Year: 1859

| SaN i G0S Will nave nun ,aIlyuOW.r I, LUIS Il
NEVER said. did say to Mr.. Lowe, what
honestly believed to be the truth, that the
crowd were very much excited, many of them
averse to longer delay and bent upon rescue
at all hazards; and that he being an old ac-
quaintance and friend Of mine, was anxious
to extricate him from the dangerous position
he occupied, and therefore advised that he
urge Jennings to give the boy up. Further
than this l did not say, either to him or any
one else. .''


The law under which am arraigned is an
unjust one, one made to crush the colored
man, and one that outrages every feeling of
humanity, as well as every rule of Right. l
have nothing to do with its constitutionality;
abbut that 1 care but little. I have often
heard It said by learned and good men that it
was, unconstitutional remember the excite
ment that prevailed throughout all the free
states when it passed, and remember how
often it has heen said by individuals, conven-
tions, communities and legislatures, that it
never could be, never should be, and was
never meant to be inforced. had always
believed until the contrary appeared in the
actual institution of proceedings, that the pro-
visions of this odious statute would never be
enforced within the bounds of this State.


But have another reason to offer why
should not be sentenced, and one think per-
tinent to the case. | have not had a trial be-
fore a jury of my peers. The common laws
of England-and you will excuse me for re-
fering to that, since l am but private citizen
was that every man should be tried before
a jury of men occupying the same position
in the social scale with himself. That lords
should be tried before a jury of lords; that
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of the realm yassals before vassals, and ali
ems before aliens, and they must not come
from the district where the crime was commit
or foes should affect the accused. The consti-
tuition of the United States guarantees-not
merely to its citizens, but to all persons trial
such trial.


The colored man is oppressed by certain
universal and deeply fixed prejudices. Those
Jurors are well known to have shared largely
in these prejudices, and therefore consider
that they were neither impartial nor were they
ajury of my peers. And the prejudices which
white people have against colored men grow
out of the facts, that we have as people con
senated for two hundred years to be slaues of
the whites. We have been scourged, crushed
and cruelty oppressed, and have submitted to
it all tamely, meekly, peaceably; mean as a
people, and with rare individual EXCEPTIONS
and to day you see us thus, meekly submit
ting to the penalties of an infamous law. Now
the Americans have this feeling, and it is an
honorable one, that they will respect those
| who will rebel at oppression, but despise those
who tamely submit to outrage and wrong !;
and while our people as people submit, they
will as people be despised. Why, they will
hardly meet on terms of equality with us in
a whiskey shop, in car, at table, or even
at the altar Of God. So thorough and hearty
contempt have they for those who will meekly
lie still under the heel of the oppressor. The
jury came into the box with that feeling
They krcw they had that feeling, and SO the
Court knows now, and knew then. The gen.
aa s%sR Mh4 me pgSSftea a9 hs G9nt ss


that feeling


Twas tried by a jury who were preudiced :;
before Court that was prejudiced; prosecuted
by an officer who was prejudiced, and defend
ed, though ably, by counsel that were preju-
diced. And therefore it is, your Honor, that
l urge by all that IS good and great in man.
hood, that should not be subjected to the
pains and penalties of this oppressive law,
when have not been tried, either by Jury
of my peers, or by jury that were impartial.


One more word, sir, and | have done. I
went to Wellington, knowing that colored
men have no rights in the United States which
white men are bound to respect; that the
Courts had SO decided; that Congress had SO
enacted; that the people had so decreed.


There is not spot in this wide country,
not even by affairs of God, nor in the shadow
of the shafts that tell the imperishable fame
and glory of the heroes of the Revolution no,
nor in the old Philadelphia Hall, where any
colored man may dare to ask mercy of a
white man. Let me stand in that Hall and tell
United States marshal that my father was
Revolutionary soldier; that he served under
Lafayette, and fought through the whole war,
and that he fought for my freedom as much
as for his own; and he would sneer at me,
and clutch me with his bloody fingers, and say
he has a right to make me slave! And
when appeal to Congress, they say he has a
right to make me slave; when appeal to
the people, they say he has right to make
me slave, and when appeal to your Honor,
ycur Honor says he has right to make me
slave, and if any man, white or black, seeks
an investigation of that claim, they make
themselves amenable to the pains and PEN
alties of the Fugitive Slave Act, for
BLACK MEN HAVE NO RIGHTS WHICH WHITES ARE
BOUND TO RESPECT. (Great Applause) I, 60
ing to Wellington with the full knowledge of
all this, knew that if that man was taken to
Columbus he was hopelessly gone, no matter
whether he had ever been in slavery before or
not. | knew that was in the same situation
myself, and that by the decision of your
Honor if any man whatever were to claim me
as his slave and seize me, and my brother,
being a lawyer, should seek to get out writ
of hapeas corpus to expose the falsity of the
claim, he would be thrust into prison under
one provision of the Fugitive Slave Law, for
interfering with the man claiming to be in
pursuit of fugitive, and ], by the perjury of
solitary wretch, would by another of its
provisions be helplessly doomed to life long
bondage, without the possibility of escape.


Some may say that there is no danger of
free persons being seized and carried off as
slaves. No one need labor under such de-
lusion Sir, four of the eight persons who
were first carried back under the act of 1850,
were afterwards proved to be free men. They
were free persons, but wholly at the mercy
of the oath of one man. And but last Sab
bath afternoon a letter came to me from a
gentleman in st. Louis, informing me that
young lady under my instructions at Colum-
bus, free person, is now lying in the Jail at
that place, claimed as the slave of some wretch
who never saw her before, and waiting for tes-
timony from relatives at Columbus to estab-
lish her freedom. could stand here by the
hour and relate such instances. In the very
nature of the case they must be constantly
occurring. A letter was not long since found
upon the person of counterfeiter when ar
rested, addressed to him by some Southern
gentleman, in which the writer says:


$50 among the niggers; find out their
marks and scars; make good descriptions,
and send to me and I'll find masters for 'em.''


That is the way men are carried "back" to
slavery.


But in view of all these facts, say, that, if
ever again man is seized near me, and is
about to be carried southwark as a slave be.
fore any legal investigation has been had, 1
shall hold it to be my duty as held it that
day, to secure for him if possible legal in
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