That there is no difference _in principle_, between the
African slave-trade and American slavery.
That every American citizen who retains a human being in
involuntary bondage, as his property is (according to
Scripture) a man-stealer.
That the slaves ought instantly to be set free, and brought
under the protection of law.
That if they had lived from the time of Pharaoh down to the
present period, and had been entailed through successive
generations, their right to be free could never have been
alienated, but their claims would have constantly risen in
solemnity.
That all those laws which are now in force, admitting the
right of slavery, are therefore, before God, utterly null and
void; being an audacious usurpation of the Divine
prerogative, a daring infringement on the law of nature, a
base overthrow of the very foundations of the social compact,
a complete extinction of all the relations, endearments, and
obligations of mankind, and a presumptuous transgression of
all the holy commandments--and that, therefore, they ought to
be instantly abrogated.
He would ask if there was any thing here different from what he had
read from his respected opponent? The sentiments were the same, though
not given in Mr. Breckinridge's strong and glowing language. Mr.
Breckinridge's description of slavery was even more methodical,
clearer, and better arranged; he was therefore inclined to prefer it
to the other. He would, however, ask Mr. Breckinridge not to persevere
in speaking of the violence, as he called it, of the abolitionists,
only in general terms. He hoped he would point out the instances to
which he alluded, and not take advantage of them, because they were a
handful and _odious_. They were not singular in being called odious.
Noah was called odious by the men of his day, because he pointed out
to them the wickedness of which they were guilty. Every reformer had
been called odious, and he trusted to be always among those who were
deemed odious by slaveholders and their apologists. He repeated, that
he wished Mr. Breckinridge to forsake general allegations, and to
specify time and place when he brought forward his charges. The time
was passed, when, in Glasgow, vague assertions could produce any
effect. The time was not, indeed, distant when even here the friends
of negro freedom had been deemed odious--when they were a mere
handful, met in a room in the Black Bull Inn. But from being odious
they had become respectable, and from respectable triumphant, in
consequence of their having renounced expediency, and taken their
stand on the broad principles of truth and justice.
* * * * *
MR. BRECKINRIDGE said, he had on so many occasions and in so many
different forms uttered the sentiments contained in the passages which
had just been read as his, that he was unable to say from what
particular speech or writing they were taken. But he had no doubt that
if the whole passage to which they belonged were read, it would be
seen that they contained, in addition to what they had heard, the most
unqualified condemnation of the irrational course pursued by the
abolitionists. He believed also, that, whatever it was, that writing
had been uttered by him in a slave state. For he could say for
himself, that he had never said that of a brother behind his back,
which he would be afraid or unwilling to repeat before his face. He
had never gone to Boston, to cry back to Baltimore, how great a sin
they were guilty of in upholding slavery. The worst things which he
had said against slavery had been said in the slave states, and had
Mr. Thompson gone there and seen with his two eyes, what he describes
wholly upon hearsay, he would, perhaps, have understood the subject
better than he seems to do. As he felt himself divinely commissioned,
he should have felt no fear, he should have gone at whatever hazard,
he should have seen slavery in its true colors, though he had read it
in his own blood. If Saul of Tarsus had gone to America to see
slavery--I dare to say, with the help of God, he would have been right
sure to see it. He did not say that Mr. T. should have gone to the
Southern states if his life was likely to be endangered by his going
there; but he would say this, that Mr. Thompson ought not to pretend,
that he had been, in the least degree, a martyr in the cause, when, in
reality, he had exercised the most masterly discretion. With regard to
the acts of the abolitionists, as he had been called on to mention
particulars, he could not say that he had ever heard of their having
killed any person, nor had he ever heard of any of them being killed.
