ANTISLAVERY CONFLICT. (continued 2)

Dr. Channing’s profound respect for human nature and the rights of man, and his heartfelt compassion for the oppressed, suffering, despised, were such that he could not but see clearly the essential, inevitable, terrible wrongs and evils of slavery to the master as well as to his subject. He portrayed these cruelties and vices so clearly and forcibly that the pages of his book contain as utter condemnations of the domestic servitude in our Southern States, and as awful exposures of the consequent corruption, pollution of families and the community in those States,—condemnations as utter and exposures as awful as could be found in The Liberator. To his chapters on “Property in Man,” “Rights,” and “Evils of Slavery,” we could take no exceptions. But his chapter entitled “Explanations” seems to us, as Mr. Garrison called it, a chapter in recantation,—a disastrous attempt to make it appear as if there could be sin without a sinner. He says that the character of the master and the wrong done to the slave are distinct points, having little or no relation to each other. He therefore did not “intend to pass sentence on the character of the slaveholder.” Jesus Christ taught that “by their fruits ye shall know men.” But the Doctor said in this chapter, “Men are not always to be interpreted by their acts or their institutions.” “Our ancestors,” he continued, “committed a deed now branded as piracy,” i. e. the slave-trade. “Were they, therefore, the offscouring of the earth?” No,—but they were pirates, their good qualities in other respects notwithstanding. They were guilty of kidnapping the Africans, and made themselves rich by selling their victims into slavery. Piracy was too mild a term for such atrocious acts. They were just as wicked before they were denounced by law as afterwards. And it was by bringing the people of England and of this country to see the enormity of the crimes inseparable from that trade in human beings, that they were persuaded to repent of it, to renounce and abhor it. Again Dr. Channing says under this head, “How many sects have persecuted and shed blood! Were their members, therefore, monsters of depravity?” I answer, their spirit was cruel and devilish, utterly unlike the spirit of Jesus. They were none of his, whatever may have been their professions. As well might we deny that David was a gross adulterer and mean murderer, because he wrote some very devotional psalms.

A more marvellous inconsistency in the book before us is this. The Doctor declares “that cruelty is not the habit of the slave States in this country.” “He might have affirmed just as truly,” said Mr. Garrison, “that idolatry is not the habit of pagan countries.” What is cruelty? The extremest is the reducing of a human being to the condition of a domesticated brute, a piece of mere property. The Doctor himself has said as much in another part of this volume, see the 26th page in his excellent chapter on “Property.” Having described what man is by nature, he adds, “The sacrifice of such a being to another’s will, to another’s present, outward, ill-comprehended good, is the greatest violence which can be offered to any creature of God. It is to cast him out from God’s spiritual family into the brutal herd.” “No robbery is so great as that to which the slave is habitually subjected.” “The slave must meet cruel treatment either inwardly or outwardly. Either the soul or the body must receive the blow. Either the flesh must be tortured or the spirit be struck down.” No Abolitionist, not even Mr. Garrison, has set forth more clearly the extreme cruelty, inseparable from holding a fellow-man in slavery one hour.

Still Dr. Channing objected to our primal doctrine,—“immediate emancipation.” But could there have been a more obvious inference than this, which an upright mind would unavoidably draw from a consideration of the rights of man, the evils of slavery, and the unparalleled iniquity of subjecting a human being to such degradation. I ask, could there have been a more obvious inference than that any, every human being held in such a condition ought to be immediately released from it? It is plain to me that Dr. Channing himself drew the same inference that Elizabeth Heyrick,H of England, and Mr. Garrison had drawn, although he rejected the trenchant phrase in which they declared that inference. Having exhibited so faithfully and feelingly the wrongs and the evils of slavery, he says, on the 119th page of this book: “What, then, is to be done for the removal of slavery? In the first place, the slaveholder should solemnly disclaim the right of property in human beings. The great principle that man cannot belong to man should be distinctly recognized. The slave should be acknowledged as a partaker of a common nature, as having the essential rights of humanity. This great truth lies at the foundation of every wise plan for his relief.” Would not any one suppose, if he had not been forbidden the supposition, that the writer of these lines intended to enjoin the immediate emancipation of the enslaved? Surely, he would have the first thing that is to be done for their relief done immediately. Surely, he would have the foot of the oppressor taken from their necks at once. He would have the heavy yoke that crushes them broken without delay. Surely, he would have the foundation of the plan for the removal of slavery laid immediately. He would not, could not counsel the slaveholder to postpone a day, nor an hour, the recognition of the right of his slave to be treated as a fellow-man. There is a remarkable resemblance between what Dr. Channing here says ought to be done in the first place, and what the Abolitionists had from the beginning insisted ought to be done immediately.

One of the Doctor’s objections to our chosen phrase was that it was liable to be misunderstood. But, as we said at the time, “if immediate emancipation expresses our leading doctrine exactly, it ought to be used and explanations of it be patiently given until the true doctrine has come to be generally understood, received, and obeyed.” Now, immediate emancipation was the comprehensive phrase that did best express the right of the slave and the duty of the master. In whatever sense we used the word immediate, whether in regard to time or order, the word expressed just what we Abolitionists meant. We insisted upon it in opposition to those who were teaching slaveholders to defer to another generation, or to some future time an act of common humanity that was due to their fellow-men at once; and would be due every minute until it should be done. We insisted upon it in opposition to the popular but deceptive, impracticable, and cruel scheme which proposed to liberate the slaves on condition of their removal to Africa.

Dr. Channing further objected that “the use of the phrase immediate emancipation had contributed much to spread far and wide the belief, that the Abolitionists wished immediately to free the slave from all his restraints.” But ought we to have been held responsible for such a senseless, wanton misconstruction of words that had been explained a thousand times by our appointed lecturers, in our tracts, and in the “Declaration of the Sentiments, Purposes, and Plans of the American Antislavery Society,” which was published three years before Dr. Channing’s book appeared? Freemen,—Republican freemen were, are, and ever ought to be subject to the restraints of civil government, equal and righteous laws. From the commencement of our enterprise, our only demand for our enslaved countrymen has been that they should forthwith be admitted to all the rights and privileges of freemen upon the same conditions as others, after they shall have acquired (those of them who do not now possess) the qualifications demanded of others.

Still further the Doctor accused us Abolitionists of having “fallen into the common error of enthusiasts,—that of exaggerating their object, of feeling as if no evil existed but that which they opposed, and as if no guilt could be compared with that of countenancing or upholding it.” We grieved especially that he suffered this censure to drop from his pen, as, coming from him, it would repress in many bosoms the concern which was beginning to be felt more than ever before for the slaves and the slaveholders. There was no danger that we should esteem or lead others to esteem the evils of their condition to be greater than they were. All about us there was still an alarming insensibility or indifference to the subject. This could not have been made to appear more glaring than by the Doctor himself, on the 137th page of his book. “Suppose,” he there said, “suppose that millions of white men were enslaved, robbed of all their rights in a neighboring country, and enslaved by a black race who had torn their ancestors from the shores on which our fathers had lived. How deeply should we feel their wrongs!” Ay, how much more deeply would even the Abolitionists feel for them! Yet why should we not all feel as much, in the case that actually existed in our country as in the one supposed? We are unable to find a reason of which we ought not to be ashamed, because it must be one based upon a cruel prejudice, the offspring of the degradation into which we had forced the black men. I really wish if there are any who think with Dr. Channing that the Abolitionists did exaggerate the guilt of holding men in slavery, or consenting with slaveholders,—I really wish such persons would read Dr. Channing’s chapter on the “Evils of Slavery,” and then show us, if he can, wherein we exaggerated them.

Dr. Channing repelled with great emphasis the charge often brought against Abolitionists, that we were endeavoring to incite the slaves to violence, bloodshed, insurrection. He said, page 131: “It is a remarkable fact, that though the South and the North have been leagued to crush them, though they have been watched by a million of eyes, and though prejudice has been prepared to detect the slightest sign of corrupt communication with the slave, yet this crime has not been fastened on a single member of this body.” No, not one of our number, that I was acquainted with, ever suggested the resort to insurrection and murder by the enslaved as the means of delivering them from bondage. And in our Declaration at Philadelphia we solemnly disclaimed any such intention.

We knew that slavery could be peaceably abolished only by the consent of the slaveholders and the legislators of their States. We knew that they could not fail to be affected, moved by the right action of our Federal Government, touching the enslavement of the colored population in the District of Columbia, and in the territories that were entirely under the jurisdiction of Congress. And we knew that the members of Congress could not be reached and impelled to act as we wished them to, but by the known sentiments and expressed wishes of their constituents,—the people of the nation North and South. It was needful, therefore, to press the subject upon the consideration of the people throughout the land. Accordingly, we did all in our power to awaken the public attention, to agitate the public mind, to touch the public heart. We sent able lecturers to speak wherever there were ears to hear them, and we sent newspapers and tracts wherever the mails would carry them.

