There is a most interesting sequel to my brief narrative of the great
outrage upon liberty in the metropolis of New England, which cannot be
so pertinently told in any other connection.
After the first attempt of the Female Antislavery Society to hold their
annual meeting on the 14th of October, in Congress Hall, was thwarted
by the fears of the owner and lessee, Mr. Francis Jackson offered the
use of his dwelling-house in Hollis Street for that purpose. But the
ladies were unwilling to believe that they should be molested in their
own small hall, No. 46 Washington Street, and thought it more becoming
to meet there than to retreat to the protection of a private house. So
the meeting was appointed to be held there on the 21st. The result, so
disgraceful to the reputation of Boston, has just been given.
On the evening of that sad day, while the rioters were yet patrolling
the city, exulting over their shameful deeds, and threatening the
persons and property of the Abolitionists, Francis Jackson, called upon
Miss Mary Parker, the truly devout and brave President of the Boston
Female Antislavery Society, and renewed the offer of his dwelling in
the following letter of invitation:--
“TO THE LADIES OF THE BOSTON FEMALE ANTISLAVERY SOCIETY.
“Having with deep regret and mortification observed the manner in
which your Society has been treated by a portion of the community,
especially by some of our public journals, and approving as I do
most cordially the objects of your association, I offer you the use
of my dwelling-house in Hollis Street for the purpose of holding
your annual meeting, or for any other meeting.
“Such accommodations as I have are at your service, and I assure
you it would afford me great pleasure to extend this slight
testimony of my regard for a Society whose objects are second to
none other in the city.
“With great respect,
“FRANCIS JACKSON.”
This heroic act thrilled with joy the hearts of the “faithful,” and
inspired them with new courage. For two or three years Mr. Jackson
had evinced a deep interest in the antislavery cause, but we did not
suspect that he had so much Roman virtue.
His invitation was gratefully accepted, and due notices were published
in the usual form that the meeting would be held at his house on the
19th of November. Renewed efforts were made by our opposers to create
another excitement. The air was filled with threats. But the editors of
the newspapers did not come up to the work as before. Fewer prominent
gentlemen encouraged “the baser sort,” and therefore the mob did not
come out in its strength. About a hundred and thirty ladies and four
gentlemen gathered at the time appointed in Mr. Jackson’s house, and
were not molested on the way thither or while there, excepting by a few
insulting epithets and an occasional ribald shout.
It was an intensely interesting meeting, conducted in the usual manner
with the utmost propriety;[E] and an air of unfeigned solemnity was
thrown over it by the consciousness of the dense cloud of malignant
hatred that was hanging over us, and which might again burst upon us in
some cruel outrage.
Among the ladies present were the celebrated Miss Harriet Martineau,
of England, and her very intelligent travelling companion, Miss
Jeffrey. At the right moment, when the regular business of the meeting
had been transacted, Ellis Gray Loring, from the beginning a leading
Abolitionist,--and one whose lead it was always well to follow, for he
was a very wise, a single-hearted, and most conscientious man,--Mr.
Loring handed me a slip of paper for Miss Martineau, on which was
written an earnest request that she would then favor the meeting with
some expression of her sympathy in the objects of the association. She
immediately rose and said, with cordial earnestness: “I had supposed
that my presence here would be understood as showing my sympathy with
you. But as I am requested to speak, I will say what I have said
through the whole South, in every family where I have been, that I
consider slavery inconsistent with the law of God, and incompatible
with the course of his providence. I should certainly say no less at
the North than at the South concerning this utter abomination, and now
I declare that in your principles I fully agree.”
Hitherto Miss Martineau had received from the _élite_ of Boston very
marked attentions. She had been treated with great respect, as one so
distinguished for her literary works and philanthropic labors deserved
to be. But from the day of that meeting, and because of the words she
uttered there, she was slighted, rejected, and in various ways made to
understand that she had given great offence to “the best society in
that metropolis.”
