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T H E 
 
 PRESENT ASPECT OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA 
 
 TFIE IMMEDIATE DUTY OE THE NOKTIl 
 
 A SPEECH 
 
 DELIVERED IN THE HALL OF THE STATE BOUSE, 
 
 BEFORE THE MASSACHUSETTS ANTI-SLAVERY CONVENTION, 
 
 ON FRIDAY NIGHT, JANUARY 29, 185 J 
 
 • 
 
 BY THEODORE PARKER. 
 
 
 BOSTON: 
 BELA MARSH 
 
 14 BROMFIELD STREET. 
 
 1858. 
 

 BOSTON: 
 Printed by Prentiss, Sawyer, &. Co., 19 Water Street. 
 
SPEECH 
 
 Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : 
 
 I shall not hold you long to-night. There are others to 
 speak after me, who have better claims to your attention — 
 the one [Mr. Remond] for his race, the other [Mr. Phillips] 
 for the personal attributes of eloquence which, in America, 
 have never reached a higher height, or exhibited themselves 
 in so fair a form. The hand of the dial shall pass round 
 once, and I leave this spot, to be filled more worthily. 
 During these sixty minutes, I ask your attention to some 
 thoughts on the Present Aspect of Slavery in America, and 
 the Immediate Duty of the North. 
 
 Mr. Guizot — one of the most learned and humane of the 
 European statesmen — prefaced one edition of his " History 
 of Representative Government " by stating that the condi- 
 tions of National Welfare were far more difficult than the too 
 sanguine hopes of mankind had ever led them to expect. If 
 that were so in Europe, where centuries of bitter experience 
 have taught men to be cautious in their hopes, how much 
 truer it is in America, where we think liberty is so natural to 
 the soil and congenial to man that it needs no support from 
 the people, but will thrive of its own sweet accord ! 
 
 In some respects, our experiment is simpler than tin 
 attempts at freedom made before us in the old world : in 
 some others, it is more complex and difficult. All the old 
 forms of civilization were based on Unity of Race. It -was 
 
4 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 so with the Romans, Greeks, Persians, Hebrews, Egyptians, 
 East Indians. The same holds good of the Moors, who mark 
 the transition from ancient to modern times. All the mediaeval 
 attempts at improvement had the same character — - in Spain, 
 Italy, France, Germany, England itself. Civilization hitherto 
 has belonged only to the Caucasian race. The Africans have 
 remained strangers to it in all times past ; they could not 
 achieve it for themselves at the time, hitherto never rising 
 above the savage or the barbarous state ; no other people 
 brought it to them, or them to it save in small numbers. 
 
 It was left for America to begin a new experiment in the 
 History of Civilization — to bring diverse races into closest 
 contact. The Catholic Spaniard began the experiment : he 
 mixed his blood with the Red man, whose country he sub- 
 dued ; he brought hither also the Black man. Thus the Afri- 
 can savage, the American barbarian, and the civilized Cau- 
 casian of Spain, became joint stockholders in this new copar- 
 ceny of races. The Protestant Briton continued what his 
 Catholic predecessor had begun ; and while the Puritan was 
 painfully voyaging to Plymouth, in the wilderness seeking an 
 asylum where the Apocalyptic woman might bear her man- 
 child to grow up in freedom, other Saxons were bringing a 
 ship-load of negroes to the wilderness, to become slaves for- 
 ever. Thus the African came to British and Spanish America. 
 Out of the 60,000,000 inhabitants of this continent, I take 
 it about 9,000,000 are of this unfortunate race. 
 
 In the United States to-day, four of the five great races live 
 side by side. There are some 60,000 or 80,000 Mongolian 
 Chinese in California, I am told ; there are 400,000 American 
 Indians within our borders ; perhaps 4,500,000 Africans ; 
 and 26,000,000 Caucasians. The union of such diverse 
 ethnological elements makes our experiment of democracy 
 more complex, and perhaps more difficult than it would 
 otherwise be. 
 
 The Mongolians are few in numbers, and so transient in 
 their stay that nothing more need now be said of them. 
 
OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA. 5 
 
 It is plain where the Red man will go. In two hundred 
 years, an Indian will be as rare in the United States as dow 
 
 in New England. Like the bear and the buffalo, he perishes 
 with the forest, which to him and them was whal cultivated 
 fields, towns, and cities are to us. Our lathers tried to enslave 
 the ferocious and unprogressive Indian ; he would not work — 
 for himself as a freeman, nor for others as a slave ; he would 
 fight, lie would not be enslaved — he could not help being 
 killed. He perishes before us. The sinewy Caucasian laborer 
 lays hold on the phlegmatic Indian warrior ; they struggle in 
 deadly grasp — naked man to naked man, hand to .shoulder, 
 knee to knee, breast to breast ; the white man bends the red 
 man over, crushes him down, and chokes him dead. It is 
 always so when the civilized meets the savage, or the barba- 
 rian — naked man to naked man: how much more fatal is 
 the issue to the feeble when the white man shirted in iron 
 has the Small Pox for his ally, and Rum for his tomahawk ! 
 In the long run of history, the race is always to the swift, 
 and the battle to the strong. The Indian will perish- — utterly 
 and soon. 
 
 The African is the most docile and pliant of all the races of 
 men ; none has so little ferocity : vengeance, instantial with 
 the Caucasian, is exceptional in his history. In his barbarous, 
 savage, or even wild state, he is not much addicted to re- 
 venge ; always prone to mercy. No race is so strong in the 
 affectional instinct which attaches man to man by tender ties ; 
 none so easy, indolent, confiding, so little warlike. Hence is 
 it that the white men have kidnapped the black, and made 
 him their prey. 
 
 This piece of individual biography tells us the sad history 
 of the African race. Not long since, a fugitive slave told me 
 his adventures. I will call him John — 'tis not his name. 
 He is an entire negro — his grandfather was brought direct 
 from the Congo coast to America. A stout man. thick-set, 
 able-bodied, with great legs, and might) arms, he could take 
 any man from this platform, and hurl him thrice his length. 
 
6 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 He was a slave — active, intelligent, and much confided in. 
 He had a wife and children. One day his master, in a fit of 
 rage, struck at him with a huge club, which broke both of 
 his arms ; they were awkwardly set, and grew out deformed. 
 The master promised to sell the man to himself for a large 
 sum, and take the money by instalments, a little at a time. 
 But when more than half of it was paid, he actually sold him 
 to a trader, to be taken further South, and there disposed of. 
 The appeals of the wife, the tears of the children, moved not 
 the master whom justice had also failed to touch. As the 
 boat which contained poor John shot by the point of land 
 where he had lived, his wife stood upon the shore, and held 
 her babies up for him to look upon for the last time. De- 
 scending the Mississippi, the captain of the boat had the river 
 fever, lost his sight for the time, and John took the com- 
 mand. One night far down the Mississippi, he found himself 
 on board a boat with the three kidnappers who had him in 
 their power, and intended to sell him. They were asleep 
 below, — the captain still blind with the disease, — he watch- 
 ful on deck. " I crept down barefoot," said John. " There 
 they lay in their bunks, all fast asleep. They had money, 
 and I none. I had clone them no harm, but they had torn 
 me from my wife, from my children, from my liberty. I 
 stole up noiselessly, and came back again, the boat's axe in 
 my hand. I lifted it up, and grit my teeth together, and was 
 about to strike : and it came into my mind, ' No murderer 
 hath eternal life.' I put the axe back in its place, and was 
 sold into slavery. "What would you have done in such a 
 case ? " I told him that I thought I should have sent the 
 kidnappers to their own place first, and then trusted that the 
 act would be imputed to me for righteousness by an all- 
 righteous God ! I need not ask what Mr. Garrison would 
 do in like case. I think his Saxon blood would move swift 
 enough to sweep off his non-resistant creed, and the three 
 kidnappers would have started on their final journey before 
 he asked, " Where shall I go? " 
 
OF SLAVERY IX AMERICA. 7 
 
 John's story is also the story of Africa. The stroke of an 
 axe would have settled the matter long ago. Bui the black 
 man would not strike. One day, perhaps, he will do what 
 yonder monument commends. 
 
 At this moment, we have perhaps 4,500,000 men of A frican 
 descent in the United States ; say 4,000,000 slaves, 500,000 
 free. They are with us, are of us ; America cannot be rid of 
 them if she would. Shall they continue slaves, or be set 
 free? "What consequences will follow either result ? 'This is 
 the great question for America. It is the question of Indus- 
 try, of Morals, of Religion; it is the immediate question of 
 Politics. It does not concern the 4,000,000 slaves alone, 
 but also each of the 26,000,000 Caucasian freemen. On it 
 depends the success or the failure of our experiment of 
 Democracy. The bondage of a class may continue in a 
 despotism ; there it is no contradiction to the national Idea. 
 It is different in a Democracy which rests on the Equality of 
 all Men in Natural Rights. So here the question of slavery 
 is this : " Shall we have an Industrial Democracy, or a Mili- 
 tary Despotism?" If you choose Slavery, then you take tin- 
 issue of Slavery, which can no more be separated from it than 
 cold from ice. No nation can escape the consequences of its 
 own first principle of politics. The logic of the idea is the 
 "Manifest Destiny" of the people. If Slavery continues. 
 Democracy goes clown ; every form of Republicanism, or of 
 constitutional Monarchy, will perish; and Absolute Military 
 Despotism take their place at last. From Despotism. 
 reared in the national garden comes Despotism, as national 
 crop, growing in the continental field. 
 
 This question of Slavery does not concern America 
 all Christendom likewise is party to the contest. To ail men 
 it is a question of Industry, Commerce. Education, Morals, 
 Religion; to the civilized world, it is the great question <>!' 
 Civilization itself. Shall this great continent be delivered 
 over to Ideas which help the Progress of Mankind, or t.. those 
 which onlv hinder it ? 
 
8 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 Every year brings America into closer relations with the 
 rest of mankind. Our slavery becomes, therefore, an element 
 in the world's politics. See, then, for a moment, how the 
 various Christian nations stand affected towards it. 
 
 Just now, there are but five great national powers in the 
 civilized or Christian world. Spain, Italy, and Greece pass 
 for nothing — they have no influence in the progressive 
 movements of mind, are no longer a force in the world's 
 civilization. They are not wholly dead ; but so far as they affect 
 other peoples, it is only by the thought of past generations, 
 not the present. I pass those three decaying nations by, and 
 look at the live peoples. There is (1) the Russian Power — 
 a great Slavic People holding Mongolians in subjection ; (2) 
 the French Power — a great Celtic People variously crossed 
 with Basque, Roman, and Teutonic tribes ; (3) the German 
 Power — a great Teutonic People, in many nations or States, 
 with Slavic and Celtic elements mixed in ; (4) the English 
 Power — a great Saxon-Teutonic People, with Celtic an- 
 nexations ; and (5) the American Power — a great English- 
 Saxon-Teutonic People, with diverse mixtures from the rest 
 of mankind. All the four act on the fifth, and influence our 
 treatment of this question of Slavery. 
 