He might mention, however, that he himself had once almost been mobbed
in Boston, and, that too, by a mob stirred up against him, by
placards, written, as he believed, by William Lloyd Garrison. He had
never obtained direct proof of this, but he might state, as a reason
for his belief, that the inflammatory placards were of the precise
breadth and appearance of the columns of Garrison's paper--the
Liberator, and the breadth of the columns of no other newspaper in
that city. Mr. B. stated a second case, in which, on the arrival at
the city of New York of the Rev. J. L. Wilson, a missionary to Western
Africa, in charge of two lads, the sons of two African kings,
committed by their fathers to the Maryland Colonization Society for
education; some friends of the Anti-Slavery Society of that city, with
the concurrence, if not by the procurement, as was universally
believed, of Elizur Wright, Jr., a leading person, and Secretary of
the principal society of abolitionists--got out a writ to take the
bodies of the boys, under the pretence of believing, that they had
been kidnapped in Africa. These two cases he considered, would
perhaps satisfy Mr. T's appetite for facts in the meantime; he would
have plenty more of them when they came to the main question of
debate. One other instance, and he would have done. There was a law in
the United States, that if a slave run away from one of the
slaveholding states, to any of the non-slaveholding states, the
authorities of the latter were bound to give him up to his master. A
runaway slave had been confined in New York prison, previous to being
sent home, an attempt was made to stir up a mob, for the purpose of
liberating him. A bill instigating the people to take the laws into
their own hands, was traced to an abolitionist--the same Elizur
Wright, Jr. He brought to the office of one of the principal city
papers, a denial of the charge--in a note signed by him in his
official capacity. He was told that was insufficient, as it was in his
individual, not in his official capacity, that he was supposed to have
done the act in question. He replied, it would be time to make the
denial in that form, when the charge was so specifically made;
meantime he considered the actual denial sufficient. Then, sir, said
one present, I charge you with writing the placard--for I saw it in
your hand writing. These instances were sufficient to prove the charge
of violence which he had made was not unfounded. In reference to the
statement made by Mr. Thompson regarding the number of slaves in the
United States, at the commencement of the Revolution, Mr. B. said, it
was impossible to know precisely what number there was at that time,
as there had been no statistical returns before 1790, at which time
there were six hundred and sixty-five thousand slaves in the five
original slave states. The exertions of the American nation to put an
end to slavery were treated with ridicule, but he would have them to
bear in mind, that there were in the United States four hundred
thousand free people of color, all of whom, or their progenitors, had
been set free by the people of America, and not one of these, so far
as he knew, had been liberated by an abolitionist. In addition to
these, there were not less than four thousand more in Africa, many of
whom had been freed from fetters and sent to that country. He would
ask if all this was to be counted as nothing. If they were to consider
for a moment the enormous sum which it would take to ransom so many
slaves, they would perceive the value of the sacrifice. They might say
that they had given $150,000,000 towards the abolition of slavery. It
might seem selfish to talk of it thus; but if the conduct of Great
Britain, rich and powerful as she was, was not reckoned worthy of
praise for having done an act of justice, in granting emancipation to
the West India slaves, at the cost of $100,000,000, or L20,000,000,
how much more might be said of L30,000,000, being paid by a few
comparatively poor and scattered communities, and individual men. They
had been told some fine stories of a mahogany table, to which the
people of America had tied themselves, and they were left to infer
that it was quite easy, that it merely required the exertion of will,
for them to set their slaves free. Now, on this head, he would only
ask, had he the power of fixing the place of his birth? No. Nor had he
any hand in making the laws of the place where he was born, nor the
power of altering them. They might, indeed, be altered and he ought to
add, they would have been altered already, but for the passionate and
intemperate zeal of the abolitionists; but for the conduct of those
who tell the slaveholders of the Southern states, that they must at
once give freedom to the slaves, at whatever cost or whatever hazard,
and unless they do so, they will be denounced on the house-tops, by
all the vilest names which language can furnish, or the imagination of
man can conceive. And what was the answer the planters gave to these
disturbers of the public peace? First, coolly, 'there's the door;'
and next, 'if you try to tell these things to those, who, when they
learn them, will at once turn round and cut our throats, we must take
measures to prevent your succeeding.' Such conduct was just what was
to be expected on the part of the slaveholders. They saw these men
coming among their slaves, and where they could not appeal to their
judgments, endeavoring to speak to the eyes of the black population by
prints, representing their masters, harsh and cruel. It was not
surprising that such unwise conduct should beget a bitter feeling of
opposition among the inhabitants of the Southern states. They
themselves knew too well the critical nature of their position, and
the dangers of tampering with the passions of the black population.