Two days afterwards the Board of Managers of the Massachusetts
Antislavery Society directed me, their Corresponding Secretary, by
a unanimous vote, to express to Mr. Jackson the very high sense
which they entertained of his generosity and noble independence in
proffering, as he had done unsolicited, the use and protection of his
dwelling-house to the Boston Female Antislavery Society, when they had
just been expelled by lawless violence from a public hall.
My letter, written immediately in pursuance of this vote, drew from Mr.
Jackson the following reply, which, considering the place where and the
time when it was written, as well as its intrinsic excellence, deserves
to be preserved among the most precious deposits in the Temple of
Impartial Liberty, whenever such a structure shall be reared upon earth.
“BOSTON, November 25, 1835.
“DEAR SIR,--I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your
highly esteemed letter of the 21st inst., written in behalf of the
Managers of the Massachusetts Antislavery Society, and expressing
in very flattering terms their approbation of my conduct in
granting to the ladies of the Antislavery Society the use of my
dwelling-house for their Annual Meeting.
“That meeting was a most interesting and impressive one. It will
ever be treasured by me, among the most pleasing recollections of
my life, that it was my good fortune to extend to those respectable
ladies the protection of my roof after they had been reviled,
insulted, and driven from their own hall by a mob.
“But in tendering them the use of my house, sir, I not only had
in view their accommodation, but also, according to my humble
measure, to recover and perpetuate the right of free discussion,
which has been shamefully trampled on. A great principle has been
assailed,--one which lies at the very foundation of our republican
institutions.
“If a large majority of this community choose to turn a deaf ear to
the wrongs which are inflicted upon millions of their countrymen in
other portions of the land,--if they are content to turn away from
the sight of oppression, and ‘to pass by on the other side,’ so it
must be.
“But when they undertake in any way to annul or impair my right
to speak, write, and publish my thoughts upon any subject, more
especially upon enormities which are the common concern of every
lover of his country and his kind, so it must not be,--so it shall
not be, if I can prevent it. Upon this great right let us hold on
at all hazards. And should we, in its exercise, be driven from
public halls to private dwellings, one house at least shall be
consecrated to its preservation. And if in defence of this sacred
privilege, which man did not give me, and shall not (if I can help
it) take from me, this roof and these walls shall be levelled to
the earth, let them fall! If it must be so, let them fall! They
cannot crumble in a better cause. They will appear of very little
value to me after their owner shall have been whipped into silence.
“Mobs and gag-laws, and the other contrivances by which fraud
or force would stifle inquiry, will not long work well in this
community. They betray the essential rottenness of the cause they
are meant to strengthen. These outrages are doing their work with
the reflecting.
“Happily, one point seems to be gaining universal assent, that
slavery cannot long survive free discussion. Hence the efforts of
the friends and apologists of slavery to break down this right.
And hence the immense stake which the enemies of slavery hold, in
behalf of freedom and mankind, in the preservation of this right.
The contest is therefore substantially between liberty and slavery.
“As slavery cannot exist with free discussion, so neither can
liberty breathe without it. Losing this, we shall not be freemen
indeed, but little, if at all, superior to the millions we are now
seeking to emancipate.
“With the highest respect,
“Your friend,
“FRANCIS JACKSON.
“REV. S. J. MAY, Cor. Sec. Mass. A. S. S.”
Well said Mrs. Maria W. Chapman, who was usually the first to give the
most pertinent expression to the best thought of every occasion,--well
said Mrs. Chapman, “Ten such men would have saved our city and country
from the indelible disgrace which has been inflicted upon them by the
outrageous proceedings of the 21st and 24th of October. Mr. Jackson
has by this act done all that _one_ man can do to redeem the character
of Boston.” And were there not nine other men in the metropolis of New
England, where dwelt descendants of Samuel Adams and Josiah Quincy,
and relatives of Joseph Warren and James Otis and John Hancock, and
other men of Revolutionary fame; were there not nine other men there to
spring to the rescue of the ark of civil liberty? Alas! they did not
appear. The abettors of slavery were in the ascendant. “The gentlemen
of property and standing” thought it good policy, both politically and
pecuniarily considered, to trample the Declaration of Independence
under foot. And the people generally seemed willing to perpetrate
wrongs far greater than Great Britain ever inflicted on their fathers.