 I. Russia is mighty by its vast territory, its great natural 
 resources, its immense population, its huge army — appointed 
 and commanded well — its strong central government, its 
 diplomatic talent, and the people's ability to spread. The 
 Government is despotic, but yet one of the most progressive 
 in Christendom. With the bondage of Africans, Russia has 
 no direct concern ; she has much to do with that of white 
 Caucasians. She is rapidly putting an end to slavery in her 
 own borders. Not many years ago, the late Emperor Nicholas 
 emancipated the serfs he had inherited as his own private 
 property. They amounted to more than 7,500,000 men ; he 
 established over 4,000 schools for the education of their 
 children. Alexander, his son, had not been in the imperial 
 seat three years before he published a decree for the gradual 
 
OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA. !• 
 
 and ultimate emancipation of all the serfs in the empire. 
 Their number must exceed the entire population of the I (hited 
 States. Here is the decree, dated the 20th of Last Novem- 
 ber — the 2d of December by our New Style calendar. The 
 proprietors of two large provinces — St. Petersburg and 
 Lithuania (containing nearly three million souls some weeks 
 since, asked permission to emancipate their serfs al once. 
 Yesterday's steamer brings also the welcome news thai the 
 proprietors of Nishni-Novogorotl have just done the same. 
 This province is as large as Virginia, with a popul 
 1,500,000, and, with the exception of the capital and its 
 environs, is the richest and most intellectual pari of the 
 empire. It abounds with manufactories ; every year, 300,000 
 strangers from Asia and elsewhere trade in its lairs. You 
 would expect the most enlightened population to demand the 
 immediate freedom of the serfs. Russia has become an ally- 
 on our side. Her example favors freedom. Soon you will 
 find a change in the Southern newspapers, and in the '•. 
 can Government, which they direct and control. In the 
 Crimean war, when Russia fought for injustice, they sustained 
 her as the ally of their own despotism, and fought againsl 
 England as their foe. All that will soon change : : nd already 
 Southern papers denounce the enfranchisement of the Russian 
 serf: "The example is dangerous;" "thi of the 
 
 British West Indies, and of Hayti, might have taught Alex- 
 ander a better lesson."' 
 
 II. The French are powerful through the character of the 
 people — the most military in the world — theirsciei 
 art, the high civilization of the land. I had a long 
 
 and sad connection with African slavery. Once she was the 
 most cruel of cruel masters. Enherfirsl Revolution, of 1789, 
 the chain was broken, bul its severed links united agaii . [n 
 the last Revolution, of is is. al the magicwordof Lamartine, 
 expressing the revolutionary thought of the people, the litters 
 were not only broken off, bul cast into the ] 
 
 a moment, was the ally of freedom — and of course encoun- 
 
10 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 tered the noisy wrath of the Southern States. But the Celtic 
 French, the most fickle people in the world, revolution their 
 normal state, perpetually turning round and round, have elect- 
 ed a tyrant for their master, and now worship the Emperor. 
 He has " crushed out " freedom from the French press as 
 completely as our own Mr. Gushing wished to do in America. 
 The new tyrant attempts to revive the African slave trade, 
 and has already made arrangements for kidnapping 5,000 sav- 
 ages in Africa, and sending them as missionaries to Christian- 
 ize the West Indies ! What will come of this scheme, I 
 know not. But just now the political power of France is 
 hostile to freedom everywhere. When the Emperor has pad- 
 locked even the French mouth, no wonder he finds it easy to 
 chain the negro's hands. No doubt the intellectual and moral 
 power of France are on our side as before ; but both are silent 
 and of no avail. The French Emperor is the " little Napo- 
 leon " of the African slave trade. Great is the joy thereat 
 in the Southern States ; already their newspapers glorify the 
 " profound policy," " the wise and humane statesmanship of 
 the great Emperor." 
 
 " A fellow-feeling makes us wondrous kind." 
 
 III. The Germans are of our blood and language — bone 
 of our bone, and flesh of our flesh — with the same blue eyes, 
 the same brown hair, and ruddy cheek, and instinctive love of 
 individuality. The people which began the civilization of 
 modern times by inventing the Press, and originating the 
 Protestant Reformation, can it ever be false to Freedom ? 
 Germany acts on mankind by Thought — by great ideas. 
 What France is for war, England for commerce, and Russia 
 for the brute power of men, that is Germany for thought. 
 The Germans have had connection with African slavery, but 
 have ended it. Sweden begun the work some years ago ; then 
 Denmark followed ; now, within the last few months, Holland 
 lias finished it. Here are the documents. Soon the last foot- 
 
OF SLAVER"* IN AMERICA. 1 1 
 
 steps of German Oppression will he covered up by the black 
 man rejoicing in his freedom. Though their rulers are often 
 tyrants, our German kinsfolk are on our side — God bless 
 them ! 
 
 IV. England has great influence by her political institu- 
 tions, her army and navy, her commerce and manufactures, 
 her power of practical thought, her large wealth, her mighty 
 spread. She and her children control a sixth pari of the 
 globe, and nearly a fourth part of its people. No tribe of 
 men has done such service lor freedom as the Lnglo-Saxons 
 in Britain and America. England has had connection with 
 African slavery, her hand has been dyed deep in the negro's 
 blood. She planted slavery in her provinces throughout the 
 continent and its many islands; the ocean reeked with the 
 foul steam of her slave-ships. She was a hard master, and 
 men died by millions under her lash. But nobly did the 
 dear old mother put this wickedness away. She abolished the 
 slave trade, making it piracy ; at length, she repudiated sl;n erj 
 itself, and in one day threw into the sea the fetters of 
 800,000 men. Well did Lord Brougham say — it was " the 
 greatest triumph ever won over the foulest wrong man ever 
 did against man." England need not boast of Agincourt, 
 Cressy, Poictiers, and many another victorious fight, at Wa- 
 terloo, Sebastopol, or Delhi ; the most glorious victory her 
 annals record was achieved on the first of August, in the first 
 year of Victoria, when Justice triumphed over such giant 
 wrong. Nobly has she contended against the slave trade, 
 rousing the tardy conscience of Brazil, and not quite vainly 
 galvanizing Spain into some show of humanity. She has 
 shamed even the American government — and I think we 
 have a sloop-of-war on the African coast, which we yearly 
 hear of in the annual appropriation bill ! 
 
 But this nobleness is exceptional even in England ; the 
 world had seen no such example before. That emancipation 
 was not. brought ahout h\ the privileged class, the royal and 
 nobilitary, who officially reign, or the commercial class, who 
 
12 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 actually govern the nation; but by the moral class, whose con- 
 science stirred the people, and constrained the government to 
 do so just a deed. Of course a reaction must follow. We 
 see its effect to-day. There is a party which favors African 
 slavery. Mr. Carlyle is the heroic representative thereof. 
 Personally amiable, in his ideas he is the Goliath of slavery. 
 Just now, the London Times appears to favor this reactionary 
 movement, and its powerful articles arc reprinted with great 
 jubilation in the American newspapers, which hate England 
 because they love the slavery which she has hated so long. 
 There is no time to inquire into the cause of this reaction. 
 It affects the political class, and still more certain commercial 
 classes to whom " Cotton is King." Great is the delight of 
 the South ; the Slave Power sings Te deums to its God. A 
 bill was before the Senate, not long since, appropriating $3750 
 to pay the masters for twelve slaves who ran away and were 
 carried off by the British in the war of 1812, whom the cap- 
 tors, even then, refused to deliver up to " democratic bond- 
 age." Mr. Hale opposed the bill, because it recognized the 
 doctrine that there may be property in human beings, declar- 
 ing that neither by vote nor by silence would he ever recognize 
 so odious and false a doctrine. Mr. Seward joined in the oppo- 
 sition. But Mr. Fugitive Slave Bill Mason came to the res- 
 cue ; and after referring to the anti-slavery opinions of the 
 British, declared he was " gratified to see those opinions are 
 rapidly undergoing a change." What signs of such a rapid 
 change he may have seen, I know not ; nor what sympathies 
 Avith the Slave power the accomplished British Minister, new 
 in this field, may have expressed to him : " Diplomacy is a 
 silent art." But I think Mr. Mason greatly mistakes the 
 British Public, if he believes they will be fickle in their love 
 of Right. The Anglo-Saxon has always been a resolute tribe. 
 I believe John Bull is the most obstinate of all national 
 animals. When his instinctive feelings and his reflective 
 conscience command the same thing, depend upon it he will 
 not lack the Will. 
 
OF SI,A\ ER"S IN AMERICA. IS 
 
 There may have been a change in the British Government, 
 
 though I doubt it much ; there has been in the London Times. 
 In the " Cotton Lords," I take it, then' is no alteration of 
 doctrine, only an utterance of what they have long thought. 
 The opinion of the British People, I think, has only changed 
 to a yet greater hatred against slavery. The Ajiti-Slavery 
 Party in England has immense power — *no1 so much l\ its 
 numbers, or its wealth, as by its intelligence, and still more 
 by that Justice which, in the long run of time, is always sure 
 of the victory. At the head of this party I musl place Lord 
 Brougham, now drawing near the end of a long and most 
 laborious life, not without its eccentricities, but mainlj devoted 
 to the highest interests of the human -race. Within the four 
 seas of Britain, I think there lives no man who has done so 
 much to proclaim Ideas of Justice and Humanity, and to 
 diffuse them among the people. If he could not oftener or- 
 ganize them into law, it was because he took too Long a step 
 in advance of public opinion; and he that would lead a child 
 must always keep hold of its hand. Nearly fiftj yeaj 
 (June 14, 1810,) he fought against the slave trade, and drew on 
 him the wrath of men "who live by treachery, rapine, torture, 
 and murder, and are habitually practicing the worsl of crimes 
 for the worst of purposes." Long ago he declared — "There 
 is a law above 1 all the enactments of human codes — the same 
 throughout the world, the same in all times ; it is the law 
 written by the finger of God on the heart of man ; and by 
 that law, unchangeable and eternal, while men despise fraud, 
 and loathe rapine, and abhor blood, they will rejeel the wild 
 and guilty phantasy that man can hold property in man." 
 When the little tyrant of France revives the slave trade, tin 
 great champion of human right roused him once more for 
 battle, and the British Government has taken the affair in 
 hand. The British love of Justice will triumph in tin- eon- 
 test. Why, the History of England is pledged as security 
 therefor. 
 
