UNPOPULARITY OF THE ABOLITIONISTS.--THE COMPROMISES OF 1850 AND THE
FUGITIVE-SLAVE LAW.--JAY'S REPLY TO WEBSTER'S 7th OF MARCH
SPEECH.--THE ATTITUDE OF THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH.--THE ABROGATION OF
THE MISSOURI COMPROMISE.--DISUNION.
The prospect was dark for the antislavery cause in 1850. Its friends had
increased steadily in numbers and in earnestness. But the Slave Power
had mustered all its forces in an aggressive campaign which aimed to
make slavery a national instead of a local institution, to introduce it
into territory hitherto free, and to browbeat the North into submission
to every demand of the slaveholder. The compromise measures adopted this
year in Congress--above all, the Fugitive-Slave Law--marked the
successful advance of arrogant Southern dictation. In the North, the
dislike of antislavery men and the willingness to satisfy the South at
the expense of conscience was expressed in such scenes as the attack of
the Rynders mob on the meeting of the American Antislavery Society in
New York and the passive attitude towards it adopted by the authorities.
Although the plan of putting down the abolitionists by force had proved
impracticable, no efforts were spared to make their lives uncomfortable
by the attacks of the press and by the pressure of social disapproval.
"Our politicians," wrote Jay to Charles Sumner, "may pride themselves on
their adroitness in pandering to popular prejudices, and in acquiring
power and influence by seasonable changes of opinion and conduct. But a
day is coming when their motives and actions will be judged by a very
different tribunal than public opinion, and when a single act of
benevolence, a single sacrifice of personal consideration to the cause
of truth, will outweigh a whole life of obsequiousness and political
trickery.
"The truths we advocate are unpalatable to the two extremes of society.
We shock the coarse, vulgar prejudices of the rabble, while the
disinterested benevolence we profess is to them an enigma to be solved
only by the imputation of fanaticism. At the same time we disturb the
tranquil consciences of the rich, thwart the calculations of politicans,
and interrupt the harmony subsisting between our merchants and their
Southern customers. Hence the upper classes look upon us as impertinent
and exceedingly ungenteel, and unfit to move in the higher circles. I
cannot tell how far your personal experience coincides with mine, but
_I_ know whereof I affirm. I have advanced no ultra-fanatical doctrines
in politics or religion. On the subject of slavery I have but reiterated
the opinions of many of the best and greatest men in England and in our
own country. I have advocated no congressional action except such as
Mr. Webster, in his better days, pronounced constitutional, and I have
condemned all forcible resistance to the Fugitive-Slave Law. Yet solely
on account of my antislavery efforts, I find myself nearly insulated in
society."
The Compromise measures of 1850 were repulsive and disheartening to the
antislavery men in the North. And no circumstance connected with them
was more discouraging than the change of front made by Daniel
Webster--his abandonment of the Wilmot Proviso and his concession to the
Southern demand for the extension of slavery into the new territory
acquired by the Mexican War. Webster's speech of the 7th of March was
answered by Judge Jay in a letter to the _Evening Post_ of March 20th,
and was afterwards published as a pamphlet and widely circulated. In
this letter Jay recalled the eloquent and positive declaration of
Webster made in the Senate on August 10, 1848, after New Mexico and
California had been acquired:
"My opposition to the increase of slavery in this country, or to the
increase of slave representation, is general and universal. It has
no reference to the lines of latitude or points of the compass. I
shall oppose all such extension at all times and under all
circumstances, even against all inducements, against all supposed
limitation of great interests, against all combinations, against all
compromises."
These words were contrasted by Jay with Webster's present excuse for
abandoning opposition to the extension of slavery on the ground that the
laws of "physical geography" made slavery impossible in the new
territory and to forbid its existence there was merely "to re-enact the
will of God."
