Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1884-04-19

son, the cOnsenuDg testimony Os the
revered fathers Of the government; al.
ways the national conscience some
where silently pleading, always the
| finger of the world steadily
| polnting In scorn. But here,
after, all the protest and the
rebulle and the endeavor, was the
malign power, which, when the con-
stitulion was formed, had been but the
shrinking AFFECT bound in the casket,
now towering and resistless. lie had
kicked his cask,t into the sea, aud
Ihaughtily defying the conscience of
country and the moral sentiment OF
mankind, demanded absolute control
of the republic ms the price of union
the republic, anxious only TO submit
and TO call submission statesnanship.
Garrison was certainly not the first
Abolitionist; no, nor was Ldther the
first Protestant. But Luther brought
all the wandering and separate rays
of protest to focua, and kindled the
contest for religious freedom. So when
Garrison flung full in the face
OF slavery the defiance of imme-
date and complete abolition, slave
ry, instinctively foreseeing its doom,
sprapg to its set, and joined, with the
heroism Of despair, in the death Crap
pie with liberty, from which, after II
generation,
LIBERTY AROSE
unbruised and victorious. But History,
looking before and after, read
justs contemporary judgments of men
and events. In all the essential
qualities of heroic action, Luther nail
Ing his challenge to the church, upon
the church's own door, when the
church was supreme in Europe Will
liam Tell In the romantic legend, Sc
, renely scorning to bow to the cap of
) Gesler, when Gesler's troops held all
: the market place. are not nobler
figures than Garrison and Phillips, in
the hour Of the complete possession of
the country by the power of slavery,
, demanding immediate and uncondi-
, tional emancipation. a tone of apol-
ogy, of depreciation, or regret, no more
becomes an American in speak
ing of the abolitiOnists, than in speak
, ing of the sons of liberty in the revolu-
, respect which we gladly. pay to the H.
, lustrious fathers of American indie
5 pendence, is paid as worthily to their
sons, the pioneers of American free
DOM
9 The freedom was secured, indeed, by
the union of many forces. The addition
: movement was moal agitation. 1t was
voice crying in the wilderness. AS
[ al American movement 1t was re-
preached for holding aloof from the
4 American political method. But in
l the order of time the moral awakening
: precedes political action. Politics are
founded in compromise and expedi.
ency, and had the abolition leaders
! paused to parley with prejudice and
, interest and personal ambition, in or
J, der to smooth and conciliate and per.
) suade, their duty would have been I'M
: done. When the alarm bell at nigh,
a has brought tue aroused citizens to the
:, street, they will organize their action.
:, But the ringer of the bell betrays his
- trust when he ceases to startle. Tu
!, vote was TO acknowledge the constitu-
= ton. TO acknowledge the constitu
. ton was to offer premium
= upon slavery by granting more pc.
= liiical power for every slave. 1t was
" to own an obligation to return limo
. cent men to unspeakble degradation,
j.. and to shoot them down If, with Il
, thousandfold greater reason than Our
fathers, they resisted oppression.
. Could Americans do this? Gould hon.
8 est men do this? Could great coun-
y try do this and not learn, sooner or
" later, by CHASTITY experience, the truth
: which George Mason proclaimed-thai
Providence Furnishes national sins by
:, national calamities? The Union, said
% Wendell Phillips, with "a calmness
T. that enchanted while it appalled,, the
Union Is called the very ark of the
l. American covenant; but has not idol
- airy of the Union been the chief
20 BULwARK OF SLAVERY,
s. and in the words and deeds and spirit
TX of the most vehement Union saviors
n who denounce agitation, can any hope
IL of emancipation be deserted? If, then
IN under the sacred charter of the Union,
10 slavery has grown to this stupendous
L. height, throwing the shadow of death
&c over the land, is not the Union as il
d exists the foe of liberty, and can we
I'd honestly affirm that it is the sole sur.
g, viving hope of freedom in the world?
~ Even while he spoke there sprang
al up around him the marshaled host ol
N an organized political party, which,
20 raising the constitution as q banner of
y freedom, MAJ ched TO the polls to make
re the Union the citadel of liberty. He,
Of Indeed, had rejected the constitution
vi aud the Union rs the bulwarlS of sav-
x cry. But he aud the political host,
N widely differing, had yet common
J. purpose, and We're c0niouuded i'm a
Of common condemnation. Aud who
Is shall count the voters in that polil.
ir ical army, and who the generous he.
N roes of the actual war, i'm whose young
y. hearts his relentless denuu-
Of citation of the Union had
20 bred the high resolve that
N under the protection of the constitution
ri and by its own lawful power, the slave
s. union which he denounced should be
rs dissolved in the tervid glory of a new
~ Union of freedom? His plea, indeed
did not persuade his friends, and was
T. inriously spurned by his foes. Hang
lie Phillips aud Yancey together. hang
ps the abolitionist and the ilre.eater. md
ne We shall have peace, cried mingled
II wrath and terror, as the absorbing do.
" Date deepened toward civil war. But
sui, through the startling flash and
over the thunder peal with which the
in tempest burst, that cry rang out undis.
ts mayed, Dctcada Covthogo!-The aw.
y iui storm has rolled away. The warn.
= Ing voice Is stilled forever. Bnt tba
n slave union whose destruction Ia
II sought Is dissolved, and the glorions
ul Union OF freedom aud equal rights
e. which his soul desired, is the e'''
c. BLESSED UNION oFToDAy.
n For his great work of arousinp tba
70 country aud piercing the national con '
la apiauop nhilt,..,, " @".."hai cou-