or oppose Slavery. I. cuts
across everything that stands in the way of the
slaves redemption and his elevation. 1t cuts off
all Christs and Gods and Devils that sustain or
sanction Slavery. There is no power in the uni
verse to sanction Slavery. There is no use in talk
ing about the example of Christ. or the apostles as
sanctioning slavery-sll we have to say to such
authority or example is get thee behind me Satan.
There is no use in talking about the authority Of
laws or constitutions to ne. When the Republic
an party declares it will let slavery alone where ii
now exists because it is sanctioned or protected
there by the United States Constitution il ceases
to be an instrumentslity with which to put Town
Slavery. When members of that party talk so
loudly against Slavery, and yet do nothing for it's
overthrow, they make themselves fools and they
befool the nation and the man who is loud in his
profession Of ansi-slavery, aud yet joins a polite
al party that thus declares it will not touch slave
~ WhCho INV ptOtoCtb II, 10 uuHUIbuy
the cause he pretends to defend.
Those men and woman, who have any humanity
in their souls. ought to put their heel upon all
Bibles and Laws aud Authorities and Constitutions
that sanction chattel Slavery. There are men who
say,-if you can put your finger upon a text of
the Bible that says Slavery is right, why then it is
right. If they can quote q text from Christ or
from Moses or one of the patriarchs which says
Slavery is right, with them il is right. And such
is the sentiment of Ohio and the whole North to-
day. Let a United States officer come with the au-
thority to kidnap one of your citizens, if be only
shows his Commission, your conscience and your
whole moral nature covers before him. -
But to true anti-slavery men and women such au-
thority is no more than the barking of q dog or The
mewing of a cat. This Difference or bowling to
authority is born in US. In youth it is bred into
US, and whipped into us until it becomes a part, al
most, Of our natures. If q man comes to you with
a paper in his hand by which he 10 authorized to
sieze your neighbor and drag him down from the
high position of a freeman to that of a chattel
slave, you bow to the authority, and another vic
tim is offered up on the accursed altar of Slavery.
Humanity cries ont against it God in Heaven
cries out against it and calls upon you to resist all
such commissions and authorities come they from
whatsoever source they may. / call upon you to
resist by oil such instrumentalitie as you can use.
If you believe it is right to resist with force the
man who would fasten the chains upon you,
wrists, then it is your duty to resist with force when
he attempts to rivet then upon your neighbor'S.-
If you believe it is ever right to use deadly weap
ons,then it is your duty to put q bullet through the
heart Of the officer when ne comes to you to exc
cute his execrable commission. say such is you,
duty, not mine, for such are your principles, and
you are bound to carry out your own convictions
of right and duty be they what they may. Live
up to the highest light within you and do for tn
slave just what you would DO for yourse!fif placed
in his circumstances. do not suppose there is ont
man in ten wto believes it is right to make him
slave-he knows it is not right, constitution or M
constitution, law or no law. Why, God has nj
more right to make me a slave than l have to max,
him a slave. There is, nor can be no power in tn
whole universe to make slavery r%ight-hence it j
, our duty to resist and trample under our feet al
! such laws aud and authorities which claim th
a right to enslsve our fellows, whether they be foun,
: in the Bible, the Shaster, the Constitution or an
o political party which stands on any other groun
I must be broken in pieces and scattered like cha
before the wind. And every Church and relil
/ ious organization, every State and Kingdom nut
a be destroyed and ~tranpled in the dust, if necessar,
9 before the all-prevailing spirit of anti-slavery.