"To what," asked Jay, "did this solemn, emphatic, unqualified
asservation refer? Did he then know that there was a foot of
territory in the United States over which it was morally and
physically impossible to extend slavery? Was he promising in these
impressive terms to oppose what he was conscious would never be
attempted? Did he make this pledge before his country with a mental
reservation to unite hereafter with General Cass and the
slaveholders in denouncing and scorning the Proviso? Did he mean to
deceive his own party? Did he desire to keep up an angry agitation
throughout the nation for electioneering purposes, and did he thus
intimate his belief in the danger of the extension of slavery and
slave representation, when he well knew that the fiat of the
Almighty had rendered such extension impossible? Was he then
acquainted with the law of physical geography which would render the
Proviso 'a re-enactment of the will of God?' And did he purposely
conceal the secret of this law in his own breast, when by revealing
it he might have stilled the raging billows of popular passion which
threatened to ingulf the Union? To suppose all this would be to
impute to Mr. Webster a degree of trickery and turpitude rarely
paralleled even among politicians. Hence we are bound to assume that
the law of nature on which he _now_ relies is a recent discovery,
subsequent at least to the 10th August, 1848. It is, however,
extraordinary that a gentleman of his acquirements did not sooner
become acquainted with '_this law of physical geography--the law of
the formation of the earth, that settles forever, beyond all terms
of human enactment, that slavery cannot exist in California or New
Mexico_.' It is to be regretted that Mr. Webster did not condescend
to demonstrate the existence of this law and to explain the mode of
its operation. He indeed tells us that our new territories are
'Asiatic in their formation and scenery'; but this fact does not
prove his law, since slavery has existed for ages amid the scenery
of Asia; it exists in the deserts of Africa, has existed in every
country of Europe, and now exists in the frozen regions of Russia.
This law, moreover, must have been enacted by the Creator since
1824, or its operation must have been suspended in deference to the
Spanish government; for under that government negro slavery did
exist in California and New Mexico, and it ceased in 1824, not by
the 'law of physical geography,' but by a Mexican edict. Thousands
of slaves are employed in the mines of Brazil, and Mr. Webster does
not explain how his law forbids their employment in the mines of
California....
"He pays a sorry compliment to the common sense of the people in
offering to them at the eleventh hour a new and unheard-of law of
'physical geography,' together with the 'Asiatic scenery and
formation' of the conquered territories, as an _excuse_ for
violating the faith he had plighted in behalf of the Proviso. He has
shocked the moral sense of a large portion of the community by
giving in advance his sanction to the Fugitive-Slave Law, which
makes the liberty or bondage of a citizen depend on the affidavit of
a slaveholder and the judgment of a post-master--a law which
converts sympathy for guiltless misery into crime, and threatens to
tenant our jails with our most estimable men and women. But Mr.
Webster underrates the intelligence and sensibilities of the masses.
Relying on the Southern affinities of our commercial cities, on the
subserviency of politicians, on the discipline of party, and on his
own great influence, Mr. Webster looks _down_ upon the people; but
the time is probably not far distant when the people will cease to
look up to him. Parties will accept of any leaders who can acquire
for them the spoils of the day, but in the political history of our
country the people have never placed their affections upon any man
in whose stability and consistency they did not confide."
To give such assistance as he could to a fugitive slave had always been
regarded by Judge Jay as a duty. "The slaveholders," he had written,
"with their accustomed impudence and mendacity, apply the term _theft_
to the humane and Christian efforts to assist a slave in escaping from
his home of bondage. In their sense of the expression, I glory in being
a slave-stealer, and I inculcate upon my children the duty, the
Christian duty, of this kind of theft." He had sheltered and aided many
runaways at his home at Bedford, and his will contained a bequest of a
thousand dollars to be used for this purpose. His son John gave his
services as a lawyer constantly and successfully to prevent the return
of fugitive slaves.
When the Fugitive-Slave Bill became a law Judge Jay was applied to by
many individuals, societies, and periodicals to give his views
concerning it. "The law," he said in a private letter, "is an outrage
upon the Constitution of our country and the precepts of our religion.
It is a burlesque on justice and on all the acknowledged rules of
evidence in the trial of issues. The demand it makes upon individual
citizens to aid in hunting and enslaving their fellow-men is diabolical.