 Such to-day is the opinion of the four great natioi 
 
14 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 Christian Europe. "What if the despotic power of the French 
 Emperor be against us ; what if, for a moment, the Cotton 
 Lords of England lead a few writers and politicians to attempt 
 the restoration of bondage ; the conscience of England and her 
 history, the intelligence of France and Germany, the example 
 of Russia are on our side. Yes, the teachings of universal hu- 
 man history. All these come with their accumulated force to 
 help the moral feeling of America sustain the Rights of Man. 
 
 The American Government has long been on the side of 
 Slavery. The present Administration is more openly hostile 
 to freedom than any of its predecessors. Mr. Buchanan is 
 no doubt weak and infatuated, strong only in his wrong-head- 
 edness ; his Cabinet is palsied with slavery. But he has done 
 one service which was thought hopelessly difficult, — he has 
 already made President Pierce's administration respectable. 
 We complain of the New Hampshire General, but the little 
 finger of Buchanan's left hand is thicker than Pierce's whole 
 loins. 
 
 Since we met last the Federal Government has committed 
 two outrages more. 
 
 I. The first is the Dred Scott Decision. Tire Supreme 
 Court is only the dirty mouth of the Slave Power, — its chief 
 function to belch forth iniquity, and name it law. Of the de- 
 cision itself, I need not speak. It is the political opinion of 
 seven partisans appointed to do officially that wickedness which 
 their personal nature also no doubt inclined them to. That 
 Court went a little beyond itself, — out-Heroding Herod. 
 
 Two Northern Judges, only two, McLean and Curtis, op- 
 posed the wrong. I think nobody will accuse me of any person- 
 al prejudice in favor of Judge Curtis, or any undue partiality 
 towards him. His conduct on other and trying occasions has 
 been justly condemned on the Anti-Slavery platform, and is not 
 likely to be soon forgot, nor should it ever be. But I should do 
 great injustice to you and him, and still more to my own feelings, 
 if 1 let this occasion pass without a v\ord of honest and hearty 
 
OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA. 15 
 
 praise of that able lawyer and strong-minded man. He opposed 
 the " decision : " with but a single Northern Judge to support 
 him, with two Northern -I udges to throw technical difficulties in 
 his way and oppose him 1»\ coward treachery, with five South- 
 ern Judges openly attacking and brow-beating him, with 
 both the outgoing and incoming Administration to oppress 
 and mock at him, with subtle and treacherous advisers al 
 home to beguile his steps and watch for his halting did Judge 
 Curtis stand up at Washington, amid those corrupt and 
 wicked judges, and in the name of History which they false- 
 ified, of Law which they profaned, of Justice which the) 
 mocked at, with a manliness which Story never showed on 
 such occasions, he pronounced his sentence against the wicked 
 Court. I remember his former conduct with indignation and 
 with shame; but no blackness of the old record shall prevenl 
 me from turning over a new leaf, and with golden li tters 
 writing there — In the Supreme Court, Judge Curtis de- 
 fended once the Higher Law of Right. 
 
 1 am truly sorry his manhood did not stay by him and 
 continue his presence in that Court. The defence of ; 
 ignation is found in the inadequacy of the salary. It was 
 $4,500 when he took it, $6,000 when he left it. A pitiful 
 reason — by no means the true one. Samuel Adams was a 
 poor man; 1 do not think he would have Lefl his sent in the 
 revolutionary Congress because more money could be 
 by the cod-fishery or by privateering. 
 
 II. The Dred Scott decision was the firsl enormity. The 
 next is Gen. Walker's filibustering expedition. I regard this 
 as the act of the Government. " Whal you do by another, 
 you do also by yourself," is a maxim older than the Etonian 
 Law which preserves it. 1 am not inclined generally to 
 much confidence in "Walker's word, hut he sometimes tells 
 the truth. In a recent speech at Mobile, he says he hail an 
 interview with the President, last summer, and declared lus 
 intention of returning to Nicaragua: his (filibustering) letter 
 was published Avith the President's consent A member of 
 
16 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 the Cabinet sought a confidential interview with him, told 
 him where he might go with safety, where only with danger, and 
 added, " You will probably sail in an American vessel, under 
 the American flag. After you have passed American limits, 
 no one can touch you but by consent of this Government." 
 A Cabinet minister told one of Walker's friends, if he made 
 an alliance with Mexico, and attempted the conquest of Cuba, 
 " means shall not be lacking to carry out the enterprise." 
 Walker says the government arrested him, not because he at- 
 tacked Nicaragua, but because he did not attack Mexico ! I 
 hold the Federal Government responsible alike for the conduct 
 of Walker and the Supreme Court. 
 
 But omitting particulars, looking only at the general course 
 of the Government, you find it favors slavery with continued 
 increase of intensity. Let not this rest on my testimony 
 alone, or your judgment. Here is " An Address delivered 
 before the Euphemian and Philomathean Literary Societies of 
 Erskine College, at the Annual Commencement, Wednesday, 
 August 12th, 1857, by Richard Yeadon, Esq., of Charles- 
 ton, S. C." Mr. Yeadon is a Representative man, editor of 
 the Charleston Courier, and a staunch defender of the peculiar 
 institution. He tells us he comes " rather to sow the good 
 seed of truth, than to affect the arts or graces of oratory ; to 
 teach the lessons of history, and impress the deductions of 
 reason, than to twine the garlands of science, or strew the roses 
 of literature ; " he would " combine the didactic in large 
 measure with the rhetorical." He discusses the character of 
 the Federal Government and its relation to Slavery, " on which 
 rest the pillars of the great social fabric of the South." He 
 attempts to show that the Constitution was so framed as to up- 
 hold slavery and check freedom ; and that the Federal Gov- 
 ernment has carried out the plan with such admirable vigor, 
 that now Slavery can stand by its own strength. But you 
 must have his own words : — 
 
 " The new Constitution not only recognized, sanctioned, and 
 
OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA. 17 
 
 guaranteed it [slavery] as a State institution, sacred within 
 State limits from federal invasion or interference, bui also so 
 far as to foster and expand it. by f< deral protection and agen- 
 cy, wherever itwas Legalized, \\ ithin State or Territorial limits ; 
 to uphold it by federal power and the federal arm against 
 domestic violence or foreign invasion ; and to make it an ele- 
 ment of federal organization and existence, by adoptin 
 a basis of federal representation and a source of federal 
 revenue." 
 
 "From thai day to this, the institution of don slavery, 
 
 within the several States, has been regarded and held sa> 
 a reserved right, exclusively within State jurisdiction and be- 
 yond the constitutional power of Congress or of th General 
 Government, except for guarantee, "protection, anddefence; it 
 being one and the chief of those ' "particular interests' which 
 the Convention had in view, as enhancing thi difficulty of their 
 work." 
 
 " The General Government and the co-States are bound by 
 constitutional duty and federal compact, to uphold and defend 
 the institution, wherever it lawfully exists, in any of the 
 States." 
 
 "Indeed, so unquestionable is the exclusive jui 
 S.I ite sovereignty, excepl in the way of guarantee and pro- 
 tection, over the institution of slavery within State limits, 
 that even the high priest and arch-fiend of political free-soil- 
 ism, Wm. H. Seward, in his speech in Congress, on tl 
 mission of California into the I aioi - thusconceded it — ' No 
 free State claims to (•■.tend its 
 
 None claims that Congress shall usurp power to abolish slave- 
 ry in the slave Stati >1 fanatics of abolition- 
 ism, of the Parker and Garrison school; pledge that 
 their atrocious crusade against the South can only achi 
 unhallowed aims by trampling as well on the Consti 
 their country, as on the Oracles of ( tod." 
 
 He has admiration for one Northern man who has been re- 
 markably faithful to the ideas and plans of the v - 1 
 He says it is the duty of the General ( rovernment to p 
 Slav ay by suppressing insurreel Lonary movements, or a' 
 at domestic violence, and to turn out the whole tone of the 
 Republic, regular and militia: — 
 :5 
 
18 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 " It was in contemplation of such a contingency, such a 
 casus /(filer is, that the eloquent, accomplished, and gifted Ev- 
 erett, (now dedicating his extraordinary powers of composition 
 and elocution, under the auspices of ' The Southern. Matron,'' 
 a patriot daughter of the Palmetto State, to the purchase and 
 consecration of the home and the grave of Washington, as 
 the Mecca of America, J in his maiden speech as the represent- 
 ative in Congress of the city of Boston, in 1826, then fresh from 
 the pulpit, in honorable contrast with the dastardly Svmncrs and 
 bullying Burlingames of the present day, thus patriotically 
 and fervently spoke — ' Sir, I am no soldier. My habits and 
 education are very unmilitary ; but there is no cause in which 
 I would sooner buckle a knapsack on my back, and put a mus- 
 ket on my shoulder, than that of putting down a servile in- 
 surrection in the South.' " 
 
 The newspapers say, with exquisite truth, that Mr. Everett 
 is " the monarch of the platform," the " greatest literary orna- 
 ment of the entire continent of America." So he is : but to 
 Mr. Yeadon he is also a great hero, the iron man of courage, 
 unlike the " dastardly Sumners," and " the dishonored and, 
 perjured miscreants, Seward, Sumner, et id omne genus, who 
 advocated the ' higher law doctrine.' " 
 
 He thus sums up the whole of our history : — 
 
 " The American Union . . . has been the great bul- 
 wark of . . . Southern Slavery, and lias, in fact, nursed 
 and fostered it, from a feeble and rickety infancy, into a giant 
 manhood and maturity, and self sustaining power, able to 
 maintain itself either in the Union or out of the Union, as may 
 best comport with the future policy and welfare of the South- 
 ern States." 
 
 "Finally to crown all, comes, in august majesty, the deci- 
 sion of the Supreme Judicatory of the United States in tbe 
 case of Dred Scott, pronouncing the Missouri restriction uncon- 
 stitutional, null and void, and declaring all Territories of the 
 Union, -present ami future, when acquired by purchase or con- 
 quest, by common treasure or common blood, to be held by 
 the General Government, as a trustee for the common benefit 
 of all the States, and open to every occupancy and residence of 
 the citizens of every State, with their property of every descrip- 
 
OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA. 19 
 
 lion, including slaves, reposing under the aegis of the Consti- 
 tution." 
 
 "The cheering result, then, is, that the Southern States 
 stand now on stronger and higher ground than at any pre\ ions 
 period of our history ; and this, under the progressive and 
 constitutional action of the General Government, blotting out 
 invidious lines, establishing the broad platform of State 
 equality, demolishing squatter sovereignty, retrieving the 
 errors of the past, and furnishing new securities for the 
 future." 
 