Dr. Channing reproached us for this, especially for sending our publications to the slaveholders. But we know not how else we could have made them sensible of the horror with which their system of domestic servitude was viewed by thousands in the Northern States; and inform them correctly of our determination to effect the liberation of their bondmen; and the peaceful means and legal measures by which we intended, if possible, to accomplish our purpose. We wondered greatly at the Doctor’s objection to our course in this direction. To whom should we have sent our publications, if not to those whose cherished institution we were aiming by them to undermine and overthrow? Would it have been open, manly, honorable not to have done so?

One more objection Dr. Channing made, which seemed to us as unreasonable as the last. It was to our manner of forming our Antislavery Associations. He said: “The Abolitionists might have formed an association, but it should have been an elective one. Men of strong principles, judiciousness, sobriety, should have been carefully sought as members. Much good might have been accomplished by the co-operation of such philanthropists.” Alas! such philanthropists, the wise and prudent men, to whom he probably alluded, seemed to have made up their minds to acquiesce in the continuance of slavery, so long as our white brethren at the South saw fit to retain the institution; or to help them take it down very gradually, by removing the victims of it to the shores of Africa. Nearly fifty years had passed, and such philanthropists as he indicated had done little or nothing for the enslaved, and seemed to be growing more indifferent to their wrongs. If we had elected them, would they have associated with us? Are they the men to bear the brunt of a moral conflict? “Not many wise,”—as this world counts wisdom,—“not many rich, not many mighty,” were ever found among the leaders of reform. God has always chosen the foolish to confound the wise. It is left for imprudent men, enthusiasts, fanatics, to begin all difficult enterprises. They have usually been the pioneers of reform. Else why was not the abolition of slavery attempted and accomplished long before by that “better class”?

I have not dwelt so long upon this book, and criticised parts of it so seriously, in order to throw any shade upon the memory of that great man, whom I have so much reason to revere and love. But I have done this in order to reveal more fully to the present generation, and to those who may come after us, the sad state of the public mind and heart in New England thirty-five years ago. All the objections Dr. Channing alleged against us in this book were the common current objections of that day, hurled at us in less seemly phrases from the press, the platform, and the pulpit. They would not have been thought of, if we had been laboring for the emancipation of white men. It was sad that a man of such a mind and heart as Dr. Channing’s could have thought them of sufficient importance to press them upon us as he did. Nevertheless, his book contained so many of the vital principles for which we were contesting, set forth so luminously and urged so fervently, that it proved to be, as I have already said, a far greater help to our cause than we at first expected. And we look back with no little admiration upon one who, enjoying as he did, in the utmost serenity, the highest reputation as a writer and a divine, put at hazard the repose of the rest of his life, and sacrificed hundreds of the admirers of his genius, eloquence, and piety, by espousing the cause of the oppressed, which most of the eminent men in the land would not touch with one of their fingers.

THE GAG-LAW.

In the winter of 1835 and 1836 the slaveholding oligarchy made a bolder assault than ever before upon the liberty of our nation, and the most alarming intimations were given of a willingness to yield to their imperious demands. The legislatures of Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia passed resolutions of the same import, only those of Virginia and South Carolina were clothed, as might have been expected, in somewhat more imperative and threatening terms. These resolutions insisted that each State, in which slavery was established, had the exclusive right to manage the matter in the way that the inhabitants thereof saw fit; and that the citizens of other States who were interfering with slavery in any way, directly or indirectly, were guilty of violating their social and constitutional obligations, and ought to be punished. They therefore “claimed and earnestly requested that the non-slaveholding States of the Union should promptly and effectually suppress all abolition societies, and that they should make it highly penal to print, publish, and distribute newspapers, pamphlets, tracts, and pictorial representations calculated or having a tendency to excite the slaves of the Southern States to insurrection and revolt.”

These resolutions further declared that “they should consider every interference with slavery by any other State, or by the General Government, as a direct and unlawful interference, to be resisted at once, and under every possible circumstance.” Moreover, they insisted that they “should consider the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia as a violation of the rights of the citizens of that District, and as a usurpation to be at once resisted, as nothing less than the commencement of a scheme of much more extensive and flagrant injustice.”

Resolutions in these words, or to the same effect, passed by the legislatures of the above-mentioned States, were transmitted by the governors of those States severally to the governors of each of the non-slaveholding States, among them to the chief magistrate of Massachusetts, then the Hon. Edward Everett.

On the 15th of January, 1836, that gentleman delivered his address to both branches of the Legislature at the organization of the State Government. In the course of that address, as in duty bound to do under the circumstances, he alluded particularly to the subject of slavery, and to the excitement kindled throughout the country by the discussion of it in the free States.

But instead of showing that the subject of human rights was ever up, and must needs be ever up, for the consideration of the American people, in private circles and public assemblies; that it ought not and could not be prohibited,—instead of conceding the impossibility (in our country especially) of preventing the freest expression of the opinion, that such a glaring inconsistency, such a tremendous iniquity as the enslavement of millions ought not to be tolerated; that the genius of our Republic, the spirit of the age, the principles of Christianity, the impartial love of the Father of all mankind, each and all demanded the abolition of slavery,—instead of availing himself of the occasion so fully given him, from his high position, to reiterate the glorious doctrines of the Declaration of Independence, and to press upon the complaining States the obvious necessity of their yielding to the self-evident claims of humanity,—instead of this, His Excellency saw fit to commend the disastrous policy of the framers of our Republic; to pass a severe censure upon us Abolitionists, and to intimate his opinion that we were guilty of offences punishable at common law.

This part of his speech was referred to a joint committee of two from the Senate and three from the House of Representatives, Hon. George Lunt, Chairman. By order of the managers of the Massachusetts Antislavery Society, I addressed a letter to the above-named committee, asking permission to appear before them by representatives, and show reasons why there should be no legislative action condemnatory of the Abolitionists. The request was granted, and on the 4th of March the proposed interview took place in the chamber of the Representatives, in the presence of many citizens.

At first a member of the committee, Mr. Lucas, objected to our proceeding; said we were premature; that we should have waited until the committee had reported; that we had no reason to apprehend the Legislature would do anything prejudicial to us, or to the liberties of the people. I replied, “that formerly it would have been a gratuitous, an impertinent apprehension, but recent occurrences have admonished us, that we may not any longer safely rest in the assurance that our liberties are secure. Alarming encroachments have been made upon them, even in the metropolis of New England. We do not fear,” I continued, “that your committee will recommend, or that our Legislature will enact, a penal law against Abolitionists. But we do apprehend that condemnatory resolutions may be reported and passed; and these we deprecate more than a penal law for reasons that we wish to press upon your consideration.”

After some discussion between the members of the committee Mr. Lucas withdrew his objection, and we were allowed to proceed. I commenced, being the General Agent of the Society, and gave a sketch of the origin, the organization, and progress of the abolition enterprise,—stating distinctly our purpose and the instrumentalities by which we intended to accomplish it. I laid before the committee copies of our newspapers, reports, and tracts,—especially the constitutions of several State and County Antislavery Societies, and more especially the report of the convention that met in Philadelphia, in December 1833, and organized the American Antislavery Society, and issued a declaration of sentiments and purposes. All these documents, I insisted, would make it plain to the committee that we were endeavoring to effect the abolition of slavery by moral means,—not by rousing the enslaved to insurrection, but by working such changes in the public sentiment of the nation respecting the cruelty and wickedness of our slave system, that strong, earnest remonstrances would be sent from the Legislature, and still more from the ecclesiastical bodies in all the free States to corresponding bodies in the slave States, imploring them to consider the awful iniquity of making merchandise of fellow-men, and treating them like domesticated brutes; at the same time offering to co-operate with them and share generously in the expense of abolishing slavery, and raising their bondmen to the condition and privileges of the free.

Some discussion here ensued as to the character of some of our publications, and the propriety of certain expressions used by some of our speakers and writers. And then Ellis Gray Loring was heard in our behalf. This gentleman had been prominent among the New England Abolitionists from the very beginning of Mr. Garrison’s undertaking. There were combined in him the strength and resolution of a man with the intuitive wisdom and delicacy of a woman. He addressed the committee more than half an hour in a most pertinent manner, replying aptly to their questions and objections. “The general duty,” said Mr. Loring, “of sympathizing with and succoring the oppressed will probably be conceded. It is enjoined by Christianity. We are impelled to it by the very nature which our Creator has conferred upon us. What, then, is to limit our exercise, as Abolitionists, of this duty and this right? The relations we bear to the oppressor control, it is said, our duty to the oppressed. If we are bound to abstain from the discussion of slavery, it must be either because we are restrained by the principles of international law, or by some provisions of the Constitution of the United States. But, gentlemen, if the slaveholding States were foreign nations, it could not be shown that we have done anything which the law of nations forbids. We have done nothing for the overthrow of slavery in our Southern States which that law forbids, more than our foreign missionary societies have for many years been doing for the subversion of idolatry in pagan lands,—nothing more than was done in this city and all over our country to aid the Poles and the Greeks in their struggle for freedom, of which our ancient allies, the Russians and the Turks, were determined to deprive them. If, then, the Law of nations does not restrain us, is it in the Constitution of the United States that such restraint is imposed? Far from it. I find in that, our Magna Charta, an abundant guaranty for the liberty of speech; but I look in vain in the letter of the Constitution for any prohibition of the use of moral means for the extirpation of slavery or any other evil.”

