LETTER TO A POLITICAL ANTISLAVERY CONVENTION AT WORCESTER,
MASSACHUSETTS, SEPTEMBER 9, 1860.
BOSTON, September 9, 1860.
DEAR SIR,--With you I hate, deplore, and denounce the Barbarism
of Slavery,--believing that the _nonentity and impossibility_
of Slavery under the Constitution of the United States can be
fully seen only when we fully see its Barbarism; so that in the
Constitutional argument against Slavery the first link is its
essential Barbarism, with the recognition of which no man will
be so absurd as to infer or imagine that Slavery can have any
basis in words which do not plainly and unequivocally declare it,
even if, when thus declared, it were not at once forbidden by the
Divine Law, which is above all Human Law. Therefore in much I
agree with you, and wish you God-speed.
But I do not agree that the National Government has power under
the Constitution to touch Slavery in the States, any more than it
has power to touch the twin Barbarism of Polygamy in the States,
while fully endowed to arrest and suppress both in all the
Territories. Therefore I do not join in your special efforts.
But I rejoice in every honest endeavor to expose the Barbarism
which degrades our Republic; and here my gratitude is so strong
that criticism is disarmed, even where I find that my judgment
hesitates.
Accept my thanks for the invitation with which you have honored
me, and my best wishes for all Constitutional efforts against
Slavery; and believe me, my dear Sir,
Very faithfully yours,