 "The number of slaveholding States lias been increased to 
 fifteen, out of an aggregate of thirty-one States, with a fair 
 prospect of further increase in Texas, and in other 7'< rritory, 
 acquired or to be acquired from Mexico, in the Carribean sea, 
 iitnl still further Smith." 
 
 The Slave States, he says, no longer "conceding domestic 
 slavery to be a ' moral, social, and political evil,' anymore 
 than any other system of menial and prsedial labor, but 
 able . . . to defend it as consistent with Scriptural teachings, 
 and as an ordinance of Jehovah for the culture and welfare of 
 the staple States, and the civilization and Christ ianizat ion of 
 the African." To them he says, " Cotton is King, and des- 
 tined to rule the nations with imperial sway." 
 
 The slaveholders feel stronger than ever before. This 
 privileged class, the "Nobility of Democracy," counts only 
 350,000 in all. Feeble in numbers, the Slave Power is 
 strong in position — holding the great federal offices, Judicial, 
 Executive, and Military, stronger in purpose and in will. 
 "The hope, the courage of assailants is always greater than 
 that of those who act merely on the defensive." At the 
 South, it rules the non-slaveholders, as at the North it has 
 had also the Democratic party under its thumb. There is a 
 secret article in the creed of that party which demands un- 
 conditional submission to the infallibility of the negro-driver. 
 Senator Toombs has no sines in ( reorgia v. ho yield to his will 
 more submissively than to the whim of the Southern 
 crouches lion. Mr. dishing, whose large intellectual talent-. 
 
20 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 great attainments, and consummate political art, in this hall 
 so fitly represent the town of Newburyport. It is the glory 
 of the Northern Democratic party that it has been the most 
 cringing slave to the haughtiest and unworthiest master in 
 the world. All individuality seemed " crushed out," to use 
 Mr. Cushing's own happy phrase. Within eight months, 
 every Northern State has had a State Democratic Convention, 
 each of which has passed resolutions endorsing the Dred 
 Scott decision. This act implies no individuality of thought 
 or of will. The Southern master gave command to each 
 Northern squad of Democrats — " Make ready your resolu- 
 tions in support of the Dred Scott decision ! " They " make 
 ready." " Consider resolutions ! " They " consider." " Vote 
 aye ! " They " vote aye." 
 
 The Slave Power, thus controlling the slaves and slave-' 
 holders at the South, and the Democratic party at the North, 
 easily manages the Government at Washington. The Federal 
 officers are marked with different stripes — Whig, Democrat, 
 and so on. They are all owned by the same master, and 
 lick the same hand. So it controls the nation. It silences 
 the great sects, Trinitarian, Unitarian, Nullitarian : the chief 
 ministers of this American Church — three-fold in denomi- 
 nations, one in nature — have nought to say against slavery ; 
 the Tract Society dares not rebuke the " sum of all villanies," 
 the Bible Society has no " Word of God " for the slave, the 
 " revealed religion " is not revealed to him. Writers of 
 school-books " remember the hand that feeds them," and 
 venture no word against the national crime which threatens 
 to become also the national ruin. In no nation on earth is 
 there such social tyranny of opinion. In Russia, Prussia, 
 Austria, France, Italy, and Spain, the despotic bayonet has 
 pinned the public lips together. The democratic hands of 
 America have sewed up her own mouth with an iron thread — 
 that and fetters are the only product of the Southern mine. 
 In Washington, not a man in the meanest office dares open 
 his lips against the monster which threatens to devour his 
 
OF SLAVER? IN AMERICA. 21 
 
 babies and his wife. No doctor allows himself a word againsl 
 that tyrant — his business would forsake him if he did. In 
 
 Southern States, this despotism drives off all outspoken men. 
 Mr. Underwood, of Virginia, made a speech againsl the 
 extension of slavery into Kansas, — lie must take his life in 
 his hand, and flee from his native State Mr. Helper, of 
 North Carolina, writes a brave, noble book, cyphering out 
 the results of freedom and of bondage, — even North Caro- 
 lina is too hot to hold him. Mr. Strickland, at Mobile, sells 
 now and then an anti-slavery book, — the groat Si 
 bama drives him out, scares oil' his wife, and will not allow 
 him to collect his honest debts! At the North, you know 
 the disposition of men who hold office from the Federal 
 Government, or who seek and expect it: the Federal hand 
 is raised to strangle Democracy. They never give the alarm ; 
 'twould be to " strike the hand that feeds them." Nay, they 
 crouch down and "lick the hand just raised to sh< 
 blood." Even at Washington, Slavery has sewed up the 
 delegated Northern mouth, else so noisy once. It is nearly 
 two years since a Southern bully, a representative man of 
 South Carolina, stole upon our groat Senator, with cow aid 
 blows felled him to the ground, and with his bludgeon beat 
 the stunned and unconscious man. lie meant to "silence 
 agitation:" he did his work too well. Excepting the- dis- 
 cussion which followed that outrage, do you remember an 
 anti-slavery speech in the Senate since Charles Sumner's, in 
 May, 185(5 I Can you think of one in the House? It' such 
 have been spoken, I have not heard either, though I have 
 listened all the time. Now and then, some one has made 
 an apology lor the North, promising not to touch SI 
 in the part most wound able. But I believe there has 
 \)ccn no manly anti-slavery speech in House or : 
 till Mr. Hale broke the silence with a noble word. The 
 Slave Power dealt the blows upon one Northern man, and 
 nearly silenced all the rest ! "The soft '* alor is Dis- 
 
 cretion!" The South has many slaves not counted in the 
 census. Ought thej to represent the N 
 
22 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 The Slave Power is conscious of strength, and sure of 
 victory. It never felt so strong before. Look at this : the 
 Treasury Department has just instructed the collectors not to 
 permit a free negro to act as master of a vessel, — he is not 
 a citizen of the United States ! See what the Southern States 
 arc doing. A bill has been reported in the Senate of Louisiana, 
 authorizing that State to import five thousand African slaves. 
 If it becomes a law, the Government will not prevent the act ; 
 our worst enemy, the Supreme Court, is ready to declare 
 unconstitutional the law which forbids the African slave trade. 
 The South may import as many slaves as she likes ; the 
 Government is for her wickedness, not against that, — 
 only against Justice and the Unalienable Rights of Man. 
 Another bill is pending before the Virginia Legislature to 
 banish or enslave all the 75,000 free colored persons in that 
 State, where more than one President has been the father of 
 a mulatto Avoman's child. The law to enslave them all may 
 pass ; the Federal Government cares nothing about it. Afri- 
 can Rachel may mourn in vain for her first-born, and refuse 
 to be comforted, because the Virginian Jacob chains the parti- 
 colored Joseph that she bore to him ; let her mourn ! What 
 does the Federal Herod care that in all Virginia there is a 
 voice heard of lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning 
 from the poor Rachel of Africa ? 
 
 Stronger than ever before, at least in fancy, and yet more 
 truly impudent than fancied strong, the Slave Power proposes 
 two immediate measures : — 
 
 I. To pass the Lccompton Constitution through Congress, 
 and force Slavery into the laws of Kansas, against the oft- 
 repeated vote of the people. 
 
 II. To add seven thousand men to the standing army of 
 the United States. They arc nominally to put down the 
 polygamous Mormons in Utah, — Satan contradicting the lies 
 he is the father of! — but really to support the more grossly 
 polygamous slaveholders ; to force the Lecompton Constitu- 
 tion upon Kansas with the bayonet; in all the North, to 
 
OK SLAVERY IN AMERICA. :', 
 
 execute the Fugitive Slave Bill, and the Drcd Scott Decision, 
 already made, and the Lemmon decision, about (<> be made, 
 and establish Slavery in each free State ; and also to put down 
 any insurrection of the colored people at the Sunt h. The 
 Mormons are the pretence, no more; the army is raised 
 against the Democracy of Massachusetts, not the Polyg 
 Utah. 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen, both of these measures will pass 
 the Senate, pass the House. If it were the end of a Presi- 
 dential term, I should expect they would be defeated, lint 
 men worship the rising mid, not the setting, who lias no more 
 golden light for them. A Boston merchant, with hut $87,000, 
 could bribe men enough to pass his tariff bill ! The new 
 President, he has more- than $87,000,000, — offices for 
 years to come. The addition to the army will cost at Leasl 
 ,$'5, 000, 000 a year, and the patronage; that e;i\e^wi]l com- 
 mand votes enough. I know how tender are the feelings of 
 Congress; I know how politicians reject with scorn the idea 
 that money or office could alter their vote ; but we all know 
 that a President, his pocket full of public money, his hands 
 full of offices, can buy votes of Honorable Senators and 
 Honorable Representatives just as readily as you can buy 
 peanuts of the huckster down stairs. 1 need not go from this 
 hall, or its eastern neighbor, T need not go back seveD years 
 to find Honorable members of the "Great and General Court 
 of Massachusetts" who were bought with a price. 1 shall 
 tell no names, though I know them onl\ too well. Peter did 
 repent, and Judas may — I will give him a chance. 1 expect, 
 therefore, that both these measures will pass. Then yon will 
 find the Northern " Democracy " supporting them: future 
 Conventions Avill ring with Resolutions in favor of the Le- 
 compton Convention, and a great standing army will be 
 one of the acknowledged "Principles" of the Democratic 
 part) — a toast on Independence Day. 
 
 When the two immediate measures arc disposed of, there 
 are three others a little more remote, which are likewise to be 
 passed upon. 
 
;34 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 I. The first is to establish Slavery in all the Northern 
 States, — the Drecl Scott Decision has already put it in all 
 the Territories. The Supreme Court will make a decision in 
 the Lemmon case, and authorize any one of the Southern 
 masters of the North to bring his slaves to any Northern 
 State, and keep them as long as he pleases. Colored men 
 " have no rights which white men are bound to respect," — so 
 says the Supreme Court, which is greater than the Constitu- 
 tion ; and if that be true generally, everywhere, then it will 
 be true specially in Massachusetts. I have no doubt the Su- 
 preme Court will make the decision. We have no Judge 
 Curtis to sit in that Court, and give his verdict for Law and 
 Justice ; his place is occupied by Hon. Nathan Clifford — a 
 very different man, if I am rightly informed. When his 
 nomination was before the Senate, Mr. Hale opposed it, and 
 said Mr. Clifford was not reckoned a first class lawyer in his 
 own district — which comprises the greater part of New Eng- 
 land ; nor in his own State — the State of Maine ; nor in his 
 own county; nor even in his own town! Then, after Mr. 
 Hale had reduced this vulgar fraction of law to his lowest 
 terms, the Senate added it to the sum of the Supreme Court. 
 He is strong enough for his function — to create new law for 
 Slavery. His appointment must needs cause a judgment against 
 him, but let us give him a fair trial. When the Court has 
 given the expected decision in the Lemmon case, then this new 
 article will be voted into the apostolic creed of the Democrat- 
 ic party, published by authority, and appointed to be read in 
 caucuses and conventions. It may be " said or sung," as fol- 
 lows : — "I believe in the Fugitive Bill ; I believe in the 
 Kansas-Nebraska Bill ; I believe in the Dred Scott Decision ; 
 I believe in the Lemmon Decision. As it was in the 
 beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. 
 Amen." 
 
