Webster on the 7th of March, 1850, a day set apart for the blessed
Martyrs, Saints Perpetua and Felicitas. We all know who was the author
of that law. It is Mr. Webster's Fugitive Slave Law! It was his
"thunder," unquestioned and unquestionable. You know what a rapid change
was wrought in the public opinion of the controlling classes, soon after
its passage. First the leading whigs went over. I will not say they
changed their principles, God knows, not I, what principles they have, I
will only say they altered their "resolutions," and ate their own words.
True, the whigs have not all gone over. There are a few who still cling
to the old Whig-tree, after it has been shaken and shaken, and thrashed
and thrashed, and brushed and brushed, by politicians, as apple-trees in
autumn. There are still a few little apples left, small and withered no
doubt, and not daring to show their dishonored heads just now, but still
containing some precious seeds that may do service by and by. Whig
journal after journal went over; politician after politician "caved in"
and collapsed. At the sounding of the rams' horns of slavery, how quick
the Whig Jericho went down! Its fortresses of paper resolutions rolled
up and blew away. Of course, men changed only after "logical
conviction." Of course, nobody expected a "reward" for the change, at
least only in the world to come. Were they not all Christians? True, on
the 17th of June last, seventy-five years after the battle of Bunker
Hill, Mr. Webster said in the Senate, that if the North should vote for
the Fugitive Slave Bill, a Tariff was expected. But that was of no
moment, no more than worldly riches to "the elect." Of course, a man has
a right to change his opinions every ten minutes, if he has a good and
sufficient reason. Of course, these men expected no offices under this
or any future President! But presently the Fugitive Slave Law became a
Whig doctrine, a test of party fidelity and fitness for office!
You all remember the "Union" meeting in Boston. On that occasion,
democrats "of the worst kind" suddenly became "respectable." The very
democratic prince of devils was thought to be as good a "gentleman" as
any in the city.
It was curious to see the effect of the Fugitive Slave Law on the
democratic party. Democrat after democrat "caved in;" journal after
journal went over; horse, foot, and dragoons, they went over. The
Democratic party North, and American Slavery South, have long been
accustomed to accommodate themselves with the same nag after the old
fashion of "ride and tye." In the cities, democrats went over in tribes;
entire Democratic Zabulons and Nephthalims, whole Galilees of Democratic
Gentiles, all at once saw great Whig light; and to them that sat in the
shadow of Freedom, Slavery sprung up.
That portion of the Whig party which did not submit, became as meek, ay,
became meeker even than the beast which the old prophet in the fable is
alleged to have ridden; for, though beaten again and again,--because
alarmed at seeing the angel of Freedom that bars the way before the
great Whig Balaam, who has been bidden by his master to go forth and
curse the people of the Lord,--it dares not open its mouth and say,
"What have I done unto thee, that thou hast smitten me these three
times?"
* * * * *
But when such a law is hostile to the feelings of a majority of the
people, to their conscience and their religion, how shall we get the law
executed? That is a hard matter. In Russia and in Austria it would be
very easy. Russia has an army five hundred or eight hundred thousand
strong; and that army is ready. But here there is no such army. True,
the President asked Congress to give him greater power, and the answer
came from the Slave party South, not from the Money party North, "No!
you have more now than you know how to use." Failing in this attempt,
what was to be done that the law might be executed? Two things must be
done: A false idea must persuade the people to allow it to be done; Base
men must be found to do it. A word upon each point.
* * * * *
I. The false idea is set on foot, that the people are morally bound to
obey any law which is made until it is repealed. General Haynau wrote a
letter, not long ago, to the subalterns in the Austrian army, and thus
quoth he: "You are bound to obey the law. It is none of your business
whether the law is constitutional or not; that is our affair." So went
it with our officers here. We are told that there is "no such thing as a
higher law," "no rule of conduct better than that enacted by the law of
the land." Conscience is only to tell you to keep the statutes. Religion
consists in "fearing God and serving the king." You are told that
religion bids you to "fear God and keep the commandments," no matter
what these commandments may be. No matter whether it be King Ahab, or
King Peter the Cruel: you are told,--"Mr. Republican, what right have
you to question the constitutionality or justice of any thing? Your
business is to keep the law." Religion is a very excellent thing, quotes
Mr. Webster, except when it interferes in politics; then it makes men
mad.