Let him who doubted go to the Southern states, and he would learn that
those harsh laws, in regard to slavery, which had been so much
condemned, were passed immediately after some of those insurrections,
those spasmodic efforts of the slaves to free themselves by violence,
which could never end in good, and which the conduct of the
abolitionists was calculated continually to renew. They ought to take
these things into account when they heard statements made about the
strong excitement against the abolitionists. He would repeat what he
had before stated, that the cause of emancipation had been ruined by
that small party with which Mr. Thompson had identified himself: but
to whose chariot wheels he trusted the people of this country would
never suffer themselves to be bound.
* * * * *
MR. GEORGE THOMPSON said, the work he had to do in reference to the
last speech was by no means great or difficult. They had heard a great
many things stated by Mr. Breckinridge on the great question in
debate, but every one of these had been stated a thousand times
before, and answered again and again within the last sixty years.
Within these very walls they had heard many of them brought forward
and refuted within the last four years. But there was one part of his
opponent's speech to which he would reply with emphasis. And he could
not but confess that he had listened to that one part of it with
surprise. He knew Mr. Breckinridge to be the advocate of gradual
emancipation; he (Mr. Thompson) had therefore come prepared to hear
all the arguments employed by the gradualists, urged in the ablest
manner, but he had not been prepared to hear from that gentleman's
lips the things he had heard--he did not expect that the foul charge
of stirring up a mob against Mr. Breckinridge for advocating the
principles of colonization, would be brought against William Lloyd
Garrison. But they would here see the propriety and utility of his
calling upon his opponent to leave generalities and come to something
specific--to lay his finger on a fact which could be examined and
tested circumstantially. And what did they suppose was the truth in
the present case? Simply this, that when Mr. Breckinridge came
forward to explain the principles of the Maryland colonization scheme,
the noisy rabble who sought to mob, did so only so long as they were
under the impression that he was an abolitionist. Mr. B. and his
brother, who was along with him on that occasion, did their best to
let the meeting know that they were not abolitionists but
colonizationists, and whenever the mob learned that, they became
quiet. This was the fact in regard to that case--he would willingly
stake the merits of the whole question on the truth of what he had
just stated, and he would call on Mr. B. to say whether it was not
true; he would call on him to exhibit the placard which had been
written by Mr. Garrison, or tell what it contained. He had a copy of
the Liberator of the day referred to, and he would ask him to point
out a single word in it which could be found fault with. He would dare
Mr. B. to find a single sentence in that paper calculated to stir up a
mob, or to induce any one to hurt a single hair of his head. With
regard to the Maryland colonization scheme, he was not going to enter
upon its discussion at that hour of the evening, but the next evening,
if they were spared, he would endeavor to show the gross iniquity of
that scheme, recommended as it was by Mr. Breckinridge. In the mean
time, to return to the next charge, they were told of an active
abolitionist--Elizur Wright. And here he would at once say, that it
was too bad to bring such a charge against an individual like Elizur
Wright, than whom he knew no man, either on this or the the other side
of the Atlantic, whose nature was more imbued with the milk of human
kindness, or whose heart was more alive to the dictates of Christian
charity--it was too bad, he repeated, to bring such a charge against
that man, unless it could be substantiated beyond the possibility of
doubt. They were told that Elizur Wright had stirred up the people of
New York to insurrection, by inflammatory placards. Here indeed was a
serious charge, but they ought to know what these placards were.
