“Notwithstanding all that has been said and written on
Slavery, I think you have first perceived and expressed this
‘unconsciousness’ of slaveholders; and the additional fact of
this unconsciousness being nearly as general at the North as
South explains the necessity of proving at this late day, even
to us of the North, the Barbarism of Slavery. We thought their
wealth and leisure led them to be generous; nobody has ever so
plainly shown their accepted necessity of meanness. We have
been unconscious of their influence in lowering our standing.…
I only wish to express my satisfaction at finding Massachusetts
again represented by a man with a constitution, so valuable in
the latitude of Washington, capable of standing the burning
heat of the South and the chilliness of the North.”
Hon. J. Q. A. Griffin, the lawyer and earnest Republican, too early
removed from life, wrote from Charlestown:--
“I must thank you for the great gratification I felt in the
perusal of your great speech. Twice I have read the whole of
it, and many times more various parts. It is small praise to
say, what is here on all lips, that it evinces marvellous
scholarship, and embraces a sternly logical statement of the
whole question between Freedom and Slavery. Its amazing courage
and justice will commend it yet more to the thinking men of
this and all other countries.”