It is instructive to see the different relations which religion has
sustained to law, at different periods of the world's history. At some
other time I may dwell more at length upon this; now I will say but one
word. At the beginning, religion takes precedence of law. Before there
is any human government, man bows himself to the Source of law, and
accepts his rule of conduct from his God. By and by, some more definite
rule is needed, and wise men make human laws; but they pretend to derive
these from a divine source. All the primitive lawgivers, Moses, Minos,
Zaleucus, Numa, and the rest, speak in the name of God. For a long time,
law comes up to religion for aid and counsel. At length law and
religion, both imperfect, are well established in society, religion
being the elder sister; both act as guardians of mankind. Institution
after institution rises up, all of them baptized by religion and
confirmed by law, taking the sacrament from the hands of each. At length
it comes to pass that law seeks to turn religion out of doors.
Politicians, intoxicated with ambition, giddy with power, and sometimes
also drunk with strong drink, make a statute which outrages all the
dictates of humanity, and then insist that it is the duty of sober men
to renounce religion for the sake of keeping the wicked statute of the
politicians. All tyrants have done so!
In the North, the majority of men think that the law of man is
subordinate to religion--the statutes of man beneath the law of God;
that as ethics, personal morals, are amenable to conscience, so
politics, national morals, are amenable to the same conscience; and that
religion has much to do with national as with individual life. Depend
upon it, that idea is the safeguard of the State and of the law. It will
preserve it, purify it, and keep it; but it will scourge every wicked
law out of the temple of justice with iron whips, if need be. Depend
upon it, when we lose our hold of that idea, all hope of order is gone.
But there is no danger; we are pretty well persuaded, that the law of
God is a little greater than the statute of an accidental president
unintentionally chosen for four years. When we think otherwise, we may
count our case hopeless, and give up all.
But with the controlling class of men it is not so. They tell us that we
must keep any law, constitutional or not, legal or not, just or unjust:
first, that we must submit passively, and let the government execute it;
next, we must actively obey it, and with alacrity when called upon to
execute it ourselves. This doctrine is the theory advanced in most of
the newspapers of Boston. It is preached in some of the pulpits, though,
thank God! not in all.
This doctrine appears in the charge of the Judge of the Circuit Court to
the grand jury.[27] I believe that judge to be a good and excellent and
honorable man; I never heard a word to the contrary, and I am glad to
think that it is so.[28] I have to deal only with his opinions; not with
his theoretic doctrines of law, of which latter I profess to know
nothing; but with the theoretic doctrines of morality he lays down. Of
morality I do profess to know something.
He says some excellent things in his charge, which I am glad were said.
He is modest in some places, and moderate in others. He does not think
that a dozen black men taking a fugitive out of court are guilty of
"levying war," and therefore should be hanged, drawn, and quartered, if
you can catch them. All honor to his justice. He does not say, as the
Secretary of State, that we must suppress discussion and stop agitation.
He says we may agitate as much as we have a mind to; may not only speak
against a law, but may declaim against it, which is to speak strongly. I
thank the judge for this respect for the Constitution. But with regard
to the higher and lower law, he has some peculiar opinions. He supposes
a case: that the people ask him, "Which shall we obey, the law of man or
the law of God?" He says, "I answer, obey both. The incompatibility
which the question assumes does not exist."
So, then, here is a great general rule, that between the "law of man"
and the "will of God" there is no incompatibility, and we must "obey
both." Now let us see how this rule will work.
If I am rightly informed, King Ahab made a law that all the Hebrews
should serve Baal, and it was the will of God that they should serve the
Lord.--According to this rule of the judge, they must "obey both." But
if they served Baal, they could not serve the Lord. In such a case,
"what is to be done?"--We are told that Elijah gathered the prophets
together; "and he came unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye?
If the Lord be God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him." Our
modern prophet says, "Obey both. The incompatibility which the question
assumes does not exist." Such is the difference between Judge Elijah and
Judge Peleg.
Let us see how this rule will work in other cases; how you can make a
compromise between two opposite doctrines. The king of Egypt commanded
the Hebrew nurses, "When you do the office of a midwife to the Hebrew
women, if it be a son ye shall kill him." I suppose it is plain to the
Judge of the Circuit Court that this kind of murder, killing the
new-born infants, is against "the will of God;" but it is a matter of
record that it was according to "the law of man." Suppose the Hebrew
nurses had come to ask Judge Sprague for his advice. He must have said,
"Obey both!" His rule is a universal one.