Again, he would call upon Mr. B. to show a copy of the placard, or to
say what were its contents. In explanation of the matter he might
state to the meeting that there was a little truth in what had been
said about this matter; and in order to make them understand the case
properly, they must first know, that in New York there were at all
times a number of runaway slaves, and also, that there was in the same
city a class of men, who, at least wore the human form, and who were
even allowed to appear as gentlemen, whose sole profession was that of
kidnappers; their only means of subsistence was derived from laying
hold of these unfortunates, and returning them to their masters in the
South. Nothing was more common than advertisements from these
gentlemen kidnappers in the newspapers, in which they offered their
services to any slave master whose slaves had run off. All that was
necessary was merely that twenty dollars should be transmitted to them
under cover, with the marks of the runaway who was soon found out if
in the city, and with the clutch of a demon, seized and dragged to
prison. These were the kidnappers. And who was Elizur Wright? He was
the man who at all times was found ready to sympathise with those poor
unfortunate outcasts, to pour the balm of consolation into their
wounds--to come into the Recorder's Court, and stand there to plead
the cause of the injured African at the risk of his life--undeterred
by the execrations of the slave-masters, or the knife of his
myrmidons. And was it a high crime that on some occasions he had been
mistaken. But Elizur Wright would be able to reply to the charge
himself. The account of this meeting would soon find its way to
America, and he would then have an opportunity of justifying himself.
As to the charge of error in his statistics, on the subject of
American Slavery, it was very easily set at rest. He had said that the
slave population amounted to but three hundred thousand, at the date
of the Union, and that it was now two millions. The latter statement
was not questioned, but it was said that there were no authentic
returns at the date of the Union, and consequently, that it was
impossible to say precisely. But although they could not say exactly,
they could come pretty near the truth, even from the statement of Mr.
Breckinridge. That gentleman admitted, that in 1790, there were only
six hundred and sixty-five thousand slaves in the states. He (Mr. T.)
had said, that in 1776, there were only three hundred thousand; but as
the population in America doubled itself in twenty-four years, he was
warranted in saying that there was no great discrepancy. But the
question with him did not depend upon any particular number or any
particular date. It would have been quite the same for his argument,
he contended, whether he had taken six hundred and sixty-five thousand
in 1790, or three hundred thousand in 1776. All that he had wished to
show, was the rapid increase of the slave population, and
consequently, of the vice and misery inherent in that system, even
while the American people professed themselves to be so anxious to put
an end to it altogether. Had he wished to dwell on this part of the
argument, he could also have shown, that the increase of the slave
population during the first twenty years of the Union, had gone on
more rapidly even during that time, the trade in slaves having been
formally recognised by the Constitution during that period, and a duty
of $10 imposed on every slave imported into the United States. The
following was the clause from the Constitution:
Sec. IX. The migration or importation of such persons as any
of the states now existing shall think proper to admit, shall
not be prohibited prior to the year 1808, but a tax or duty
may be imposed on such importation, not exceeding $10 for
each person.
To sum up Mr. Breckinridge's last address, what, he would ask,
had been its whole aim? Clearly, that they should consider the
abolitionists as the chief promoters of all the riots that had taken
place in America on this question, by making inflammatory appeals to
the passions of the people. He would call upon Mr. Breckinridge
again, to lay his hand on a single proof of this. He would call upon
him to point out a single instance where language had been used which
was in any degree calculated to call up the blood-thirsty passions of
the mob as had been represented. If the planters of the South were
roused into fury by the declaration of anti-slavery sentiments--if
they were unable to hear the everlasting truths which it promulgated,
was that a sufficient reason for those to keep silent who felt it to
be their duty, at all hazards, to make known these truths. Or were
they to be charged with raising mobs, because the people were enraged
to hear these truths. As well might Paul of Tarsus have been charged
with the mobs which rose against his life, and that of his
fellow-apostles. As well might Galileo be charged with those
persecutions which immured him in a dungeon. As well might the
apostles of truth in every age be charged with the terrible results
which ensued from the struggle of light and darkness. In conclusion,
Mr. Thompson said, that on the following evening, he would take up the
question of the Maryland colonization scheme.
* * * * *
DR. WARDLAW announced to the meeting that the discussion closed for
the evening. In doing so he complimented the audience on the very
correct manner in which they had observed the rule regarding all
manifestation of applause. The attention and interest of the audience
were much excited throughout the whole proceedings, indeed, at few
meetings have we observed so lively an interest taken in the entire
business of an evening, and yet there was not a single instance in
which the interference of the chairman was required. On several
occasions the rising expression of applause was at once checked by
the general good sense of the meeting.