Mr. Loring here took up the three clauses of the Constitution in which alone any allusion is made to the subject of slavery, and showed clearly that there was nothing in them which forbade the fullest and freest discussion of the political expediency or moral character of that system of oppression. And he confirmed his position by referring to the fact, that the framers of that great document did not understand it as the proslavery statesmen and politicians of our day would have it understood. Washington declared himself warmly in favor of emancipation. Jefferson’s writings contain more appalling descriptions and more bitter denunciations of slavery than are to be found in the publications of modern Abolitionists; and Franklin, Rush, and John Jay were members of an antislavery society formed a few years after they had signed the Constitution, and they joined in a petition to Congress praying for the abolition of that system of domestic servitude, so inconsistent with our political principles and disastrous to our national honor and prosperity.”

I have not given, nor have I room to give, anything like a full report of Mr. Loring’s speech. He closed with these words: “A great principle, gentlemen, is involved in the decision of this Legislature. I esteem as nothing in comparison our feelings or wishes as individuals. Personal interests sink into insignificance here. Sacrifice us if you will, but do not wound liberty through us. Care nothing for men, but let the oppressor and his apologist, whether at the North or the South, beware of the certain defeat which awaits him who is found fighting against God.”

The next one who addressed the committee was the Rev. William Goodell, one of the sturdiest, most sagacious and logical of our fellow-laborers. We are indebted to him for “a full statement of the reasons which were in part offered to the committee,” &c., &c., given to the public in a pamphlet which was issued from the press a few days after our interviews with said committee.

I shall here quote only the most important passage in his speech: “We would deprecate the passage of any condemnatory resolutions by the Legislature, even more than the enactment of a penal law, for in the latter case we should have some redress. We could plead the unconstitutionality of such a law, at any rate, it could not take effect until we had had a fair trial. Not so, gentlemen of this committee, in the case of resolutions. We should have no redress for the injurious operation of such an extra-judicial sentence. The passage of such resolutions by this and other legislatures would help to fix in the public mind the belief that Abolitionists are a specially dangerous body of men, and so prepare the public to receive such a law as the slaveholding States might dictate. We solemnly protest against a legislative censure, because it would be a usurpation of an authority never intrusted to the Legislature. They are not a judicial body, and have no right to pronounce the condemnation of any one.”

“Hold,” said Mr. Lunt, the Chairman of the committee, “you must not indulge in such remarks, sir. We cannot sit here and permit you to instruct us as to the duties of the Legislature.”

Mr. Goodell resumed, justified the remark for which he had been called to order, and completed his very able argument against any concurrence on the part of the General Court of Massachusetts with the demands of the Southern States.

Mr. Garrison next addressed the committee in a very comprehensive and forcible speech. But he neglected to give any report of it in his Liberator. I can therefore lay before your readers only this brief passage: “It is said, Mr. Chairman, that the Abolitionists wish to destroy the Union. It is not true. We would save the Union, if it be not too late. To us it would seem that the Union is already destroyed. To us there is no Union. We, sir, cannot go through these so-called United States enjoying the privileges which the Constitution of the Union professed to secure to all the citizens of this Republic. And why? Because, and only because, we are laboring to accomplish the very purposes for which it is declared in the preamble to the Constitution that the Union was formed! Because we are laboring ‘to establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, and promote the general welfare.’”

Dr. Follen then arose. He was extensively known and very much respected and beloved by all who had known him, as a Professor in Harvard College, or as a preacher of true Christianity in several parishes in the vicinity of Boston. He had done and suffered much for the sake of civil and religious liberty in his own country,—Germany,—and had come to our country in the high hope of enjoying the blessings and privileges of true freedom. He early espoused the antislavery cause, and rendered us essential services by his wise counsels and his labors with several prominent persons whom we had failed to reach. He was selected as one of the nine to maintain our rights before the legislative committee, and avert the wrong that seemed impending over us from the unhappy suggestions in the speech of Governor Everett.

The Doctor evidently felt very deeply the grave importance of the occasion. He commenced his speech with some profound remarks upon the rights of man and the spirit and purpose of our republican institutions, and then proceeded to point out the fearful encroachments, that had been made on the fundamental principles of our Republic by slaveholders and their Northern partisans. “And now,” said he, “they are calling upon the Northern legislatures to abolish the Abolitionists by law. We do not apprehend, gentlemen, that you will recommend, or that our General Court will enact, such a law. But we do apprehend that you may advise, and the Legislature may pass, resolutions severely censuring the Abolitionists. Against this measure we most earnestly protest. We think its effects would be worse than those of the penal law. The outrages committed in this city upon the liberty of speech, the mobs in Boston last October, were doubtless countenanced and incited by the great meeting of August, in Faneuil Hall. Now, gentlemen, would not similar consequences follow the expression by the Legislature of a similar condemnation? Would not the mobocrats again undertake to execute the informal sentence of the General Court? Would they not let loose again their bloodhounds upon us?”

“Stop, sir!” cried Mr. Lunt. “You may not pursue this course of remark. It is insulting to the committee and to the Legislature which they represent.”

Dr. Follen sat down, and an emotion of deep displeasure evidently passed through the crowd of witnesses.

I sprang to my feet and remonstrated with Mr. Lunt. Mr. Loring and Mr. Goodell also expressed their surprise and indignation at his course. But it was of no avail. He would not consent that Dr. Follen should proceed to point out what we considered the chief danger to be guarded against. We therefore declined to continue our interview with the committee; and gave them notice that we should appeal to the Legislature for permission to present and argue our case in our own way before them, or before another committee.

THE GAG-LAW.—SECOND INTERVIEW.

We left the committee very much dissatisfied with the treatment we had received from Mr. Lunt and the majority of his associates. Hon. Ebenezer Moseley was an honorable exception. From the first he had treated us in the most fair and gentlemanly manner. And at the last he protested against the procedure of the Chairman.

We forthwith drew up, and the next morning presented, a memorial to the Legislature, intimating that we had not been properly treated by the committee, and asking that our right to be heard might be recognized, and that we might be permitted to appear and show our reasons in full, why the Legislature of Massachusetts should not enact any penal law, nor pass any resolutions condemning Abolitionists and antislavery societies. The remonstrance was read in both branches of the Legislature and referred to the same committee, with instructions to hear us according to our request.

On the afternoon of the 8th, therefore, we met the committee again in the Hall of the Representatives. The reports which had gone forth of our first interview had so interested the public, that the house was now quite filled with gentlemen and ladies, many of whom had never before shown any sympathy with the antislavery reform.

It was intended that Dr. Follen should address the committee first, beginning just where he had been, on the 4th, so rudely commanded by Mr. Lunt to leave off, and that he should press home that part of his argument which we all deemed so important. But he was detained from the meeting until a later hour. It devolved upon me, therefore, to commence. I confined my remarks to two points. First, I contended that our publications were not incendiary, not intended nor adapted to excite the oppressed to insurrection. Secondly, I assured the committee that, whatever they might think of the character of our publications, we had never sent them to the slaves nor to the colored people of the South, and gave them our reasons for having refrained so to do.

Samuel E. Sewall, Esq., then made a somewhat extended, but very close legal and logical argument against the demands of the slaveholding States,—“arrogant, insolent demands,” as he called them. “To yield to them would be to subvert the foundations of our civil liberties, and make it criminal to obey the laws of God, and follow the example of Jesus Christ.” His excellent speech evidently made an impression upon the committee as well as his larger audience. But I have not room here for such an abstract of it as I should like to give.

While Mr. Sewall was speaking Dr. Follen came in, and when he had ended the Doctor arose and commenced by showing very clearly that we Abolitionists were accused of crime by the legislatures of several of our Southern States, and that the Governor of Massachusetts had indorsed the accusation, because we had exercised in the cause of humanity that liberty of speech and of the press which was guaranteed to us in the Constitution of our Republic, not less explicitly than in the fundamental law of this State. “We have endeavored by persuasion, by argument, by moral and religious appeals to urge upon the nation, and especially upon our Southern brethren, the necessity of freeing themselves from the sin, the evils, and the shame of slavery. You cannot punish or censure freedom of speech in Abolitionists, without preparing the way to censure it in any other class of citizens who may for the moment be obnoxious to the majority. A penal enactment against us is less to be dreaded than condemnatory resolutions; for these are left to be enforced by Judge Lynch and his minions, and I must say, as I said the other day—”

“I call you to order, sir,” said Mr. Lunt, with great emphasis. “This is not respectful to the committee.”

Dr. Follen replied, “I am not conscious of having said anything disrespectful to the committee. I beg to be informed in what I am out of order.”

Mr. Lunt replied, “Your allusion to mobs, for which you were called to order at our first interview, is not proper.”

“Am I then to understand,” said Dr. Follen, “that deprecating mobs is disrespectful to this committee?”

Mr. Moseley, one of the committee, here spoke with much feeling; said he dissented wholly from the action of the Chairman. “I see nothing in the allusion to mobs disrespectful to the committee or the Legislature; and I consider Dr. Follen entirely in order.”