Another decree was once made as it is said, in the Old Testament, that
no man should ask any petition of any God for thirty days, save of the
king, on penalty of being cast into the den of lions. Suppose Daniel--I
mean the old Daniel, the prophet--should have asked him, What is to be
done? Should he pray to Darius or pray to God? "Obey both!" would be the
answer. But he cannot, for he is forbid to pray to God. We know what
Daniel did do.
The elders and scribes of Jerusalem commanded the Christians not to
speak or to teach at all in the name of Jesus; but Peter and John asked
those functionaries, "Whether it be right in the sight of God to hearken
unto you more than unto God, judge ye." Our judge must have said, There
is no "incompatibility;" "obey both!" What "a comfortable Scripture"
this would have been to poor John Bunyan! What a great ethical doctrine
to St. Paul! He did not know such Christianity as that. Before this time
a certain man had said, "No man can serve two masters." But there was
one person who made the attempt, and he also is eminent in history. Here
was "the will of God," to do to others as you would have others do to
you: "Love thy neighbor as thyself." Here is the record of "the law of
man:" "Now both the chief priests and the Pharisees had given a
commandment, that, if any man knew where he [Jesus] were, he should show
it that they might take him." Judas, it seems, determined to "obey
both,"--"the law of man" and "the will of God."--So he sat with Jesus at
the Last Supper, dipped his hand in the same dish, and took a morsel
from the hand of Christ, given him in token of love. All this he did to
obey "the will of God." Then he went and informed the Commissioner or
Marshal where Jesus was. This he did to obey "the law of man." Then he
came back, and found Christ,--the agony all over, the bloody sweat wiped
off from his brow, presently to bleed again,--the Angel of Strength
there with him to comfort him. He was arousing his sleeping disciples
for the last time, and was telling them, "Pray, lest ye enter into
temptation."--Judas came and gave him a kiss. To the eleven it seemed
the friendly kiss, obeying "the will of God." To the Marshal it also
seemed a friendly kiss,--obeying "the law of man." So, in the same act,
he obeys "the law of God" and "the will of man," and there is no
"incompatibility!"
Of old it was said, "Thou canst not serve God and mammon." He that said
it, has been thought to know something of morals,--something of
religion.
Till the fugitive slave law was passed, we did not know what a great
saint Iscariot was. I think there ought to be a chapel for him, and a
day set apart in the calendar. Let him have his chapel in the navy-yard
at Washington. He has got a priest there already. And for a day in the
calendar--set apart for all time the seventh of March!
Let us look at some other things in that Judge's address to the grand
jury. "Unjust and oppressive laws may indeed be passed by human
government. But if infinite and inscrutable Wisdom permits political
society ... to establish such laws, may not the same Wisdom permit and
require individuals ... to obey them?" Ask the prophets in such a case,
if they would have felt themselves permitted and required to obey them!
Ask the men who were tortured, not accepting deliverance, that they
might obtain a better resurrection; who had trial of cruel mockings and
scourgings, yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonment; who were stoned and
sawn asunder; who were slain with the sword; who wandered about in
sheep-skins and goat-skins, destitute, afflicted, and tormented, of whom
the world was not worthy! Ask the apostles, who thanked God they were
counted worthy to suffer shame in the name of Christ! Ask Paul, who was
eight times publicly beaten, thrice shipwrecked; and in perils of
waters, of robbers, of the heathen, of false brethren--that worst of all
peril! Nay, ask Christ; let the Crucified reply,--whether, when a
wicked law is made, and we are commanded to keep it, God means we
should! Ask the men who, with their ocean-wearied feet, consecrated the
rock of Plymouth forever! Ask the patriots of the Revolution! What do
they say? I will not give the answer. Even the martyred Jesuits say No.
Who is it that says Yes? Judas and the Judge. Let them go--each "to his
own place." Let me say no more of them.
This attempt to keep the people down by false doctrine, is no new thing.
But to say that there is no law higher than what the State can make, is
practical atheism. It is not a denial of God in his person; that is only
speculative atheism. It is a denial of the functions and attributes of
God; that is real atheism. If there is no God to make a law for me, then
there is no God for me.
The law of the land is so sacred, it must override the law of God, must
it? Let us see if all the laws of the United States are kept everywhere.
Let a black man go to South Carolina in a ship, and we shall see. Let
the British minister complain that South Carolina puts British subjects
in jail, for the color of their skin. Mr. Secretary Clayton tells him,
We cannot execute the laws of the United States in South Carolina. Why
not? Because the people of South Carolina will not allow it!