I have made up my mind to suffer imprisonment and the spoiling of my
goods rather than hazard my soul by rendering any active obedience to
this sinful law. It is horrible that so many of our fashionable cotton
divines are now preaching up the supremacy of human law and virtually
dethroning Him whose ambassadors they profess to be."
"In my opinion, every Northern slave-catcher is a base man, and every
lawyer who takes reward against the innocent is a disgrace to a noble
profession. I myself shall offer no forcible resistance against the
execution of this most wicked law, but I trust that, through the grace
of God, I would go to the scaffold sooner than obey it."
Concerning the constitutionality of the law, Judge Jay wrote to Josiah
Quincy: "The fugitive-slave clause in the Constitution is of course
obligatory, but there is a wide distinction between the fugitive-slave
_clause_ and the fugitive-slave _law_. The Constitution gives no power
to Congress to legislate on the subject, but imposes on the States the
obligation of rendition. Chief-Justice Hornblower, of New York, and
Chancellor Walworth, of New York, long since pronounced the fugitive law
of '93 unconstitutional on this very ground."
The demoralization caused by the execution of the law was described by
Jay in a letter to Gerrit Smith: "It is scoundrelizing our people.
Cruelty and injustice are cultivated as virtues, Christian love and
sympathy with human suffering are treated as prejudices to be conquered,
and zeal in hunting slaves is made the test of patriotism and of fitness
for office. But the most diabolical effect of the law is the competition
it has excited among our politicians to offer the blood of their
fellow-citizens in exchange for Southern votes."
To a committee of free coloured men who asked Judge Jay's advice
regarding the propriety of arming themselves to prevent being kidnapped
under the law, he said: "Most deeply do I sympathize with you in your
unhappy state. With your wives and children, you are now placed at the
disposal of any villain who is ready to perjure himself for the price
you will bring in the human shambles of the South. With less ceremony
and trouble than a man can impound his neighbour's ox, you may be
metamorphosed from a citizen of the State of New York into a beast of
burden on a Southern plantation. On leaving your house in the morning
you may be enticed into another, where one of the newly appointed
commissioners, after reading one affidavit, made a thousand miles off,
and another that you are the person named in the first, or on the bare
oath of the kidnapper himself, may inform you, to your amazement and
horror, that you are a _slave_. The fetters previously prepared are
placed on your limbs, and in a few minutes you are travelling with
railroad velocity to a Southern market. Never again will you behold your
wife and children, nor will any tidings from them ever reach your ear.
The remainder of your life is to be one of toil and stripes.... Yet," he
continued, "leave, I beseech you, the pistol and the bowie-knife to
Southern ruffians and their Northern mercenaries. That this law will
lead to bloodshed I take for granted, but let it be the blood of the
innocent, not of the guilty. If anything can arouse the torpid
conscience of the North, it will be our streets stained with human blood
shed by the slave-catchers."
The Fugitive-Slave Law, in Jay's opinion, was the natural sequence to
the attempt to put down the antislavery movement by force: "For years,
most strenuous efforts, prompted by commercial and political views, were
made to deprive the opponents of slavery of their constitutional
privileges by lawless violence. The right of petition was suspended, the
freedom of debate interrupted, the sanctity of the post-office violated,
public meetings dispersed, printing-presses destroyed, furious mobs
excited, churches sacked, private houses gutted, and even murder
perpetrated. All this violation of rights was regarded with complacency
by many who had much at stake, so long as abolitionists alone were the
victims. But the spirit of aggression thus raised and fostered is
seeking new subjects on which to exercise its power. 'Gentlemen of
property and standing' are now beginning to feel alarmed about
socialism, anti-rentism, agrarianism, etc. Hence, of late we hear much
of the importance of conservatism, as it is called. The political
movements of the last few months seem to indicate that our landlords and
cotton lords and merchant princes regard an alliance with the
aristocracy of the South as at least in some degree a security against
the violation of vested rights, sequestration of rents, oppressive
taxation, unequal laws, etc. To the influence of gentlemen of this class
the late slave law owes its passage.