 II. The next measure is to conquer Mexico, Central 
 America, and all the Northern Continent down to the Isthmus ; 
 to conquer Cuba, Hayti, Jamaica, all the West India Islands, 
 
OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA. g5 
 
 and establish Slavery there. This conquest of the Islands 
 might seem rather a difficult work — if mighl require some 
 fighting; but the late Hon. Senator Butler, of South Carolina, 
 was very confident it would be done. You remember how be 
 spoke of those Islands in a rambling speech thai he once 
 made which was truth-telling because drunken. Yon smile; 
 but if in vino vcritas be good Latin, a fortiori is il 
 American to say, there is more truth in whiskey which is strong- 
 er. In one of his fits of "loose expectoration," that distin- 
 guished Senator, a Representative man, like Bully k 
 instantial and typical of his State, spoke of " ouit Southern 
 Islands," meaning Cuba, San-Domingo, Jamaica, Trinidad, 
 St. Thomas, and the rest. He called them <//// islands, not that 
 they were so then, or because he had any personal know Ledge 
 that they ever would be; but "being in the Spiril 
 Slavery,) and the Spirit (of Whiskey) being also in him — 
 imperium hi imperio — by this twofold inspiration (of Slavery 
 from without and Whiskey from within,) and from this 
 double consciousness (out of the abundance of the stomach the 
 mouth also speaking,) he prophesied (this medium of two 
 spirits,) not knowing what he said. 
 
 That is the second measure, — to re-annex theWesI I 
 and the Continent. 
 
 III. The third measure is to resfo slave 
 
 trade. Now and then, the South puts forth a. feeler, to try 
 the weather ; the further South yon go the more boldly are 
 the feelers put out. South Carolina and Lou: 
 ready for this measure; and of course the Supreme C< 
 ready. You must not be surprised if yet another article be 
 added to the Democratic Creed, and we hear Mr. Cushing 
 deacon off this new Litanj of Despotism, with — ■" 1 believe 
 in the African Slave Trade." 
 
 To carry all these measures, the Slave Power depends on 
 the Federal Government. But it never pesters the Govern- 
 ment with petitions on paper ; it scuds it- petitions ii: 
 They are not referred to Committees in House or Son 
 4 
 
26 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 Petitions in Boots are themselves the Committee of House 
 and Senate. Gentlemen, the Slave Power has got the Federal 
 Government, especially the Supreme Court — a Constant 
 Power. 
 
 It relics also on the Democratic party North for its aid in 
 this destruction of Democracy. Gentlemen, it has got that 
 party — will it keep it ? Heretofore the two have seemed 
 united, not for better but for worse, " so long as they both do 
 live." Witness the arguments of Mr. Cashing, yesterday, 
 in this hall, against the Personal Liberty Law ; and he faith- 
 fully and consistently represents the Northern Democratic 
 party as it was. 
 
 The Slave Power depends on the four great commercial 
 cities of the North — Cincinnati, Philadelphia, New York, 
 and Boston. Gentlemen, it has the support of these four 
 cities, and will continue to have it for some time to come. If 
 the two immediate and the three remote aggressive measures 
 I have just mentioned were to be passed on by the voters of 
 these four towns, I think they would vote as the Slave Power 
 told them. They did so for the Fugitive Slave Bill, for the 
 Kansas-Nebraska Bill ; — they will vote for the Lccompton 
 Bill, the Army Bill ; and when their help is wanted for the 
 Americanization of the rest of the continent, by filibustering ; 
 for the Southemization of the North, by the Lemmon deci- 
 sion ; for the Africanization of America, by restoring the Af- 
 rican slave trade, they will do as they are bid. 
 
 If these five measures were left to the voters of Boston 
 alone, the result might be doubtful, — nay, I think it would 
 be adverse to the South. But look at the matter a little more 
 nicely- Divide the Boston voters into four classes: — the 
 Rich — men worth $100,000 or more; the Educated — 
 men with such culture as pupils get at tolerable colleges ; the 
 Poor — the Irish, and all men worth but $400 or less ; the 
 Middling class — the rest of the male citizens. If the ques- 
 tion were submitted to the first three, I make no doubt the 
 vote would be for the South, for the destruction of Democracv. 
 
OF SI..W l.m I.N AMI.IIK \. !', 
 
 The educated and the poor Mould do as the rich commanded 
 them — they would not " strike the hand that feeds them," 
 for they know how 
 
 " To crook the pregnant hinges of the knee, 
 \\ hi re thrift may follow fawning." 
 
 I speak of the general rule, and do honor to the exceptions. 
 I hope you think me harsh m this judgment. .Many of you, 
 I see, are members of this House, and do not know exactly 
 the city you are strangers in. I believe it the best city in 
 the world; but it has some faidts which warrant my conjec- 
 tural fear. Two things have happened, Mr. President, since 
 our last annual meeting, which show the proclivity of the 
 controlling class in Boston to support slavery. The first took 
 place on the seventeenth oi June. One or two haberdashers 
 and the hotel-keepers of Boston were anxious to celebrate the 
 eighty-second anniversary of the battle of Bunker Hill. The 
 State and the City united in that good work. There was a 
 Committee of the Massachusetts Legislature, joined with 
 a ( 'ommiltee of the City Council. 1 lere is the Book 
 "printed by authority," giving an account of some of the 
 proceedings. The Committee invited distinguished champions 
 of Slavery to come and consecrate the statue of Warren. 
 Here is the reply of Gov. Wise, of Virginia. It contains an 
 admirable hint, lie hopes the Revolutionary times will return. 
 So do I. 
 
 Here are letters from the Hon. Mr. Hilliard, of Alabama, 
 from ex-President Tyler, and from similar people, too nu- 
 merous to mention in an anti-slavery speech. There is a lull 
 to be paid by the Commonwealth by and by. and someofyou, 
 gentlemen, will have an opportunity to vote the money of 
 Massachusetts to pay for the liquor which intoxicated 
 of the great champions of Slavery whom the Committee in- 
 
 !"> 
 
 n>. 
 
 vited to do honor to Bunker Hill by their bodilj p: 
 
 and to Boston by their subsequent carouse. There will be .1 
 
 bill amounting to $1007. 04 which I would advise the legisla- 
 
%$ THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 tors to look at carefully, and see what the " items " are, and 
 ascertain who consumed the "items.'" But let me return to 
 the " Great Celebration," — almost equal in glory to the 
 Battle itself. 
 
 The Committee invited the author of the Fugitive Slave 
 Bill to partake of their festivities. Yes, ladies and gentle- 
 men, they invited the Hon. Mr. Mason, of Virginia, the most 
 insolent man in the American Senate, the most bitterly and 
 vulgarly hostile to the Democratic institutions of the North, 
 the man who had treated your own Senator with such inso- 
 lence and abuse ; Mr. Kcitt, of South Carolina, also should 
 have been included ! I shall not now speak of the men who 
 outraged the decency of New England by asking such a man to 
 such a spot on such a day, — they were types of a class of 
 men whom they too faithfully serve. But on that occasion, 
 " complimentary flunkeyism " swelled itself almost to burst- 
 ing, that it might croak the praises of Mr. Mason and his 
 coadjutors. 
 
 When the coward blows of Mr. Brooks — one of that holy 
 alliance of bullies who rule Congress — had brought Charles 
 Sumner to the ground, and he lay helpless between Life and 
 Death, you know the people of Boston proposed to have a 
 meeting in Fane nil Hall to express their indignation. A 
 Committee, appointed at a previous meeting, had the matter 
 in charge. They invited Hon. Mr. Winthrop to attend. 
 " No," he " could not come." They asked Mr. Everett. 
 " No," he too was " unable." It was reported at the 
 time, and I thought on good authority, that when the Com- 
 mittee asked Hon. Mr. Choate, he asked " if blows on 
 the head with a gutta percha stick would hurt a man much ?" 
 These three were ex-Senators. They all refused to attend 
 the meeting and join in any expression of feeling against the 
 outrage upon Mr. Sumner. Gentlemen, I respect sincerity, 
 and I was glad that they were not hypocrites on that occasion. 
 Twice the Committee waited on the first two gentlemen, offer- 
 ing the invitation, which was twice refused. But Mr. Win- 
 
OF SLAVER? IN \MK 111 ( A. 19 
 
 throp and Mr. Everett were both at Charlestown, to pay that 
 feudal homage to Mr. Fugitive-Slave-Bil] Mason, which 
 Northern vassals owe the Slave Power. With their " flunkey- 
 ism," they tainted still worse the air of thai town w hich has 
 a proverbial repute and name. 
 
 Then was fulfilled that celebrated threat of Senator Toombs, 
 of Georgia. On the eighty-second anniversary of New Eng- 
 land's first great battle, at the footof Bunker llill Monument, 
 the author of the Fugitive Slave Bill, the most offensive of 
 all Ms tribe, called over the roll of his slaves; and nun, 
 their names unknown to fame, their personalities too indistincl 
 for sight, at least for memory, with the ( 'ity ( rovernmenl of 
 Boston, the authorities of Harvard College, two ex-Senators, 
 one ex-Governor, the Governor of Massachusetts, (spite of 
 the " certainty of a mathematical demonstration," now also 
 an ex,) answered to their names! 
 
 That was not all. The next day, at the public cost, in a 
 steamboat chartered expressly for the purpose, the City Gov- 
 ernment took Mr. Mason about the harbor, showing to him 
 the handsome spectacle of nature, the green islands, then so 
 lair; and you saw, a hideous sight, the magistrates of this 
 town doing- homage to one of the foulest of her enemies, who 
 had purposely incited a kindred spirit to deal such blows on 
 the honored bead of a noble Senator of this State ! 
 
 Nor was that all. The next night, one of* the Professors 
 of Harvard College, both a learned and most genial man. but 
 at that time specially representing the servility of his institu- 
 tion, better even than his accomplishments generally represent 
 its Greek scholarship, invited the author of the Fugitive Slave 
 Bill to an entertainment at his house. 
 