Are the laws of Massachusetts kept in Boston, then? The usury law says,
Thou shalt not take more than six per cent. on thy money. Is that kept?
There are thirty-four millions of banking capital in Massachusetts, and
I think that every dollar of this capital has broken this law within the
past twelve months; and yet no complaint has been made. There are three
or four hundred brothels in this city of Boston, and ten or twelve
hundred shops for the sale of rum. All of them are illegal: some are as
well known to the police as is this house; indeed, a great deal more
frequented by some of them, than any house of God. Does anybody disturb
them? No! I have a letter from an alderman who furnishes me with facts
of this nature, who says, that "Some of the low places are prosecuted,
some broken up." Last Saturday night, the very men who guarded Mr. Sims,
I am told, were playing cards in his prison-house, contrary to the laws
of Massachusetts. In Court Square, in front of the court-house, is a
rum-shop, one of the most frequented in the city, open at all hours of
the day, and, for aught I know, of the night too. I never passed when
its "fire was quenched," and its "worm" dead. Is its owner prosecuted?
How many laws of Massachusetts have been violated this very week, in
this very city, by the slave-hunters here, by the very officers of the
State? What is the meaning of this? Every law which favors the
accumulation of money, must be kept; but those which prohibit the
unjust accumulation of money by certain classes--they need not be
kept.[29]
No doubt it would be a great pity to have the city government careful to
keep the laws of the city,--to suppress rum-shops, and save the citizens
from the almshouse, the jail, and the gallows. Such laws may be executed
at Truro and Wellfleet; but it is quite needless for the officers of
"The Athens of America," to attend to the temperance laws.[30]--What a
pity for the magistrates of Boston to heed the laws of the State! No; it
is the fugitive slave law that they must keep.
* * * * *
II. A great deal of pains has been taken to impress the people with
their "moral duty to obey the fugitive slave law." To carry it out,
government needs base men; and that, my brothers, is a crop which never
fails. Rye and wheat may get blasted many times in the course of years;
the potato may rot; apples and peaches fail. But base men never fail.
Put up your black pirate-flag in the market-place, offer "money and
office," and they will come as other carrion-vultures to their prey. The
olive, the fig, and the orange are limited in their range; even Indian
corn and oats will not grow everywhere; but base men are indigenous all
the world over, between the tropics, and under a polar sky. No bad
scheme ever failed for lack of bad men to carry it out. Do you want to
kill Baptists and Quakers in Boston? There are the men for you. To hang
"witches" at Salem? There are hangmen in plenty on Gallows Hill. Would
James the Second butcher his subjects? He found his "human" tools ready.
Would Elizabeth murder the Puritans and Catholics? There was no lack of
ruffians. Would bloody Mary burn the Protestants? There were more
executioners than victims. Would the Spanish Inquisition torture and put
to death the men for whom Christ died? She found priests and
"gentlemen," ready for their office. Would Nero murder the Christians,
and make a spectacle of their sufferings? Rome is full of scoundrels to
do the deed, and teems with spectators rushing to the amphitheatre at
the cry of "Christians to the Lions!" all finding a holiday in their
brothers' agony. Would the high-priests crucify the Son of man? They
found a commissioner to issue the mandate, a marshal to enforce it, a
commissioner to try him by illegal process,--for the process against
Christ was almost as unconstitutional as that against Sims,--they found
a commissioner ready to condemn Christ, against his own conscience,
soldiers ready to crucify him. Ay! and there was a Peter to deny him,
and a Judas to betray, and now there is a judge with his legal ethics,
to justify the betrayal! I promised not to speak of Judas or the judge
again, but they will come up before me! It is true, that, if in Boston,
some judicial monster should wish to seethe a man in a pot of scalding
water, he would find another John Boilman in Boston, as Judge Jeffries
found one in England, in 1686.
The churches of New England, and the North, have had their trials. In my
time they have been tried in various ways. The temperance reformation
tried them. They have had perils on account of slavery. The Mexican war
tried them; the fugitive slave law has put them to the rack. But, never
in my day, have the churches been so sorely tried, nor done so well as
now. The very letter of the New Testament on the one side, and of the
Old Testament on the other, both condemned the law; the spirit of them
both was against all slavery.