"And is it indeed believed that the rights of the rich will be protected
by familiarizing the populace with the practice of injustice and cruelty
towards the poor? Will the sight of innocent men seized in our streets
and sent in fetters to till the broad fields of great landowners
increase the reverence felt for land titles? Is it wise to give the
people practical lessons in the demolition of all the barriers raised by
the common law for the protection of the weak against the strong? Is it
true conservatism to obliterate in the masses the sense of justice, the
feelings of humanity, the distinction between right and wrong?"
The tacit support given to slavery by the Episcopal Church at large and
the active support given to it by many individual clergymen was a source
of constant grief to Judge Jay and a frequent subject of his thoughts.
"You well know," he wrote to Joseph Sturge, "what a mighty effort has
been made by our Northern traders in Southern votes and merchandise,
under the leadership of Daniel Webster, to roll back the antislavery
tide. To a certain extent they have succeeded. The commercial interest
in the great towns, through a rivalry for the Southern trade, has
professed great alacrity in slave-catching, and political aspirants for
office under the Federal Government find it expedient to make
slave-hunting the test of patriotism. But the religious feeling of the
commonalty--that is, of those who are not pre-eminently gentlemen of
property and standing--is shocked by the enormous cruelty and injustice
of the fugitive law. To overcome this feeling, which in its
demonstrations is exceedingly inconvenient to our merchants and
office-seekers, the clergy have been urged by the press and other
agencies to come out in support of the law--in other words, to give the
sanction of the gospel of Christ to the enslavement of innocent men.
Some pastors who preach in fine churches to rich and fashionable city
congregations have complied. You must understand that many of our
brokers, merchants, lawyers, and editors were exceedingly scandalized by
the opposition of religious people to this vile law, and they have
trembled for the honour of our holy religion when some of its professors
contended that an impious law was not binding on the conscience."
The position of the church was strongly stated by Jay in a letter to
Rev. Hiram Jelliff: "It is one of the most melancholy circumstances of
the condition of the coloured people that so many of the ministers of
the Lord Jesus Christ are among their most influential enemies. The
church of the living God is the great buttress of slavery and caste in
the United States. If any plea can be urged in behalf of infidelity, it
is that Christianity as represented by multitudes of its official
teachers authorizes the abrogation of all its precepts of humility,
justice, and benevolence in the treatment of persons to whom God has
given a coloured skin. Look at the conventions of New York and
Pennsylvania excluding ministers and disciples of the crucified Redeemer
merely because they are poor and despised! I confess, my dear sir, that
were I a young man, with no early religious impressions and about to
decide on the truth or falsehood of revelation, I fear I should be
strongly tempted to believe that a religion such as it is practically
exhibited by your cotton-parsons could not and did not proceed from a
just and benevolent being. I have had great opportunities of knowing the
effect produced by the countenance given to slavery and caste by the
church on the faith of many kind-hearted and conscientious people, and
in all sincerity I declare that our pro-slavery clergy, our negro-hating
clergy, our slave-catching clergy, are the most successful apostles of
infidelity in the country. I write thus freely to you because your
course is in direct opposition to those I condemn. The Saviour eat,
drank, and lodged with the Samaritans, who were the negroes of Judea, a
despised, degraded caste, from whom a Jew disdained to receive even a
cup of water.... May God bless and reward your labours."
Occupying, as Judge Jay did, a position of leadership in both the
Episcopal Church and the antislavery movement, it was to him that men
most frequently turned for advice on subjects relating to the connection
between the church and slavery. From mature minds, such as that of
Senator Salmon P. Chase, from divinity students and young men
contemplating connection with a religious body, came inquiries
regarding the duty of joining the church or of remaining a member. To a
young man Jay wrote in 1854: "I shall say nothing of the claims of the
Episcopal Church as arising from her doctrines, forms, and government,
except that I know of no church which, judged _by its authorized
standards_, is more scriptural and more conducive to holiness in this
life and to salvation in the next. You desire to enter this church but
have not been able to overcome the objection arising from its connection
with slavery, and would like to know, for your information, how I
reconcile my continuance in this church with my antislavery opinions.