Some discussion ensued. Two others of the committee, making a majority, silently assented to the opinion of Mr. Lunt. So it was decided that the Doctor was out of order, and must not allude to mobs.

Here I called the attention of Mr. Lunt to the memorial, in answer to which we were permitted by the Legislature to appear before the committee, and they were instructed to hear us. “It seemed, on the fourth instant, that the Chairman considered that we came here by his grace to exculpate ourselves from the charges alleged against us by the Legislatures of several of the Southern States; and that we were not to be permitted to express our anxious apprehensions of the effects of any acts by our Legislature intended to gratify the wishes of those States. In order, therefore, that we might appear before you in the exercise of our right as free citizens, we have appealed to the Senate and House of Representatives, and have received their permission so to do. Dr. Follen was setting before you what we deem the most probable and most serious evil to be apprehended from any condemnatory resolutions which the Legislature might be induced to pass; and if he is not permitted to press this upon your consideration our interview with the committee must end here.” Mr. Lunt then consulted with his associates and intimated that Dr. Follen might proceed. He did so, and having referred to the disastrous influence of the great meeting in Faneuil Hall, August, 1835, and of the condemnatory resolutions there passed, he showed clearly that far greater outrages upon the property and persons of Abolitionists would be likely to follow the passage of similar resolutions by the Legislature of the Commonwealth.

Rev. William Goodell then arose and made a most able and eloquent speech. He ignored for the time being all the personal dangers and private wrongs of the Abolitionists; he set aside for the moment the consideration of everything else but the imminent peril that seemed to be impending over the very life of liberty in our country. “For what, Mr. Chairman,” said he, “are Abolitionists accused by the Southern States, and our own Legislature called upon to condemn them? For nothing else but exercising and defending the inalienable rights of the people. What have we said that is not said in your Declaration of Independence? and why are we censured for carrying into practice what others have been immortalized as patriots for writing and adopting? In censuring us you censure the Father of our Country. I turn to the portrait of Washington as it looks upon us in this hall, and remind you how he declared that he earnestly desired to see the time when slavery should be abolished. For saying this, and urging it upon our countrymen, the mandate has come from the South to stop our mouths, and we are here to avert the sentence our own Legislature is called upon to pronounce upon us.” Mr. Goodell then went on to quote the strongest antislavery sentiments uttered by President Jefferson, Chief Justice John Jay, and Hon. William Pinckney, a distinguished member of the Legislature of Maryland, the last in stronger language of condemnation than ever issued from an antislavery press. “Shall the men of the South speak thus, and we be compelled to hold our peace? Mr. Chairman, in this hour of my country’s danger, I should disdain to stand here pleading for my personal security. In behalf of my fellow-citizens throughout the land, I implore the Legislature of this Commonwealth to pause before they act on those documents of the South. What are they? A demand for the unconditional surrender to the South of the first principles of your Constitution, the surrender of your liberties. It is a blow particularly aimed at the independence of your laboring classes.” Mr. Goodell here quoted the declaration of Governor McDuffie and other distinguished Southern gentlemen, distinctly asserting the doctrine that “the laboring population of no nation on earth are entitled to liberty or capable of enjoying it.” “Mr. Chairman, we are charged with aiming at disunion, because we seek what only can save the Union. I charge upon those who promulgate the doctrines on your table, a deep and foul conspiracy against the liberties of the laboring people of the North.” Mr. Lunt here interrupted him.

“Mr. Goodell, I must interfere,” he said. “You must not charge other States with a foul conspiracy, nor treat their public documents with disrespect.” Mr. Goodell replied: “Something may be pardoned to a man when he speaks for the liberties of a nation.” Mr. Lunt continued: “The documents emanating from other States are required by our Federal Constitution to be received with full faith and credit here.” “Certainly, sir,” responded Mr. Goodell. “I wish them to be regarded as official, accredited documents, and I have referred to an accredited document from the Governor of South Carolina, in which he says, that the laborers of the North are incapable of understanding or enjoying freedom, that liberty in a free State best subsists with slavery, and that the laborers must be reduced to slavery, or the laws cannot be maintained. This, sir, is also a document entitled to full faith and credit,—holding up a report of the doings of the Legislature of South Carolina, in which they declared an entire accordance with Governor McDuffie in the sentiments expressed in his message.” Mr. Lunt here interposed with great warmth. “Stop, sir!” Mr. Goodell stopped, but remained standing. “Sit down, sir,” said Mr. Lunt; “the committee will hear no more of this.” Mr. Goodell said: “My duty is discharged, Mr. Chairman, if I cannot proceed in the way that seems to me necessary to bring our case properly before the committee and the Legislature. We came here as free men, and we will go away as freemen should.” Some one in the vast audience that had been watching our proceedings with intensest interest cried out, “Let us go quickly lest we be made slaves.” I here made one more appeal to Mr. Lunt. “Are we, sir, to be again denied our right of being heard in pursuance of our memorial to the Legislature?” The Chairman intimated that they had heard enough.

The audience here began to leave the hall, but were arrested by a voice in their midst. It was that of Dr. Gamaliel Bradford, not a member of the Antislavery Society, who had come there only as a spectator, but had been so moved by what he had witnessed that he pronounced an eloquent, thrilling, impassioned, but respectful appeal in favor of free discussion. I wish that I could spread the whole of it before my readers. So soon as he sat down Mr. George Bond, one of the most prominent merchants and estimable gentlemen of Boston, expressed a desire to say a few words to the committee. “I am not a petitioner nor an Abolitionist,” said he; “but, though opposed to some of the measures of these antislavery gentlemen, I hold to some opinions in common with them. If under these circumstances the committee will permit, I beg leave to offer a few remarks.” The Chairman preserved silence; but another member of the committee intimated to Mr. Bond that he might proceed. “It strikes me,” said Mr. Bond, “that this is a subject of deep and vital importance; and I fear as a citizen that the manner in which it has been treated by the committee will produce an excitement throughout the Commonwealth. With due respect to the committee, I beg leave to say that, from the little experience I have had in legislative proceedings, it is not the practice to require of persons, appearing before a committee, a strict conformity to rules. They are usually indulged in telling their own story in their own way, provided it be not disrespectful. I have certainly heard nothing from the gentlemen of the Antislavery Society that called for the course that has been adopted. It does seem to me that some of the committee have been too fastidious, too hypercritical.”

Mr. Lunt here broke out again. “Be careful, sir, what you say. The committee will not submit to it.” Mr. Bond replied: “I certainly have no wish to say anything unpleasant to the committee, but I cannot help regretting the course that has been taken to withhold a full hearing from the parties interested. They came here through their memorial, which had been received by the Legislature and referred to this committee, and I expected that the committee would have allowed them to say what they pleased, using proper language. If they state their case improperly, it will injure them and not the committee. I may be wrong, but I regret to see the grounds given for the gentlemen and their friends to say they have been denied a hearing. The action on this question here is of immense importance in the influence it may have, not only upon those who have appeared before the committee, but upon the Legislature, the community, the Commonwealth, and the whole country.” When Mr. Bond had closed, instead of proffering to us a further hearing, the committee broke up without a formal adjournment, the Chairman immediately retiring, conscious, as it seems to me he must have been, of the very general indignation which his conduct had excited. Just as he was leaving, Mr. Moseley, one of the committee, said to him, “I am not satisfied with your course. You have been wrong from the beginning. I will not sit again on such a committee.”

The large audience retired from the hall murmuring their astonishment, shame, indignation at the conduct of the Chairman. Many gentlemen and ladies, who had never shown us favor before, came to assure us that they had been led, by what they had heard and seen that afternoon, to take a new view of the importance of the great reform we were laboring to effect.

Nothing, however, gratified us so much as seeing Dr. Channing approach Mr. Garrison, whom until then he had appeared to avoid, shake him cordially by the hand, and utter some words of sympathy. From that time until his death the larger portion of his publications were upon the subject of slavery, increasing in earnestness and power to the last.

The conduct of the committee, especially the Chairman, was severely censured next day in the Senate by Hon. Mr. Whitmarsh, and other members of that body. Reports of our interviews were published and republished throughout the Commonwealth, and called out from almost every part of it condemnatory comments. Many were brought over to the antislavery faith, and our party became not a little significant in the estimation of the politicians. Governor Everett’s too evident inclination to yield to the insolent demands of the slaveholding oligarchy damaged him seriously in the confidence of his fellow-citizens, and, if I remember correctly, at the very next election he was beaten by the opposing candidate, whose sentiments on slavery were thought to be more correct than his.

HON. JAMES G. BIRNEY.

Let me again beg my readers to bear in mind, that I am not attempting to write a complete history of the antislavery conflict. Many individuals rendered essential services to the cause in different parts of our country whose names even may not be mentioned on any of my pages, for the reason that I had little or no personal acquaintance with them. My purpose is merely to give my recollections of the most important incidents in the progress of the great reform, and of the individuals whom I personally knew in connection with those incidents.

Although I did not enjoy a very intimate acquaintance with the distinguished gentleman whose name stands at the head of this article, my connection with him was such that it will be very proper, as well as very grateful to me, to give some account of him and of his inestimable services.