 So the magistrates of Boston, the authorities of Harvard 
 College, the "respectabilities of the neighborhood," the 
 Committee of the Legislature, the Governor of the Common- 
 wealth, and its ex-Senators said in their acts, and then- vrords 
 too, "Thus shall be done unto the man whom the Slav< 
 Power delighteth to honor.'" 
 
30 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 Here is the other act. Mr. Alger, a young Unitarian min- 
 ister of this town, had been invited to deliver the annual 
 Fourth of July Address before the city authorities ; and he, 
 good honest man, in the simplicity of his heart, like Horace 
 Mann and Charles Sumner long before, thought that one day 
 in the year was consecrate to Independence, and an orator 
 might be pardoned if, on Independence Day, he said a word 
 in behalf of the self-evident truths of the old Declaration, 
 and spoke of the natural and unalienable right of all men to 
 life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Mr. Alger's grand- 
 father fought in the battle of Bunker Hill, and it was not 
 surprising that the " Spirit of '75," speaking through such a 
 " Medium," should be a little indignant at the spirit of '57 ! 
 He spoke as he ought. The City Government refused to 
 print his speech — which, however, printed itself. The act 
 was consistent. They who had crouched to Senator Mason, 
 and answered at the roll-call of his slaves, how could they 
 publish a manly speech rebuking their " complimentary flunk- 
 eyism !" 
 
 These two acts may make you doubt what would be the fate 
 of the Slave Power's measures if left to Boston alone ; but they 
 make me sure what it would be if left to the three classes I 
 have just now named. 
 
 But will these measures succeed, even with such help ? If 
 I had stood in this spot on the 29th of January, 1850, and 
 foretold as prophecy what is history to-day, would you have 
 believed me, Mr. President? Ladies and Gentlemen, you 
 could not credit it ; that Mason's Bill, proposed the week be- 
 fore, would become a law ; that Boston would ever be the 
 haunt of man-stealers, her Court-House a Barracoon, Faneuil 
 Hall crammed with soldiers hired to steal a negro boy ; that 
 her Judge of Probate would forego the benevolence of his na- 
 ture, or at least of his office, and become a kidnapper, and 
 even a pretended anti-slavery Governor keep him in office 
 still ! No, you could not believe that Wendell Phillips 
 would ever be brought to trial for a " misdemeanor," because, 
 
OF SLAVERY IN \MF,l;n \. 31 
 
 in the Cradle of Liberty, he declared if wrong fora Judge of 
 Probate to turn kidnapper! No, you would not hear the 
 prediction that the Missouri Compromise would be repealed, 
 the Kansas-Nebraska act be passed, and the military arm of 
 the United States, lengthened out with Border Ruffians, 
 would be stretched forth to force Slavery into Kansas with 
 the edge of the sword. You would have said "The Dred 
 Scott Decision is impossible ; the Supreme Courl cannot de- 
 clare that no colored man is a citizen of the United States, — 
 that the Constitution itself puts Slavery into every Territory, 
 spite of local legislation, spite of Congress itself, spite of the 
 People's will ! Should they attempt so foul a wrong, the 
 next Convention of Northern Democrats would rend the Court 
 asunder! Caleb Cushing would Mar against it!" Whal 
 have we seen abroad; what do some of you hear in tins Hall, 
 day out, day in ! On the 29th of January. 1858, is it more 
 unlikely that the Federal Government will decree these three 
 new measures, — to establish Slavery in all the North. 
 quer and enslave the Southern part of the continent, to re- 
 store the slave trade? The past is explanation of the present, 
 as the present also of the past. 
 
 There are two things you may depend on : the impudent 
 boldness of your Southern masters; the thorough corruption 
 of their Northern slaves. These two arc "sure as Death and 
 Rates." 
 
 But opposition is made againsl Slavery. — some of it is 
 quite remarkable. I begin with mentioning what comes from 
 quarters which seemed least promising. 
 
 1. A Northern Democrat enters on the stage, — an un- 
 wonted appearance. But it is no "infant phenomenon," no 
 stripling, "who never appeared on any stage before," making 
 his tics; essay by venturing on an anti-slavery part. It is an 
 old stock actor — the Little Giant of many a tragedy. Mr. 
 Douglass has broken with the Administration ; the author of 
 the Kansas-Nebraska act is now undoing his own work : the 
 
32 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 inventor of " Squatter Sovereignty " (or, if Cass be the in- 
 ventor, Douglass has the patent) turns round and strikes the 
 hand that fed him with honors and applause. He has great 
 personal power of work, of endurance, immense ability to 
 talk ; all the arts of sophistry are at his command ; adroit, 
 cunning, far-sighted, for an American politician — no man, I 
 think, better understands the strategy of politics, and no 
 man has been more immoral and shameless in its use. He 
 has long been the leader of the Northern Democracy, and 
 knows its instincts and its ideas ; his hand is familiar with 
 the strings which move the puppets of the party. Amongst 
 men not clerical, I have heard but one speaker lie with such 
 exquisite adroitness, and make the worse appear the better 
 reason. He is a Senator, still holding his place on important 
 Committees ; he is rich, in the prime of life, ambitious of 
 power ; he has abandoned drunkenness, and his native 
 strength returns to his stout frame once more. Let us not 
 disguise it, — no mere politician in America can do the Slave 
 Power such harm. 
 
 But I have no more confidence in Mr. Douglass now than 
 in 1854. The Nature of the man has not changed, nor can 
 it change ; even his "Will is still the same. No man has 
 done us such harm. You know his public measures, his 
 public speeches — the newspapers report all that ; but his 
 frauds, his insolent demeanor, his brow-beating and violence 
 towards the Republican Senators, you do not know — only 
 the actual spectators can understand such thiugs. Do you 
 remember that, after Mr. Sumner had made his last great 
 speech, Mr. Douglass said — " Does the Senator want us to 
 kick him ? " You have not forgot that when Brooks made 
 his attack upon Sumner, Douglass also was there, and did not 
 interfere to prevent a continuance of the blows. He also was a 
 part of that outrage. The man has not changed. If he were 
 President, he would do as Buchanan does, only more so. If 
 he were sure of his Senatorial office for six years to come, I 
 think we should hear no words from him in behalf of Kansas. 
 
OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA. 33 
 
 But his term expires in March, next year. He knows he 
 cannot be re-elected, unless he changes his course. So be 
 alters his Measures, and provisionally favors freedom, nol 
 his Principles, which are the loaves and fishes of power. 1 
 am sorry to hear Republicans express their confidence in him, 
 and give him praise which leaves nothing to add to such men 
 as Hale, Seward, and Chase. I know it is said " any stone 
 is good enough to throw at a dog ;" bul this is a stone thai 
 will scale in its flight, veer oil", and finally hil whal you mean 
 not to hurt but to defend. Yet it is unexpected to rind 
 any individuality of conduct or opinion in the party. It is 
 pleasant to see what a train of followers he lias already . and 
 to think that Democracy is not quite dead among "Demo- 
 crats." He is fighting against our foes — thai is an accidenl : 
 he is not fighting for us, but only for Stephen A. Douglass, 
 and if he wins that battle, he cares not who his allies are, 
 nor who his foes. 
 
 2. The next help conies from a Slave State. Here is 
 the valuable speech of Hon. F. P. Blair, from Missouri. 
 "The civilized world," says he, "is al wax with the ] 
 
 tion of slavery, whether by fraud or by the sword ; and those 
 •who look to gain political ascendancy on this 
 bringing the weight of this system, like an eno 
 not to subject the slaves only, but their fellow-citizens and 
 kindred of the same blood. . falsi a ig nf the 
 
 yf 'the times." 
 Significant words — doubly important when coming from a 
 slave State. Do not think he is alone. 
 behind him not of don e speech 
 
 James B. Gardenhire, lately made in the Hous 
 sentatives at Jefferson City, Missouri. It is of the sam< 
 as Mr. Blair's, and advocates the abolition of slavery i i Mis- 
 souri itself. 
 
 3. Here is something from Republican Members oi Con- 
 gress. ISTot to mention others from New England, or else- 
 where, here is a speech from Hon. Eli Thaye 
 
 5 
 
34 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 sometimes, I take it, but plain and direct in substance. He 
 would have the free States send settlers to Northernize the 
 South — already he has a cfllony in Virginia — and New- 
 Englandize Central America ! " The Yankee," says Mr. 
 Thayer, " has never become a slaveholder, unless he has been 
 forced to it by the social relations of the slave State where he 
 lived ; and the Yankee who has become a slaveholder has 
 every day of his life thereafter felt in his very bones the bad 
 economy of the system." " Why, sir, he can buy a negro 
 power in a steam-engine for ten dollars, and he can clothe and 
 feed that power for one year for five dollars ; and are wc the 
 men to give $1000 for an African slave, and $150 a year to 
 feed and clothe him ? " 
 
 This is an anti-slavery argument which traders can under- 
 stand. Mr. Thayer is not so much a talker as an organizer ; 
 he puts his thoughts into works. You know how much 
 Kansas owes him for the organization he has set on foot. One 
 day will he not also revolutionize Virginia ? There is a to- 
 morrow after to-day. 
 
 Here is a speech from Hon. John P. Hale. I think it is 
 the ablest he ever made, — the first any one has made, I 
 think, since the discussion caused by the assault on Mr. 
 Sumner. It relates to Kansas and the Dred Scott Decision. 
 Hear what he says of the latter : — 
 
 " If the opinion of the Supreme Court be true, it makes 
 the immortal authors of the Declaration of Independence 
 liars before God and hypocrites before the world ; for they 
 lay clown their sentiments broad, full, and explicit, and then 
 they say that they appeal to the Supreme Ruler of the uni- 
 verse for the rectitude of their intentions ; but, if you believe 
 the Supreme Court, they were merely quibbling on words. 
 They went into the courts of the Most High, and pledged 
 fidelity to their principles as the price they would pay for 
 success, and now it is attempted to cheat them out of the 
 poor boon of integrity ; and it is °aid that they did not 
 mean so ; and that when they said all men, they meant all 
 v hii r men ; and when they said that the contest they waged 
 
07 5LAYERV IN AMERICA. 85 
 
 was for the rights of mankind, the Supreme Court of the 
 United State- would have you believe that they mean it was 
 to establish & Against that 1 protest, here, now, and 
 
 everywhere; and 1 tell the Supreme Court that these things 
 are so impregnably fixed in the I ■ people, on the 
 
 page of history, in the recollection- and traditi 
 that it will require mightier efforts than they have m 
 ran make to overturn or to shake these settled convictions of 
 the popular understanding and of the popular heart. 
 