Assuredly I could not belong to a church which exacted of its members an
admission of the lawfulness of human bondage. Of such a sin and folly
the Episcopal Church is guiltless. No sanction of slavery can be found
in any of her standards, and hence I can very consistently hold the
doctrines of the church and join in its prayers and rites and at the
same time regard American slavery as the sum of all villainies. There
are in the church slaveholding bishops, clergymen, and communicants,
_plenty of them_. But I am not responsible for their presence.... There
never has been, and I suppose there never will be, a widely extended
church without unworthy pastors and members. A _pure_ church composed of
fallible and sinful men is a figment of the imagination.... Many popish
doctrines and practices are occasionally advocated by our Puseyites. But
I, as a private member of the church, am in no degree responsible for
the heresies of Puseyism nor the more disgusting heresies of
cotton-divinity.... In my opinion, in nine cases out of ten an
antislavery Christian can do more good to his own soul, to the cause of
Christ, and to the interests of the slave by remaining in his church and
there battling for truth and justice, than by going in search of a pure
church. It often happens when an abolitionist abandons an alleged
pro-slavery church he finds no other that suits him. Hence the public
worship of God and the Sacraments are neglected. Gradually he and his
family learn to live without God in the world, and finally enter upon
that broad road which leads to destruction."
The position assumed by the Episcopal Church towards the rights and
elevation of the blacks was indicated by the refusal of the Diocesan
Council of New York to admit the coloured church of St. Philip, although
the parish was constitutionally entitled to be represented and her
minister and delegates were entitled to seats and votes. Judge Jay
opposed earnestly a majority report from a committee on the question of
their admission, which contended that the applicants belonged to a race
"socially degraded, and improper associates for the class of persons who
attend our conventions." Such an apology for the violation of the
constitutional rights ordained by the State, and such a presentation of
the theological views entertained by the committee on the unity of the
church and the catholic brotherhood of its members, was not calculated
to strengthen the opposition to St. Philip's; and the Christian world
breathed more freely when, after a nine years' struggle to obtain a vote
on the question maintained by Judge Jay and his son, the coloured parish
was admitted by a large majority of both orders.
In 1854 Southern aggression had nearly reached its culminating point.
The Missouri Compromise was abrogated; the Kansas-Nebraska Bill threw
open to slavery an immense territory hitherto free, under the subterfuge
invented by General Cass and Senator Douglas of "popular sovereignty."
Slavery was thus to extend over the vast regions in the centre of the
continent. An indefinite number of new slave States were to be admitted
into the Union, which would give the control of the Senate, and
consequently of all legislation, forever to the Slave Power.
In February, 1854, Judge Jay received an invitation to address the
Anti-Nebraska Convention of the Free Democracy of Massachusetts. His age
and health prevented a journey to Boston, but he wrote to the committee
of invitation as follows:
"It is meet and right that the stupendous iniquity now about to be
perpetrated should be resisted by the true-hearted citizens of that
State which, more than any other in the confederacy, has debauched
the moral sentiment of the nation and prepared the community for
submission to the most insolent usurpation yet attempted by the
Slave Power. The present effort to extend the dominion of the whip
to the northern limits of the United States is the legitimate
consequence of the disastrous and disgraceful concessions of 1850.
Those concessions were effected more through the ability and
labours of the late distinguished senator from Massachusetts
than of any of his coadjutors. Mr. Webster, avowing the entire
constitutionality of the Wilmot Proviso and having voted for it in
relation to Oregon, objected to its application to the newly
conquered territories on the ground that their _Asiatic scenery_ and
_geographical conformation_ rendered it _physically impossible_ for
negro slavery ever to exist in them. Unhappily for his novel and
extraordinary theory, numerous slaves were at the time he spoke held
in California.... Slaves are at this day held in New Mexico.