At the annual meetings of the American Antislavery Society in New York, and of the Massachusetts Society in Boston in May, 1835, our hearts were greatly encouraged and our hands strengthened by the presence and eloquence of the Hon. James G. Birney, then of Kentucky, lately of Alabama. We had repeatedly heard of him during the preceding twelve months, and of his labors and sacrifices in the cause of our enslaved countrymen. As I said in my report at the time, all were charmed with him. He was mild yet firm, cautious yet not afraid to speak the whole truth, candid but not compromising, careful not to exaggerate in aught, and equally careful not to conceal or extenuate. He imparted much valuable information and animated us to persevere in our work.

Mr. Birney was a native of Kentucky, the only son of a wealthy planter, who gave him some of the best opportunities that our country then afforded for acquiring a thorough classical, scientific, and professional education, to which were added the advantages of extensive foreign travel. When he had completed his preparations for the practice of the law he opened an office in Danville, his native place, and married a Miss McDowell, of Virginia. Thus he was allied by marriage as well as birth to a large circle of prominent slaveholders in two States. Soon after he removed to Huntsville, Alabama, where he rapidly rose to great distinction in his profession and in the estimation of his fellow-citizens. He was elected Solicitor-General of the State, and in 1828, when John Q. Adams was nominated for the Presidency, Mr. Birney was chosen by the Whig party one of the Alabama Electors. Moreover, he was an honored member of the Presbyterian church, and was zealous and active as an elder in that denomination. I make these statements to show that Mr. Birney occupied a very high position, both civil and ecclesiastical.

He had been accustomed to slavery from his birth. So he purchased a cotton plantation near Huntsville and directed the management of it. But his kind heart was ill at ease in view of the condition of the slaves. He could not regard them as brute animals, and felt that there must be a terrible wrong in treating them as if they were. He gladly entered into the project of the Colonization Society, hoping it would lead ultimately to the deliverance of the bondsmen. He became so interested in it that he turned from his legal practice, which had become very lucrative, that he might discharge the duties of General Superintendent of the Colonization Society in the States of Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, and Arkansas. He travelled extensively throughout those States, was everywhere treated with respect, and had abundant opportunities for forming an opinion of the real effect of the Colonization scheme upon the institution of slavery. He saw that it was tending to perpetuate rather than to put an end to the great iniquity.

Towards the close of 1833 Mr. Birney removed back to his native place, that he might be near and minister to the comfort of his aged father. He returned carrying with him his new-formed opinions of Colonization. He found a few who had come to feel, with him, that something else and more should be done for the relief of the oppressed. In December of that year he joined them and formed the “Kentucky Gradual Emancipation Society.” But the principles of it did not long satisfy him.

Mr. Garrison’s “Thoughts on Colonization,” published more than a year before in Boston, had reached that neighborhood, and probably had come under the consideration of Mr. Birney. It contained a faithful searching review of the purposes, the spirit and tendency of Colonization. Soon after, the famous discussion arose in Lane Seminary, of which I have given some account on a previous page, and which resulted in an eruption that threw eighty “live coals” in as many directions over the country,—fervent young men, who went diligently about, kindling up the minds of the people on the question of immediate emancipation.

That remarkable young man, Theodore D. Weld, leader of the antislavery party in Lane Seminary, visited Mr. Birney, and found him ready for conversion, if not already a convert to the highest antislavery truth. Their interviews resulted in Mr. Birney’s entire conviction that the Colonization plan tended to uphold rather than to subvert slavery; and that immediate emancipation, without removal from their homes, was the right of every slave, and the duty of every slaveholder.

Without delay, he acted in accordance with this conviction. He addressed an admirable letter to Rev. Mr. Mills, Corresponding Secretary of the Kentucky Colonization Society, announcing that he must no longer be considered a member of that association, and stating, in a very lucid and impressive manner, his weighty reasons for disapproving of, and feeling impelled to oppose, an enterprise in which he had taken so much interest, and to which he had devoted so much time and labor. Better than this, he summoned all his slaves into his presence, acknowledged that he had been guilty of great wrong in holding them as his property, informed them that he had executed deeds of manumission for each and all of them, and that henceforth they were free men, free women, free children. He offered to retain in his service all who preferred to remain with him, and to pay them fair wages for their labor. None left him, and, as he himself told me, they afterwards toiled not only more cheerfully than before, but more effectively, and for a greater number of hours. In several instances he had been impelled to go to them in person, and insist upon their “hanging up the shovel and the hoe.” In the fall of 1834 he addressed a letter to the members of the Presbyterian Synod, in the vicinity of Danville, in which he pressed upon them the sinfulness of holding their fellow-beings as property, and showed them the true Scripture doctrine respecting slavery. He also visited the seat of government during the session of the Kentucky Legislature, and conversed with many members. He found that most of them regarded slavery as an evil which could not be perpetual, but most of them recoiled from the plan of immediate emancipation.

Convinced that this was the vital doctrine, he determined to do all in his power to disseminate it among the people. For this purpose he purchased a printing-press and types, and engaged a man to print for him at Danville a paper to be called The Philanthropist. So soon as his intention became known, his neighbors roused themselves to prevent the execution of it. While he continued a slaveholder and in favor of Colonization, it was proper and safe enough for him to express freely his opinions. But when he became an immediate emancipationist, and liberated his slaves, he was regarded as a dangerous man. And now that he was preparing to disseminate his doctrines through the press, he was to be denounced and silenced.

On the 12th of July, 1835, the slaveholders of his neighborhood assembled in mass meeting, in the town of Danville, and after rousing themselves and each other to the right pitch of madness, they addressed a letter to Mr. Birney, vehemently remonstrating with him, and pledging themselves to prevent the publication of his paper, by the most violent means, if necessary. Mr. Birney respectfully but firmly refused to yield to their demand, assured them that he understood the rights of an American citizen, and that he should exercise and defend them. However, their threats, which did not intimidate him, so far excited the apprehensions of his printer that he utterly refused to undertake the publication.

When the report reached Alabama that Mr. Birney had become an immediate Abolitionist, had renounced the Colonization Society, and had liberated his slaves, most of those who had formerly known and honored him there united in expressing very emphatically their displeasure, and declaring their contempt for his new fanatical opinions. The Supreme Court of that State expunged his name from the roll of attorneys practising at its bar. And in the University of Alabama, of which he had been a most useful trustee, several literary societies, of which he had been an honorary member, hastened to pass resolutions expelling him from their bodies. These acts convinced him of their hatred, but not of his error.

Finding that he could not get his paper printed in Danville, he removed his press and types to Cincinnati, in order that he might publish his Philanthropist as near to his father’s home and his native State as possible, and under the ægis of Ohio, whose constitution explicitly guarantees to her citizens freedom of speech and of the press.

But he had not got himself and family settled in Cincinnati, before he found that the inhabitants of that city were so swayed by Southern influence that it would be useless to attempt to issue a paper there, opposed to slavery and to the expatriation of the free colored people. He therefore removed twenty miles up the river to the town of New Richmond, where the dominant influence was in the hands of Quakers. The Philanthropist was much better received by the public than he expected, and was so generally commended for the excellent spirit with which the subject of slavery was discussed, that he thought it best to remove his press back to Cincinnati. But he had hardly got it established there before “the gentlemen of property and standing” bestirred themselves and their minions to the determination that the incendiary paper “must be suppressed by all means, right or wrong, peaceably or forcibly.” Mr. Birney contended manfully, nobly, for the liberty of speech and of the press. He met his opponents in public and in private, refuted their arguments and exposed the fearful consequences of their conduct, if persisted in. But his facts, his logic, and his eloquence were of no avail. What had not been reasoned into them could not be reasoned out of them. His opponents were fixed in a foregone conclusion that slavery was a matter with which the citizens of the free States were bound not to meddle, and were made more impetuous by that dislike of the colored people, which was intensified by the consciousness that they were living witnesses to the inconsistency, cruelty, and meanness of our nation. I wish I had room for a full account of Mr. Birney’s courageous and persistent defence of his antislavery opinions, and of his right to publish and disseminate them.

Suffice it to add that, on the evening of the 1st of August, 1836, Mr. Birney having gone to a distant town to deliver a lecture, large numbers of persons, among them some of the most respectable citizens of Cincinnati, went to the office of The Philanthropist, demolished or threw into the streets everything they found there excepting the printing-press. That they dragged to the bank of the Ohio, half a mile distant, conveyed it in a boat to the middle of the river and threw it in.

In the fall of 1837 Mr. Birney removed to New York, and for two years or more rendered inestimable services as one of the Corresponding Secretaries of the American Antislavery Society.