 "Sir, you are now proposing to cany out this Dred Scott 
 decision by forcing upon the people of Kansas a Constitution 
 against which they have remonstrated, and to which there 
 can be no shadow of doubl a very large portion of thi 
 opposed. Will it succeed '. I do not know ; it is not for 
 me to say; but I will say this: if you force that — if you 
 persevere in thai attempt — I think, I hope, the men of 
 Kansas will fight. I hope they will resist to blood and to 
 death the attempt to force them to a submission against which 
 their lathers contended, and to which they never would have 
 submitted. Let me tell you, sir, I stand not here to use the 
 language of intimidation or of menace ; but you kindle the 
 fires of civil war in that country by an attempt to force thai 
 Constitution on the necks of an unwilling people; and you 
 will light a fire that all Democracy cannot quench — aj 
 there will come up many another Peter the Hermit, that will 
 go through the length and the breadth of this land, telling 
 the story of your wrongs and your outrage.-; and they will 
 stir the public heart; they will raise a feeling in this country 
 such as has never yet been raised ; and tin- men of this 
 country will go forth, as they did of olden time, in another 
 crusade; but it will not be a crusade to redeem the dead 
 sepulchre where the body of the Crucified had lain from the 
 profanation of the infidel, but to redeem this fair land, which 
 God has given to be the abode of freemen, from the desecra- 
 tion of a despotism sought to be imposed upon them in the 
 name of 'perfect freedom' and e popular sovereignty.' " 
 
 This is a little different from the speeches made in Con- 
 gress last winter. There is nothing apologetic and depreca- 
 tory this time. Mr. Seward said, long ago, •• The time for 
 compromises has passed by." 
 
 Mi. Sumner's chair is vacant still. — and yet it speak- with 
 
3D THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 more power than any Senator can bring to defend Slavery 
 with. In the long line of men Massachusetts has sent to do 
 service in the Halls of Congress, there has been none nobler 
 than Charles Sumner, none more faithful. I know how 
 dangerous it is to praise a living man, especially a politician ; 
 to-morrow may undo the work of half a century. But here I 
 feel safe ; for of all the men I have known in political life, he 
 is the only one who has thereby grown stronger in the noblest 
 qualities of a man. Already his integrity has been tried in 
 the severest ordeal ; I think hereafter it -will stand any test. 
 Massachusetts has had three great Adamses — Samuel, John, 
 John Quincy. In their graves, they are to her what " the 
 three Tells " are to Switzerland. Here is a man equally 
 noble, perhaps with a nicer culture than any of them. He 
 has now the same firmness, the same integrity — faithfulness 
 to delegated trust, allegiance to the Higher Law of Right. 
 His empty chair is eloquent. 
 
 4. Then there are Republicans out of Congress, in 
 official station, who are at work. All the New England 
 States, New York, Michigan, Ohio, Illinois, Iowa, Wiscon- 
 sin, have Governors and Legislatures, I think, hostile to 
 slavery — after the " Republican " way. The election of Mr. 
 Banks was a triumph in Massachusetts. In fifty years past, 
 no Northern State has sent a man to the House of Repre- 
 sentatives, who in twenty-five years acquired as great in- 
 fluence there as Mr. Banks in four. He has many qualities 
 which fit him for eminence in American politics — if he only 
 be faithful to the Right. I hear loud condemnation of him 
 from anti-slavery men, because, say they, " he will do wrong 
 by and by." Our sentence will be in season if it comes after 
 the crime ; and the actual offences of Republican politicians 
 are so numerous that I will not condemn conjectural felonies 
 before they are committed. I hear it said he will not remove 
 Judge Loring. Wait and see. This I know, that a good 
 deal within twelve months, he said he wished him removed, 
 by the address of the Legislature; and if he (Banks) were 
 
OF SLAVER'S l\ AMERICA. 
 
 Governor, he (Banks) would do it! [f he try to ride a Com- 
 promise, he may depend on it. he will nol ride far, ho 
 long - ! "The day of Compromise is past." I remember the 
 speech he made in Wall Street, New York; also the one al 
 Salem. I have no defence to make for them, no excuse to 
 offer for him. 1 felt astonished and ashamed. But to ex- 
 change his predecessor for him seemed a triumph of B 
 in 1857 ; I hope ii will pn>\ e so in years to 'nine. 
 
 The Republican party has (lone considerable service, hut it 
 does not behave very well. It is cowardly; a Little deceit- 
 ful; " making / dare not wait upon / would." Colored 
 waiters at public festivals say, " the Democrats treat us better 
 than the Republicans." Events have clearly shown that the 
 party did not deserve to gain the federal power in 1856 ; that 
 it would have been ruinous to the- party could they then have 
 taken the great offices, and disastrous to the cause of freedom, 
 which they would compromise. Yet, as it is the best politi- 
 cal party Ave have, I would not be over-nice in criticising it. 
 I like not to pick holes in the thin spots of the onlj political 
 coat we have in this stormy weather. I know the difficulties 
 of the party, and have pity for its offenders — none for its 
 mere hunters after place. 
 
 I have spoken of the services of these classes of political 
 men. There is one trouble which disturbs all four. I hey 
 are Liable to a certain disease of a peculiar nature. 1 have a 
 good copy of Galen, but he docs not mention it ; the Last 
 edition of Hippocrates, but neither he nor his commentator, 
 though both well-lettered men, makes an\ reference thereto. 
 Hence I suppose it is a new disease, which, though not 
 exactly a Doctor of .Medicine, perhaps 1 am the first to 
 describe. So I will call it the Presidential Fever; or, in 
 Latin, Typhus infandus Americanus* I will trj • 
 the specific variety which is endemic in the Northern S 
 
 * It may be the same Herod is said to have died of. From S 
 description, it would stem that Cataline had a Blight touch oi B( 
 
 Cat., ch. I. 
 
38 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 the only place where I have studied the disease. I may 
 omit some symptoms of the case, which other observers will 
 supply. At first, the patient is filled with a vague longing 
 after things too high for him. He gazes at them with a fixed 
 stare ; the pupils expand. But he cannot see distinctly ; 
 crooked ways seem straight ; the shortest curve he thinks is 
 a right angle ; dirty things look clean, and he lays hold of 
 them without perceiving their condition. Some things he 
 sees double — especially the number of his friends ; others 
 with a semi-vision, and it is always the lower half he sees. All 
 the time he hears a confused noise, like that of men declaring 
 votes, State after State. This noise obscures all other sounds, 
 so that he cannot hear the still, small voice which yet moves 
 the world of men. He can bear no " agitation ; " the word 
 " Slavery " disturbs him much ; he fears discussion thereof 
 as a hydrophobiac dreads water. Yet he is fond of the " rich 
 brogue " of the foreign population. His sense of smell is 
 so morbid, that an honest man is unbearably offensive. His 
 tongue is foul, but he has an irresistible propensity to lick 
 the hands of those he thinks will give him what he seeks. 
 His organ of Locality is crazed and erratic in its action ; the 
 thermometer may stand at 20 below zero, — even lower, if 
 long enough, — the Mississippi may be frozen over clear 
 down to Natchez, Hellgate be impassable for ice, and the 
 wind of Labrador blow for months across the continent to the 
 Gulf of Mexico, — still he can't believe there is any North ! 
 Combativeness is irregularly active ; he fights his best friends 
 and clings to his worst enemies. Destructiveness is intense ; 
 he would abolish the negroes, enforce the Fugitive Slave Bill, 
 and hang the Abolitionists. Benevolence is wholly inert. 
 Casuality has become idiotic ; he looks into the clockwork of 
 the State, and everywhere finds " a little nigger has got into 
 the machinery," which he would set right by " crushing- 
 out " the intruder. Ideality fills him with the foolishest 
 of dreams. The organ of Self-Esteem swells to a monstrous 
 size — like a huge wen on the top of the head, " a sight to 
 
OF SLAVERY IN AMKKH \. 89 
 
 behold." He talks about himself excessively, ad nauseam ; 
 and " makes a noise tow n-meel Lng days," and is : > I xv ays " up " 
 in tbe Legislature. Vanity In immense; he would be before 
 the people continually ; no place is too small, if only public ;' 
 he lives in the eye of the people, greedy of praise. Elope Is 
 in ;i state of delirious excitemenl ; no failure disconcerts him, 
 no fall abates desire to rise. Veracitj is in a comatosi 
 
 "he will lie like Governor ." Conscientiousness has 
 
 " t-,;\r<\ in,'" and in its place 1 there is " a hole in his 
 
 lie knows no higher law above his own ambition, for which 
 
 all means seem just. He often speaks of " the Father of his 
 
 mntry," but never tells his noblest deeds, His Reverence 
 
 • delirious in its action; he worships every graven or molten 
 
 rge that faces South, and lies prostrate before the 
 
 y idol of Slavery, rending his garments, and cries, " Baal 
 
 ) us ! Baal help us!" Disease incurable; yields to no 
 
 licine ; not hellebore enough in all Anticyra to affeel the 
 
 iced not speak of the old Anti-Slavery Society. It is not 
 sary I should criticise their action — I have done that 
 enough before. If we deserve any praise, let others 
 it, or give it not, as suits them best. 
 
 There has been a great change in the People i 
 — else. Mr. President, we were not here to-night. Yov 
 remember the Legislatures of 1850, 1851, 1852, — what if 
 yon had asked them for this Hall! In 1851, even Faneuil 
 Hall could not be had for a Convention of fifteen hundred as 
 respectable and intelligent men as ever assembled in the 
 
 * "Fidenarum Gabiorumque ess 
 
 Et dc mensura jus dicere, Vasa minora 
 Frangere, pannosus vacuia Jvlilis Ulubria; 
 qui nimios optabat honores " 
 
 The Latin is only for Doctors, who know the local 
 geography. 
 
40 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 United States, with Horace Mann at their head. We are 
 here to-night by the will of the People of Massachusetts. 
 For many years we have come up before the Legislature of 
 this State ; it has always heard us patiently, and I think at 
 length has always done what we asked. Former Legislatures 
 have done all in their power to remove the only Massachusetts 
 Judge of Probate that ever kidnapped a man. I make no 
 doubt this Legislature will as faithfully represent the Con- 
 science of the State. 
 
 I say, there has been a great change in the People. Com- 
 pare the old Daily Advertise?- with the new, which I think 
 one of the humanest as well as ablest newspapers in New 
 England. 
 
 I recall the fate of the Northern men who voted for the 
 Kansas-Nebraska Bill. There were thirteen Northern Sena- 
 tors who did so. The official term has expired for ten of 
 them. Nine of the ten lost their election — veteran old Mr. 
 Cass at their head ; the Camden and Amboy Railroad sent 
 back Mr. Thompson to represent their rolling-stock. Stuart 
 of Michigan, Jones of Iowa, and Douglass of Illinois, abide 
 their time. 
 