"Mr. Webster, in giving his earnest and cordial support to the
atrocious Fugitive-Slave Act, candidly acknowledged on the floor of
the Senate that in 'his judgment' Congress had no constitutional
power to legislate on the subject, the obligation of surrendering
fugitives resting on the States. Yet he scrupled not in his
subsequent addresses to speak in terms of unmeasured obloquy of
every lawyer who presumed to deny the constitutionality of that
horrible law. He admitted the right of Congress to grant the
fugitive a trial by jury, yet was unwearied in his advocacy of a law
denying to the most helpless of mortals that important safeguard of
personal liberty....
"The course of this gentleman at a moment when the dearest
principles of liberty, justice, and humanity were vehemently
assailed was rapturously applauded by the monied, the literary, and
the ecclesiastical aristocracy of Massachusetts, and the New England
Church has to a great extent canonized his memory.
"The ardour evinced by the city of Boston in the surrender of Simms,
and the intense servility and degradation accompanying that
surrender, together with the emphatic endorsement of Mr. Webster's
conduct, have exerted an influence in behalf of human bondage and
in derogation of Christian obligation far beyond the bounds of
Massachusetts. The moral bulwark raised at the North against slavery
in times past by the religious sentiment and the respect for the
rights of man is nearly demolished.
"The Slave Power, taking advantage of the present paralysis of the
Northern conscience and the frantic cupidity of our demagogues and
merchants for Southern votes and Southern trade, is about placing
its yoke on willing and bending necks.
"Think not that Nebraska is to be the terminus of slaveholding
encroachments. New slave States are from time to time to be carved
out of Mexico. Cuba is to be wrested from Spain and St. Domingo
re-enslaved and annexed. As the field for slave labour widens and
widens, the supply will be found inadequate to the demand. The
discovery will then be made that both religion and policy require
the repeal of the prohibition of the African slave-trade. We shall
be told of the Christian duty of bringing the pagans of Africa to
our own civilized shores and of preparing them for heaven by the
discipline of the whip and the teachings of slave-drivers, while
politicans and political economists will insist on the removal of
the restriction as essential to the development of our national
wealth and enterprise. In vain will Virginia and the other breeding
States strive to retain their present lucrative monopoly of the
human shambles. The cotton and sugar States, together with the newly
acquired slave States, aided by Northern politicians, will establish
free trade in the bodies and souls of men.
"The Southern Church is almost without exception the unblushing
champion of slavery, while the Northern Church, adopting a
time-serving, heartless, and often hypocritical neutrality, and
holding in its fraternal embrace slave-breeders and slave-traders,
has virtually taught that the vilest outrages on both the civil and
religious rights of the black man are perfectly compatible with the
highest sanctity in his white oppressor. Some of our religious
journals are sadly grieved and scandalized by the alleged discovery
that certain opponents of slavery are infidels. For my own part, I
know of no form of infidelity so hideous as that which impiously
claims the authority of Almighty God for abrogating all His laws in
behalf of justice and mercy in reference to our conduct towards
millions of our countrymen not of the same colour as ourselves. This
cutaneous Christianity, so insulting to the Deity, so disastrous to
man, is fast becoming the national religion.
"The present crisis is indeed an awful one. While various causes
have aided in producing it, its immediate origin is to be traced to
the lamentable defection, in 1850, of so many of the rich and
influential from truth and justice, liberty and humanity, under the
fallacious plea of saving the Union. Well may the Free Democracy of
Massachusetts, with their hands and consciences undefiled by
oblations on the altar of the American Moloch, now strive to avert
the calamity impending over the country. May a long-suffering God
bless their efforts and rescue a guilty nation from the punishment
it seems anxious to inflict upon itself."
"As to the wickedness of the whole Kansas business," Jay wrote to
Charles Sumner, in March, 1856, "I most fully agree with you, and I do
not wonder that amid such abounding iniquity you are at a loss what
atrocity to assail first. I am very much inclined to look upon every
Northern member of Congress who voted for the repeal of the Missouri
Compromise as a rascal. This may seem harsh--it is certainly not
polite--and yet I am utterly unable to assign a good, honest, religious
motive for the vote, or to reconcile it with the fear of God or with
love to man.... Let us fight on, with all our heart and mind and soul.