There are two great sects in Christendom,--the churches of Christianity,
and the churches of commerce. The churches of Christianity always do
well: they think that religion is love to God, and love to man. But the
churches of commerce, which know no higher law, what should they do?
Some of the ministers of the churches of commerce were wholly silent.
Why so? The poor ministers were very modest all at once. Now, modesty is
a commendable virtue; but see how it works. Here is a man who has given
his mind ten, twenty, or thirty years to the study of theology, and
knows every Hebrew particle of the Old Testament, and every Greek
particle of the New Testament, as well as he knows the Lord's Prayer;
every great work on the subject of Christianity, from Nicodemus down to
Norton. Let him come out and say that the Old Testament was written like
other books; let him say that the miracles of the Old and New Testament
are like the miracles of the Popish legends; then, ministers in their
pulpits, who never studied theology or philosophy, or pretended to
study, only to know, the historical development of religion in the
world,--they will come down instantly upon our poor man, call his
doctrines "false," and call him an "infidel," an "atheist." But let a
rich parishioner, or a majority of the rich parishioners, be in favor of
the fugitive slave law, and all at once the minister is very modest
indeed. He says to his people, by silence or by speech, "I do not
understand these things; but you, my people, who all your lives are
engaged in making money and nothing else, and worship mammon and nothing
else, you understand them a great deal better than I do. My modesty
forbids me to speak. Let us pray!"[31]
Some ministers have been silent; others have spoken out in favor of the
lower law, and in derision of the higher law. Here is a famous minister,
the very chief of his denomination, reported in the newspapers to have
said that he would surrender his own mother to slavery rather than have
the Union dissolved! I believe him this time. A few years ago, that
minister printed, in the organ of his sect, that the existence of God
was "not a certainty!" He did not mean to say that he doubted or
disbelieved it, only that it was "not a certainty!" I should suppose
that he had gone further in that direction, and thought the
non-existence of God was "a certainty." But he is not quite original in
this proposed sacrifice. He has been preceded and outbid by a Spanish
Catholic. Here is the story in Senor de Castro's History of the Spanish
Protestants, written this very year. I can tell the story shorter than
it is there related. In 1581, there lived a man in Valladolid, who had
two Protestant daughters, being himself a Catholic. The Inquisition was
in full blast, and its fiery furnace heated seven times hotter than
before. This man, according to the commandment of the priests and Pope,
complained to the inquisitors against his daughters, who were summoned
to appear before them. They were tried, and condemned to be burned
alive, at his suggestion. He furnished the accusation, brought forward
the evidence, and was the only witness in the case. That was not all.
After this condemnation, he went round his own estates, and from
selected trees cut down morsels of wood, and carried them to the city
to use in burning his own daughters. He was allowed to do this, and of
course the priest commended him for his piety and love of God! Thus, in
1581, in Valladolid, a father at noon-day, with wood from his own
estate, on his own complaint and evidence, with his own hands, burned
his two daughters alive; and the Catholic Church said, Well done! Now,
in my opinion, the Hidalgo of Valladolid a little surpasses the
Unitarian Doctor of Divinity. I do not know what "recompense of reward"
the Spanish Hidalgo got for his deed; but the American divine, for his
offer, has been put into "one of the priests' offices, that he might eat
a piece of bread." He has been appointed, as the newspapers say, a
Chaplain of the Navy at Washington. Verily he has his reward.
But there have been found men in Boston to go a little further. Last
Thanksgiving Day, I said it would be difficult to find a magistrate in
Boston to take the odium of sending a fugitive back to slavery. I
believed, after all, men had some conscience, although they talked about
its being a duty to deliver up a man to bondage. Pardon me, my country,
that I rated you too high! Pardon me, town of Boston, that I thought
your citizens all men! Pardon me, lawyers, that I thought you had been
all born of mothers! Pardon me, ruffians, who kill for hire! I thought
you had some animal mercy left, even in your bosom! Pardon me, United
States' commissioners, marshals, and the like, I thought you all had
some shame! Pardon me, my hearers, for such mistakes. One commissioner
was found to furnish the warrant! Pardon me, I did not know he was a
commissioner; if I had, I never would have said it!
Spirits of tyrants, I look down to you! Shade of Cain, you great first
murderer, forgive me that I forgot your power, and did not remember that
you were parent of so long a line! And you, my brethren, if hereafter I
tell you that there is any limit of meanness or wickedness which a
Yankee will not jump over, distrust me, and remind me of this day, and I
will take it back!