While there, some time in 1839, his father died, leaving a large amount of property in lands, money, and slaves to him and his only sister, Mrs. Marshall. Mr. Birney requested that all the slaves, twenty-one in number, might be set off to him at their market value, as a part of his patrimony. This was done. He immediately wrote and executed a deed manumitting them all. Thus he sacrificed to his sense of right, his respect for humanity, that which he might legally have retained or disposed of as property, amounting to eighteen or twenty thousand dollars.I

This act, added to all else that he had done and said in the cause of liberty, and the invaluable contributions from his pen, and the noble traits of character that were ever manifest in all his deeds and words, raised Mr. Birney to the highest point in the estimation of all Abolitionists. When, therefore, they had become weary of striving to induce one or the other of the political parties to recognize the rights of the colored population of the country; when they had found that neither the Whigs nor the Democrats would attempt anything for the relief of the millions of the oppressed, but what their oppressors approved or consented to; when thus forced to the conclusion that a Third Party must needs be formed in order to compel politicians and statesmen to heed their demands for the relief of suffering outraged millions in our land, James G. Birney was unanimously selected to be their candidate for the presidency. He unquestionably possessed higher qualifications for that office than either of the candidates of the other parties. But, with shame be it said, he had too much faith in the glorious doctrine of the Declaration of Independence, and in the declared purpose of the Constitution of the United States to suit the depraved policy of the nation in 1840. In that year the Liberty party gave a very significant number of votes for Mr. Birney. And again in 1844 their votes for him amounted to 62,300. These votes, if given for Mr. Clay, as they would have been had he been true to “the inalienable rights of man,” would have secured his election by a majority of 23,119. This number was too large to be ignored. It showed that the Abolitionists held the balance of power between the Whigs and the Democrats. Their opinions and wishes thenceforward were more respected by politicians and their partisans. Various attempts were made to conciliate them, which, after several political abortions, gave birth to the Republican party. This party, we hope and trust, will be guided or forced to pursue such measures as will not only abolish slavery, but raise the colored population of our country to the enjoyment of all the privileges and the exercise of all the prerogatives of American citizens.

JOHN QUINCY ADAMS.

Although this gentleman—so prominent for more than half a century among our American statesmen and scholars—was not a member of our Antislavery Society, he rendered us and our cause, in one respect, a most important service. And as I have some interesting recollections of him, a few pages devoted to them will be german to my plan.

In January, 1835, a petition was committed to Mr. Adams, signed by more than a hundred women of his congressional district, praying for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia. He presented it and moved its reference to a select committee. Instantly several Southern representatives sprang to their feet and vehemently opposed even the reception of it. They insisted that Congress ought not to receive such petitions, adapted as they were, if not intended, to create an excitement, and wound the feelings of members from the slaveholding States. Mr. Adams urged the reception of the petition with earnestness and eloquence, reminding his opponents that the feelings of his constituents, and of many of the people of the non-slaveholding States, were deeply wounded by being held in any way responsible for the continuance of such a system of oppression as they considered slavery. No right of the people, he said, could be more vital, or should be held as more sacred, than the right of petition,—the right to implore their rulers to relieve them of any unnecessary burden, or to correct what seemed to them a grievous wrong. He besought the representatives of the American people to show their respect for the right of petition by receiving the paper he now presented. If there were any expressions in the language of this petition disrespectful or improper, let the signers of it be reproved. It might be easy, he added, to show that this prayer of his constituents ought not to be granted, but that was no reason for refusing to hear their request. To petition is a right guaranteed to every one by the Constitution, of our Republic,—yes, a right inherent in the constitution of man, and Congress is not authorized to deny it or to abridge it. Such was the effect of his speech that the petition was received. But it was immediately laid on the table.

Again in January, 1837, Mr. Adams offered a petition of the same tenor, signed by a hundred and fifty women. Forthwith several Southern members passionately objected to the reception of it. Mr. Adams planted himself as firmly as before in defence of the right of petition. He charged upon the opposers that they were violating most fearfully the federal Constitution, which they had sworn to support. He besought the House not to give its countenance, its sanction, to the violent assaults which had been made in our country within the last eighteen months upon the freedom of the press and the liberty of speech, by denying the still more fundamental right,—the right of petition; and this “to a class of citizens as virtuous and pure as the inhabitants of any section of the United States.”

A violent debate ensued, in which Mr. Adams maintained his part with so much fortitude, dignity, and force of argument that the petition was received by a large majority. I am sorry to add that it was soon after laid on the table by a majority almost as large. And a few days afterwards, on the 18th of January, 1837, the House of Representatives passed this infamous resolution: “That all petitions relating to slavery, without being printed or referred, shall be laid on the table, and no action shall be had thereon.” This resolution, intended to shut the door of legislative justice and mercy against millions of the most cruelly oppressed people on earth, was passed in the Congress of these United States by a vote of 139 ayes to 96 nays.

Petitions for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia had been sent to Mr. Adams and to other members of Congress, from various parts of the country. For it was the feeling of Abolitionists everywhere that we were all, in some measure, directly responsible for the continuance of slavery in that District, over which Congress had then, and has now, exclusive jurisdiction. Seeing how such petitions were to be spurned, by the advice of the managers of the Antislavery Society, I addressed a letter to Mr. Adams, proposing that thereafter our petitions should be “for the removal of the national capital to some place north of Mason and Dixon’s line.” He replied that nothing would be gained by such a change. Petitions so worded, coming from Abolitionists, would be treated with the same contempt. And he thought it better to persist in demanding the abolition of slavery in the District, and contend for the right of petition on that issue.

Nothing daunted by the high-handed measure of January 18th, Mr. Adams, on the 6th of the following month, announced to the Speaker that he held in his hand a petition which purported to come from a number of slaves, without, however, stating what it prayed for. Before presenting it, he wished to be informed by the Speaker whether such a paper would come under the order of the 18th ult. Without waiting for the decision, several slaveholders rose in quick succession and poured out their astonishment, their indignation, their wrath at the effrontery of the man who could propose to offer such a petition,—a petition from slaves! One said it was so gross an insult to the House that the paper ought to be taken and burnt. Another insisted that the representative from Massachusetts deserved the severest censure, yes, that he ought to be immediately brought to the bar of the House and reproved by the Speaker. Others demanded that Mr. Adams should be forthwith expelled from his seat with those he had so grossly insulted.

Amidst this storm Mr. Adams remained as little moved as “the house that was founded upon a rock.” When it had spent its rage enough for a human voice to be heard, the brave “old man eloquent” rose and said: “Mr. Speaker, to prevent further consumption of the time of the House, I deem it my duty to request the members to modify their several resolutions so that they may be in accordance with the facts. I did not present the petition. I only informed the Speaker that I held in my hand a paper purporting to be a petition from slaves, and asked if such a petition would come under the general order of January 18th. I stated distinctly that I should not send the paper to the table until that question was decided. This is one fact, and one of the resolutions offered to the House should be amended to accord with it.

“Another gentleman alleged in his resolution that the paper I hold is a petition from slaves, praying for the abolition of slavery. Now, Mr. Speaker, that is not the fact. If the House should choose to hear this paper read they would learn that it is a petition the reverse of what the resolution states it to be. If, therefore, the gentleman from Alabama still shall choose to call me to the bar of the House, he will have to amend his resolution by stating in it that my crime has been attempting to introduce a petition from slaves, praying that slavery may not be abolished,—precisely that which the gentleman desires.”

A variety of absurd and incoherent resolutions were proposed, and as many abusive speeches were made, after which the following were adopted: “Resolved, That this House cannot receive the said petition without disregarding its own dignity, the rights of a large class of citizens of the South and West, and the Constitution of the United States.” Yeas, 160. Nays, 35. “Resolved, That slaves do not possess the right of petition secured to the people of the United States by the Constitution.” Yeas, 162. Nays, 18.

None of the Northern representatives interposed to aid Mr. Adams in the conflict, excepting only Messrs. Lincoln and Cushing, of Massachusetts, and Mr. Evans, of Maine. These gentlemen defended his positions with distinguished ability. But the “old man eloquent” was a host in himself,—a match for all who rose up against him. Through the whole of the unparalleled excitement he behaved with exemplary equanimity and admirable self-possession. “His speech, in vindication of his cause,” said Mr. Garrison, “was the hewing of Agag in pieces by the hand of Samuel.” His exposure of the vice and licentiousness of slaveholding communities was unsparing. His sarcasms were as cutting as the surgeon’s knife. His rebukes were terrible. He contended that there was not a word, not an intimation in the Constitution, excluding petitions from slaves. “The right of petition,” said he, “God gave to the whole human race when he made them men,—the right of prayer,—the right of those who need to ask a favor of those who can bestow it. It belongs to humanity; it does not depend upon the condition of the petitioners. It belongs to the wronged, the destitute, the wretched. Those who most need relief of any kind have the best right to petition for it, enslaved men more than all others. Did the gentleman from South Carolina think he could frighten me by his threat of a grand jury? Let me tell him he mistook his man; I am not to be frightened from the discharge of a duty by his indignation, nor by all the grand juries in the universe. Mr. Speaker, I never was more serious in any moment of my life. I never acted under a more solemn sense of duty. What I have done I should do again under the same circumstances if it were to be done to-morrow.”