 Forty-two Northern Representatives were equally false to 
 Democracy. Thirty-nine of them have gone to their own 
 place, only three returned to their seats : J. Glancey Jones, 
 and T. B. Florence, of Pennsylvania, and W. H. English, of 
 Indiana, alone remain. 
 
 If the South is more confident of victory than ever, the 
 North is also more determined to conquer. The late elec- 
 tions show this ; that of Mr. Banks is a very significant sign 
 of the times. The " rebellion " of Mr. Douglass, so his 
 old masters call it, is popular at the North. He could 
 be elected to the Senate to-morrow by a vote of the people of 
 Illinois. I do not say I would vote for him ; that State will. 
 All the West is on his side. See how many tender-footed 
 Democrats there are who cannot walk over a majority of legal 
 voters in Kansas ten thousand strong, and force Slavery on 
 
OF SLAVEKV IX AMERICA. \\ 
 
 that State, even at the command of the old master. Soon 
 there will be Conscience Democrats, as once "Conscience 
 Whigs.'''' The Administration Party may carry their measures ; 
 it will be as of old, "the counsel of the froward is carried 
 headlong." In 1860, the Northern Democratic Party will be 
 where the Whig Tarty was in 1856. There will be a pack 
 of men about the federal office's in all the greal towns, united 
 by common desire for public plunder ; but the Party will be 
 as dead as Benedict Arnold. If Mr. Cushing will "crush 
 out" all individualism from the Democracy he will leave no 
 life there ! 
 
 Such is the Aspect of Slavery now. It is clear whal Dut] 
 the North has to do. She must choose either Freedom of the 
 Black man, with an Industrial Democracy gradually spreading 
 over all the continent, diffusing everywhere the civilization of 
 New England; or else the Slavery of the Black man, with a 
 Military Despotism certainly overspreading the land and 
 crushing down the mass of men, white and black, into Asiatic 
 subjection. The choice is between these two extremes. 
 
 There are 18,000,000 in the North, all free. The power 
 of numbers, wealth, industry, education, ideas, institutions, 
 all is on our side. So are the sympathies of the civilized world, 
 the hopes and the primal instinct- of mankind ; " the Stars in 
 their courses fight against Sisera." The Federal ( rovernment 
 Insl us — Ave might have had it on our side if we would. 
 
 The last Presidential election showed who in the North 
 were the allies of the South. They dwell mainly in the four 
 great cities, and in that debatable land which borders on the 
 slave States, a strip of territory 200 miles wide, reaching from 
 New York harbor to the Mississippi. I trust the Anti-Slavery 
 Society will send out its missionaries to arouse and instruct 
 the people in that border land. There is a practical work to 
 be done — to be attempted at once. 
 
 Slavery is amoral wrong and an economical blunder ; but it 
 is also a great political institution. It cannot be put down bj 
 6 
 
42 THE PRESENT ASPECT 
 
 political economy, nor by ethical preaching; men have not 
 only pecuniary interests and moral feelings but also political 
 passions. Slavery must be put down politically, or else mili- 
 tarily. If not peacefully ended soon, it must be ended wrath- 
 fully by the sword. The negro won't bear Slavery forever ; 
 if he would, the white man won't. 
 
 If the Republican party behave wisely, there will never be 
 another inch of slave soil added to the national domain, nor 
 another slave State admitted to the Union : but Slavery will 
 be driven out of all the territories. Look at this fact. There 
 are now fifteen slave States, sixteen free. Minnesota and 
 Kansas will soon be admitted, Washington and Oregon ere 
 long — four new free States. Missouri may abolish Slavery 
 within four years. T,hen, in 1864, we shall stand twenty-one 
 free States to fourteen slave States. Nay, perhaps Utah will 
 repudiate both forms of polygamy, the voluntary and the forci- 
 ble, and be an ally in our defence. It is easy to conquer the 
 Southern part of the continent ; it is not easy to establish Af- 
 rican slavery there, in the midst of a population made up of 
 Africans or Indians ready to shelter the slave, and also much 
 more dense than that in the Gulf States from Georgia or 
 Florida to Texas. 
 
 If the North is wise and just, we shall choose an Anti- 
 Slavery President in 1860, and on March 4th, 1861, incorpo- 
 rate the Principles of the Declaration of Independence and of 
 the Constitution's preamble into the Federal Government 
 itself. And on the Fourth of July, 1876, there will not 
 be a slave within all the wide borders of the United States ! 
 For that service, we do not want a man like Col. Fre- 
 mont, who has had no political experience ; we want no 
 Johnny Raw for the most difficult post in the nation. It must 
 not be a man broken down with the Presidential fever. 
 
 But much is to be done before that result is possible. The 
 whole policy of the Republican party must be changed. We 
 must attack Slavery — Slavery in the Territories, Slavery in 
 the District, and above all, Slavery in the slai^e States. Would 
 
OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA. 43 
 
 you remove the shadow of </ tree? Then down with the tree 
 itself ! There is no other way. To get rid of the accidents 
 of a thing, you make way with its substance. Does not the 
 Constitution guarantee a Republican form of Government 
 to every State ? South Carolina has a Republican form of 
 Government, has she? We must lie aggressive, and kill the 
 trunk, not maim the branches. When you attempt that, depend 
 upon it the South will know T you are in earnest. The Su- 
 preme Court is our worst enemy. I should attack it carefully 
 by regular siege. Conquer and re-construct it. 
 
 If I were Republican Governor of Massachusetts, or a 
 Senator of the State, I should make it a part of my duty to 
 attend every Anti-Slavery Convention and to speak there. 
 Such men go to Cattle Shows, and Mechanics' Fairs, and 
 meetings of Bible Societies, to show that they arc at least 
 officially interested in farming, manufacturing, and religion. 
 So would I go to the other place, to show that I really took 
 the deepest, heartiest interest in the great principles of 
 Democracy, and wished to see justice done to the humblest 
 of human kind. 
 
 The Dally Advertiser gives us good counsel, [n the edi- 
 torial of the 26th, 1 find these words : "The enemies of 
 Slavery and its extension have hitherto occupied too exclusivi i\ 
 a defensive; attitude ; its friends, by venturing on bold courses 
 of aggression, have continually been gaining ground. If 
 they did not carry their whole point, they always gained some- 
 thing by compromise. It is right to learn from one's enemy, 
 and it will be fortunate if our friends in Congress have really 
 learned the valuable lesson of refusing to be kepi on the 
 defensive." 
 
 I know how anxious men are for office. I take it there are 
 ;^0,000 candidates for the Presidency now living. I wish 
 they were enumerated in the census — they might come after 
 the overseers of slaves. Certainly no man is too small for 
 the place. The experience of Europe shows thai little men 
 may lie horn to high office : America proves that they can he 
 
44 THE PRESENT ASPECT OF SLAVERY IN AMERICA. 
 
 chosen — and Democratic election is as good as Royal fore- 
 ordination. But no man is likely to gain that high office by 
 compromise. Webster tried it, and failed ; Clay also failed. 
 If Seward, Chase, or Banks attempt the same thing, they also 
 will come dishonored to the ground. It is always hard to 
 ride two horses. What if, as now, both be swift, and North 
 runs one way, and South the other ? Anti-Slavery is a move- 
 able stone — he that falls on it will be broken, but on whom- 
 soever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder ! 
 • I know men say, " If you attack Slavery, the South will 
 dissolve the Union." She dissolve the Union ? She does 
 not dare. Without commerce, manufactures, schools, with 
 no industry but slavery, more than one third of her popula- 
 tion bondmen, their interest antagonistic to hers, — let her 
 try if she will. Her threat — I '11 tell you what it is like. 
 " Mamma," said a spoiled boy to a mother of ten , other and 
 older children, "Mamma, I want apiece of pickled elephant." 
 " No, my dear, he can't have it. Johnny must be a good 
 boy." " No, I won't be a good boy. I don't want to be 
 good. I want a piece of pickled elephant." " But aint he 
 mother's youngest boy ? When we have some pickled ele- 
 phant, he shall have the biggest piece !" " Ma'am, I don't 
 want a piece ! I want a whole pic hied elepha?it ! I want him 
 now ! If you don't let me have him now, I '11 run right off 
 and catch the measles. I know a boy that's got 'em first 
 rate." 
 
T II E 
 
 PRESENT ASPECT OF SLAVERY IN .NIBRH'.l 
 
 THE IMMEDIATE DUTY OF THE NORTH 
 
 A SPEECH 
 
 DELIVERED IN HIE BALL OF THE STATE SOUSE, 
 
 BEFORE THE MASSACHUSETTS ANTI-SLAVEin CONVENTION, 
 
 OX FRIDAY NIGHT, JANUARY 29, 1858. 
 
 BY THEODORE PARKER. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 BELA MARSH, 
 
 14 BROMFIEID STREET. 
 1858. 
 
The following Works of Theodore Parker may i» 
 had of Bela Marsh, II Bromfield St., or of Little, Brown, 
 & Co., 112 Washington Street, Boston. 
 
 1. A Discourse oi Matters pertaining ro 
 
 Religion. 1 Vol. l2mo $1.25 
 
 2. An Introduction to the Old Testament. 
 
 From the German of De Wette. 2 Vols. 8vo. 
 
 3. Critical and Miscellaneous Writings. I VoL 
 
 12mo. 1.25 
 
 4. Occasional Sermons and Speeches. 2 Vols. 
 
 12mb. [Out of print — a new edition in prepara- 
 tion.] 2.50 
 
 5. Ten Sermons of Religion. 1 Vol. 1l ; iii<>. . 1.00 
 
 6. Sermons ok Theism, Atheism, and the 
 
 Popular Theology. 1 Vol. l2mo. . . . 1.25 
 
 7. Additional Sermons and Speeches. 2 Vols. 
 
 12mo. 2.50 
 
 8. The Trial of Theodore Parker, for the 
 
 Misdemeanor of a Speech in Fanenil Hall, 
 against Kidnapping; with the Defence. 1 Vol. 
 8vo l.oii 
 
 PAMPMI, 1 : T S . 
 
 1. The Moral and Spiritual Condition of 
 
 Boston, (isi'.i.) 
 
 2. The Publu Education of the People. (1850.) 20 
 o. The Moral Dangers incident to Prosperity. 
 
 (1855.) 15 
 
 •1. Consequences of an Immoral Principle. (1855.) 15 
 
 5. Of Immortal Life. 4th Edition. (1855.) I" 
 
 6. The Functions of a Teacher of Religion. (1855.) 20 
 
 7. A New Lesson FOR the Das (1856.) 15 
 
 8. The Great Battle between Freedom \\i> 
 
 Slavery. (185G.) 25 
 
 9. The Present Aspect of Slavery in Amerk \. 
 
 (1858.) 
 
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