God is with us, approves our efforts, and whether He shall crown them
with success or not, He will not forget our work of faith and labour of
love. I have full faith in an ultimate triumph, although you and I may
not live to enjoy it. My belief is, that as soon as the North ceases to
tremble before the slave-drivers, the non-slaveholders of the South will
proclaim their independence and insist upon free speech and a free
press, and as soon as these are obtained the doom of slavery is sealed."
The repeal of the Missouri Compromise was the beginning of the end, the
fatal step of the South on its road to destruction. Throughout the North
the conviction grew that Union and slavery could not exist much longer
together. On the 4th of July, 1854, Garrison publicly burned a copy of
the Constitution of the United States with the words, "The Union must be
dissolved!" He represented only an extreme sentiment. But the people at
large began to calculate the value of this Union for which so many
sacrifices had been made. Slavery became odious to many persons hitherto
indifferent to the subject, on the ground that it persistently and
selfishly placed the Union in peril.
In the summer of 1857 Judge Jay received a circular calling for a
National Disunion Convention, to be held at Worcester, signed by T. W.
Higginson, Wendell Phillips, Daniel Mann, and W. L. Garrison. To this
circular he replied at length, giving his views on the question of
separation as it then appeared to him.
"The subject you propose for consideration," he said, "has long been
to me one of deep and painful interest. Although fully conscious of
the many social, commercial, and political advantages derived from
the Federal Union, I am nevertheless convinced that it is at present
a most grievous moral curse to the American people. To the people of
the South it is a curse by fostering and strengthening and
perpetuating an iniquitous, corrupting institution. To the millions
of African descent among us it is a curse by riveting the chains of
the bondman and deepening the degradation of the free man. To the
people of the free States it is a curse by tempting them to trample
under foot the obligations of truth, justice, and humanity for the
wages of iniquity with which the Federal Government has so
abundantly rewarded apostates from liberty and righteousness.
"In my opinion, while the Union continues to be thus a curse it will
be indissoluble; if it ever ceases to be a curse, it will be
converted into a blessing.
* * * * *
"What possible reason have you to expect that those in church and
state who have surrendered their consciences to the seductions of
the Union will listen to your call and aid you in breaking a power
which they glory in saving? While I believe you are doomed to
disappointment, I nevertheless rejoice in every exposure of the
demoralizing influence of the Union. I rejoice in such exposure, not
as tending to bring about dissolution, but to render it unnecessary.
When the people of the North cease to idolize the Union, they will
cease to offer on its altar their rights and their duties. When
released from their thraldom to the Slave Power, they will cease to
place its minions in office. When no longer covetous of the votes
and the trade of the South, they will no longer be bullied into all
manner of wretchedness and all manner of insult by the idea and
ever-repeated threats of dissolution. But when this happy time
arrives, the Union will be converted from a curse into a blessing.
Our divines, instead of vindicating cruelty and oppression, and
denouncing as fanatics those who consider the will of God a higher
law than an accursed act of Congress, will become preachers of
righteousness. Democrats, seeing the Federal patronage wielded by
the opponents of slavery, will, in the rapidity and extent of their
conversion to truth and justice, eclipse all the marvels of New
England revivals; and men who for years have been bowed to the earth
by spinal weakness will as by miracle stand erect. When all this
happens, the North will continue its Union with the South; and you
yourselves will have no wish to see that Union severed.
"At the close of the war, Washington, solicitous that the divine
favour might rest on the new-born nation, publicly offered the
prayer that God would dispose us all to do justice and love mercy.
May the Union, when exerting an influence in accordance with this
prayer, be indissoluble; but may God forbid that it may ever be
saved by promoting, extending, and perpetuating injustice and
cruelty, by invoking the wrath of Heaven, and becoming a proverb and
a reproach among the nations of the earth."