For this dignified, persistent, heroic defence of the right of petition Mr. Adams deserved the gratitude of all the suffering, and those who desired their relief,—of the enslaved and those who were laboring for their redemption. But in the course of the debate he said, “It is well known to all the members of this house that, from the day I entered this hall to the present moment, I have invariably, here and elsewhere, declared my opinion to be adverse to the prayer of petitions which call for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia. I have, however, uniformly insisted, and do insist, that such petitions ought to be respectfully received, duly considered, and our reasons given for refusing to grant them.”

Such a declaration from the champion of our petitions, it will readily be believed, disconcerted us Abolitionists not a little. Some denounced him. Many thought he certainly ought not to be returned to Congress again.

I was then one of his constituents, living about thirteen miles from his residence. I was as much disconcerted as any were by Mr. Adams’s opposition to the prayer of our petition, and could not rest without hearing from himself his reasons for that opposition. Accordingly, soon after his return to Quincy, in the summer of 1837, I called at his house. He received me graciously, and, on being told what was the object of my visit, he thanked me for coming to himself to learn what were the principles by which he endeavored to govern his conduct as a member of the National Legislature, and what the reasons for the opinion he held respecting the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia by an act of Congress. “You cannot doubt,” said he, “that I desire the abolition of slavery there, and everywhere, as much as you or any Abolitionist desires it. I am ready to do all that I think can be done legally to exterminate that great wrong, that alarming evil, that dark shame from our country. I shall ever withstand any plan for the extension of slavery in any direction an inch beyond the limits within which unhappily it existed at the formation of our Union. I have repeatedly declared myself at any time ready to go for the most stringent prohibition of our interstate slave-trade, putting it under the same ban with the foreign slave-trade.J But, sir, the citizens of the District of Columbia are in an anomalous condition,—a condition not to be reconciled with one of the fundamental principles of our democratic institutions. They are governed by laws enacted by a Legislature in which they have no representative, and to the enactment of which they have given no consent. Whenever, therefore, I am called upon to act as a legislator for the District of Columbia, I feel myself to be all the more bound in honor to act as if I were a representative chosen by the people of that District, that is, to act in accordance with what I know to be the will of my quasi constituents. Therefore, until I know that the people of that District generally desire the abolition of slavery, I cannot vote for it consistently with my idea of the duty of a representative.”

Of course I demurred at the sufficiency of this reason, and urged several objections to it. But I need not add a stern old statesman was not to be moved from his allegiance to a principle which he said had governed him through his long political life.

I left him dissatisfied and doubting whether I could help by my vote to re-elect him to Congress. I conferred much with some of the leading Abolitionists in his district. They were troubled in like manner. But we could think of no man who could be elected in his place that would go further in opposition to slavery than Mr. Adams had gone, or could utter such scathing condemnation of our American despotism. When, too, we reviewed the course he had pursued in Congress in defence of the right of petition, and considered his venerable age, his high official and personal character, his intimate acquaintance with every part of the history of our country, his unequalled adroitness in the conduct of a legislative debate, the insults and abuse he had endured in Congress, because of his words and acts bearing upon the subject of slavery, and his perfect fearlessness in the midst of the angry, violent, bullying slaveholders, we came to the conclusion that it would be most unjust, ungrateful, and unwise in Abolitionists to withhold their support from Mr. Adams. We determined rather to rally about him.

And first we thought it would be becoming in his constituents to give some public and emphatic expression of their high and grateful appreciation of his faithfulness and heroic courage, in advocating and maintaining the sacred right of petition. Accordingly, we conferred with the prominent members of the Whig party in his district, who, after some hesitation, agreed to unite with us in calling a delegated convention to consider the alarming assaults that had been made in the Congress of the nation upon the right of petition, and the noble defence of that right by the venerable and illustrious representative of the twelfth Congressional District.

Such a convention was held in Quincy, on the 23d of August, 1837. Seventeen towns were represented by delegates, and a large number of other citizens were present.

Hon. Thomas Greenleaf, of Quincy, was chosen President. Hon. Cushing Otis, of South Scituate, and Hon. John B. Turner, of Scituate, Vice-Presidents. Hon. Gershom B. Weston, of Duxbury, and Orrin P. Bacon, Esq., of Dorchester, Secretaries. The forenoon was spent in listening to speeches upon the sacredness of the right of petition, the assaults made upon that right in the Congress of our nation, and the persistent, dauntless, noble defence of it by our representative. A series of appropriate resolutions was passed and a committee appointed to present a copy of them to Mr. Adams, and request him to favor the convention with his presence in the afternoon.

We reassembled soon after 2 P. M., and were informed by the committee that Mr. Adams would be with us at three o’clock. There was no other business before the convention. Several topics were proposed by resolutions or motions that were ruled out of order, as not german to the purpose of the meeting. Members were getting impatient. I had begun to fear that some of our ardent ones would break over the agreement under which the convention had been called. Just at this crisis our excellent friend, Francis Jackson, of Boston, came into the hall. His face was radiant with his message of glad tidings. He came straight towards me, and placed in my hand a paper covered with lines, in the clear, beautiful handwriting of that true philanthropist, John Pierpont, with which I was familiar. “A Word from a Petitioner.” Nothing could have been more timely, nothing more appropriate. I seized it, and commenced reading at once:—

The reading of this first stanza brought down the house in rapturous applause. It struck the key-note to which the feelings of all were attuned. Every stanza was received with some response of approval or delight. When the last line was read and I began to fold the paper, “Encore! Encore!!” resounded from every part of the hall. So I read the admirable poem again and better than the first time. And just as I was reading the last stanza, Mr. Adams entered the convention escorted by the committee. Now the applauses rose in deafening cheers. “Hurrah! Hurrah!! Hurrah!!! the hero comes!!!!” Three times three and then again. Mr. Adams tottered to his seat next the President, wellnigh overcome with emotion. And when the uproar ceased and he rose to speak he seemed for the moment no more “the old man eloquent.” He could not utter a word. He stood trembling before us. But the moment passed, and the orator was himself again. His first words were: “My friends, my neighbors, my constituents, though I tremble before you, I hope, I trust you know that I have never trembled before the enemies of your liberties, your sacred rights.” Again was the assembly thrown into an uproar of applause, which did not die away until his self-possession had entirely revived. And then he addressed us for nearly an hour, giving a very graphic account of his conflict with the slaveholders in Congress, and making it evident, perhaps more evident to us than to himself, that some of them were determined to rule or else to ruin our Republic.

By order of the convention a memorial was sent to our fellow-citizens of each congressional district in the Commonwealth, commending to their just appreciation the conduct of Mr. Adams in defence of the right of petition, and praying them to send representatives who would be equally true, faithful, fearless in withstanding the enemies of freedom.

THE ALTON TRAGEDY.

Rev. Elijah P. Lovejoy was a young Presbyterian minister, a native of Maine, who soon after his graduation from college settled in the city of St. Louis, first as a school-teacher, then as a preacher, and lastly as the editor of a religious paper. In all these offices he had commended himself to the respect and affectionate regards of a large circle of friends. He conducted his paper to very general acceptance, until he became an Abolitionist. An awful, a diabolical deed perpetrated in or near St. Louis, compelled him to look after the evil influences which could have prepared any individuals to be guilty of such an atrocity, and the community in which it was done to tolerate it.

Some time in the latter part of 1836, or the beginning of 1837, a slave was accused of a heinous crime (not worse, however, than many white men had been guilty of). He was tried by a Lynch Court, over which a man most appropriately named Judge Lawless presided. He was found guilty, sentenced to be burned alive, and actually suffered that horrid death at the hands of American citizens, some of whom were called “most respectable.” Mr. Lovejoy faithfully denounced the horrible outrage as belonging to the Dark Ages and a community of savages, and thenceforward devoted a portion of his paper to the exposure of the sinfulness and demoralizing influence of slaveholding. This was not long endured. His printing-office was broken up, his press destroyed, and he was driven out of the State of Missouri. He removed about twenty miles up the Mississippi River to Alton, Illinois, and there commenced the publication of a similar paper, called the Alton Observer. But though in a nominally free State, he was not beyond the power of the slaveholders. The people of that town, obsequious to the will and tainted with the spirit of their Southern and Southwestern neighbors, soon followed the example of the Missourians, demolished his printing-office and threw his press into the river.

Mr. Lovejoy was a man whose determination to withstand oppression was a high moral principle rather than a resentful passion. He therefore set about, with calm resolution, to re-establish his office and his paper. In this he was encouraged and assisted by the sympathy and the contributions of some of the best people in Alton, St. Louis, and that region of country. But he had issued only one or two numbers of his Observer, before the ruffians again fell upon his establishment and destroyed it.

This second violation of his rights, in a State professedly free, brought him and his patrons to feel that they were indeed “set for the defence” of the liberty of the press. They appealed in deeper tones of earnest remonstrance and solemn warning to their fellow-citizens, to their countrymen, to all who appreciated the value of our political institutions, to help them re-establish and maintain their desecrated press. They called a convention of the people to consider the disgrace that had been brought upon their town and State, and to awaken a public sentiment that would overbear the minions of the slaveholding oligarchy, which was assuming to rule our nation. Dr. Edward Beecher, of Jacksonville, came to Alton and spoke with wisdom and power in defence of the Alton Observer, and its devoted editor.

Mr. Lovejoy gave notice that he felt it to be a momentous duty incumbent on him, there to vindicate the precious right which had been so ruthlessly outraged in his person and property. He gave notice that he had taken measures to procure another printing-press and materials for the publication of his paper. He hoped the violent men, who had twice broken up his office, would see their fearful mistake and molest him no more. He trusted the good people of Alton and the officials of their city would see to it that he should be protected, if the spirit of outrage should again appear in their midst.

Many of the good people of the place gathered about him with assurances of help, if needed. A Mr. Gilman, by all acknowledged to be one of the very best men in the community, readily consented to receive the press into his store for safe-keeping, and many other gentlemen agreed to come there to defend it, if any attempt to take it away should be made.

As the day drew near on which the press was to arrive, alarming threats were heard about the city, and evidences of preparation for another deed of violence were too plain to be mistaken. Mr. Gilman called upon the Mayor for protection,—to appoint a special police for the occasion, or to have an armed force in readiness, if the emergency should require their interposition. That official informed him that he had no military at his service, and did not feel authorized to appoint a special police. Then Mr. Gilman craved to know if the Mayor would authorize him to collect an armed force to protect his property if it should be assaulted. The Mayor gave him to understand that he would be justified in so doing.

The boat arrived in the night of the 6th of November, and the press was safely deposited in Messrs. Godfrey & Gilman’s store. The next evening a mob assembled with the declared purpose of destroying the press or the building that contained it, in which were goods valued at more than $100,000. Mr. Gilman went out and calmly remonstrated with the mob. He assured them that it was his determination, as it was his right, to defend his own property and that of another, which had been committed to him for safe-keeping, and that he was prepared so to do; that there were a considerable number of loaded muskets in his store and resolute men there to use them. He had no wish to harm any one, and besought them to refrain from their threatened assault, which would certainly be repulsed. They heeded him not, but reiterated their cries for the onset. It was agreed between himself, Mr. Lovejoy, and their helpers that they would forbear until there could be no longer any doubt of the fell purpose of the assailants. The suspense was brief. Stones and other heavy missiles were thrown against the building and through the windows. These were quickly followed by bullets. At this several of the besieged party fired upon the mob, killing one man and wounding another. After a temporary retreat, the madmen returned bringing materials with which to fire the store. A ladder was raised and a torch applied to the roof. Mr. Lovejoy came out and aimed his musket at the incendiary. So soon as he was recognized he was fired upon and fell, his bosom pierced by five bullets.

Mr. Garrison and most of the oldest Abolitionists regretted that Mr. Lovejoy and his friends had resorted to deadly weapons. If he was to fall in our righteous cause we wished that he had chosen to fall an unresisting martyr. From the beginning we had determined not to harm our foes. And though we had been insulted, buffeted, starved, imprisoned, our houses sacked, our property destroyed, our buildings burnt, not the life of one of our number had hitherto been lost. But we doubted not that our devoted brother had been governed by his highest sense of right. He had acted in accordance with the accepted morality of the Christian world, and in the spirit of our Revolutionary fathers. A sensation of horror at the murder of that amiable and excellent young man thrilled the hearts of all the people that were not steeped in the insensibility to the rights of humanity which slaveholding produces. The 7th of November, 1837, was fixed in the calendar as one of the days never to be forgotten in our country, nor remembered but with shame.

The American Antislavery Society, the Massachusetts, and other kindred societies took especial and very appropriate notice of the dreadful outrage, and renewed their solemn pledges to labor all the more assiduously, for the utter extermination of that system of iniquity in the land, which could be upheld only at the expense of our freedom of speech and the liberty of the press.

Rev. Dr. Channing and many more of the prominent citizens of Boston were moved to call a public meeting in their “Old Cradle of Liberty,” without distinction of sect or party, there to express the alarm and horror which were felt at the outrage on civil liberty, and the murder of a Christian minister, for attempting to maintain his constitutional and inalienable rights. Accordingly, the Doctor and a hundred other gentlemen made an application to the Mayor and Aldermen of the city for permission to occupy Faneuil Hall for that purpose. Their application was rejected as follows:—

“City of Boston. In Board of Aldermen, November 29, 1837: On the petition of William E. Channing and others, for the use of Faneuil Hall on the evening of Monday, the 4th of December,

“Resolved, That in the opinion of this Board, it is inexpedient to grant the prayer of said petition, for the reason that resolutions and votes passed by a public meeting in Faneuil Hall are often considered, in other places, as the expression of public opinion in this city; but it is believed by the Board that the resolutions which would be likely to be sanctioned by the signers of this petition on this occasion ought not to be regarded as the public voice of this city.”

This extraordinary conduct of the city authorities kindled a fire of indignation throughout the city and the Commonwealth, that sent forth burning words of surprise and censure. Dr. Channing addressed an eloquent and impressive “letter to the citizens of Boston,” that produced the intended effect. It was widely circulated, and everywhere read with deep emotion. A public meeting was called by gentlemen who were not Abolitionists, to be held in the old Supreme Court Room, “to take into consideration the reasons assigned by the Mayor and Aldermen for withholding the use of Faneuil Hall, and to act in the premises as may be deemed expedient.” A large concourse of citizens assembled. George Bond, Esq., was chosen chairman, and B. F. Hallett, Secretary. Dr. Channing’s letter was read, and then a series of resolutions, “drawn up with consummate ability and strikingly adapted to the occasion,” were offered by Mr. Hallett, and after an animated discussion were unanimously adopted. A committee of two from each ward was appointed to renew the application (precisely in the words of the former one) for the use of Faneuil Hall, and to obtain signatures to the same. This request was not to be denied. The Mayor and Aldermen yielded to the pressure.

On the 8th of December the doors of Faneuil Hall were thrown open, and as many people as could find a place pressed in. Hon. Jonathan Phillips was called to the chair, and made some excellent introductory remarks. Dr. Channing then made an eloquent and impressive address, after which B. F. Hallett, Esq., read the resolutions which Dr. Channing had drawn up. These were seconded by George S. Hillard, Esq., in a very able speech. Then arose James T. Austin, the Attorney-General, and made a speech in the highest degree inflammatory and mobocratic. He declared that “Lovejoy died as the fool dieth.” He justified the riotous procedure of the Altonians, and compared them to “the patriotic Tea-Party of the Revolution.” What he said of the slaves was really atrocious. Hear him!

“We have a menagerie in our city with lions, tigers, hyenas, an elephant, a jackass or two, and monkeys in plenty. Suppose, now, some new cosmopolite, some man of philanthropic feelings, not only towards men but animals, who believes that all are entitled to freedom as an inalienable right, should engage in the humane task of giving liberty to these wild beasts of the forest, some of whom are nobler than their keepers, or, having discovered some new mode to reach their understandings, should try to induce them to break their cages and be free? The people of Missouri had as much reason to be afraid of their slaves as we should have to be afraid of the wild beasts of the menagerie. They had the same dread of Lovejoy that we should have of this supposed instigator, if we really believed the bars would be broken and the caravan let loose to prowl about our streets.”

Though this was the most disgusting passage in Mr. Austin’s speech, nearly all of it was offensive to every true American heart, and some parts were really impious. He likened the Alton and St. Louis rioters to the men who inspired and led our Revolution. He infused so much of his riotous spirit into a portion of his audience that at the close of his speech they attempted to break up the meeting in an uproar. Happily for the reputation of Boston, there were present a preponderance of the moral élite of the city. So soon as the disorder had subsided, a young man, then unknown to most of his fellow-citizens, took the platform, and soon arrested and then riveted the attention of the vast assembly to a reply to the Attorney-General that was “sublime, irresistible, annihilating.” I wish there were room in these columns for the whole of it. I can give you but a brief passage.

“Mr. Chairman, when I heard the gentleman lay down principles which placed the rioters, incendiaries, and murderers of Alton side by side with Otis and Hancock, with Quincy and Adams, I thought those pictured lips [pointing to the portraits in the hall] would have broken into voice to rebuke the recreant American, the slanderer of the dead. [Great applause and counter-applause.] Sir, the gentleman said that he should sink into insignificance if he dared not to gainsay the principles of the resolutions before this meeting. Sir, for the sentiments he has uttered on soil consecrated by the prayers of Puritans and the blood of patriots, the earth should have yawned and swallowed him up!”

I need only tell my readers that this was the début of our Wendell Phillips, who has since become the leading orator of our nation, and the dauntless champion of our enslaved, down-trodden countrymen. He was then just established in the practice of law in Boston, with the most brilliant prospect of success in his profession. No young man would have risen so soon as he, or to so great a height as an advocate at the bar and a speaker in the forum, if he had pursued his course as a lawyer and a politician. But, blessed be the God of the oppressed, the cry of the millions, to whom in our Republic every right of humanity was denied, entered into his bosom. He espoused their cause with no hope of fee or reward, but that best of all compensations, the consciousness of having relieved suffering, and maintained great moral and political principles, and throughout the thirty-two years that have since passed away, he has consecrated his brilliant powers to the service of the enslaved with an assiduity and effect of which our whole nation has been the admiring witness.