Chapter 4

You do not think your law more barbarous than that of 1793. Let me further enlighten you. Judge McLean of the Supreme Court, in his opinion delivered last May in the case of _Norris_ v. _Newton et al._, remarks,--"In regard to the arrest of fugitives from labor, the law [act of 1793] _does not impose any active duties on our citizens generally_"; and he argues in defence of the law, that "it gives no one a just right to complain; he has only to refrain from an express violation of the law." In other words, the law only required individuals to be passive spectators of a horrible outrage, and did not compel them to be active participators in other men's villany. Now, what says your law? Why, that every commissioner may appoint as many official slave-catchers as he pleases, and that each of these menials may "summon and call to their aid the _by-standers_ or _posse comitatus_ of the proper county, when necessary to insure a faithful observance of the clause of the Constitution referred to in conformity with the provisions of this act, AND ALL GOOD CITIZENS ARE HEREBY COMMANDED TO AID AND ASSIST in the prompt and efficient execution of this law, whenever their services may be required." And what is the fate you have provided for the "good citizen," who, believing slavery to be sinful, cannot, in the fear of God, "aid and assist" in making a fellow-man a slave? Any person "who shall aid, abet, or assist" the fugitive "directly or indirectly" (cunning words) to escape from such claimant, as, for instance, refusing to join in a slave-hunt when required, shall be fined not exceeding $1,000, be imprisoned six months, and pay the claimant $1,000. I hope, Sir, you are now able to perceive that your law has a preëminence in barbarity over its predecessor. And now, Sir, please to recollect, that party discipline, aided by the influence of Messrs. Webster and Clay, and the factory and cotton interest of Boston and New York, could not procure for this atrocious law the votes of _one half_ the members of the House of Representatives. Of two hundred and thirty-two members, only one hundred and nine dared to place their names on an enduring and shameful record, while many basely deserted their seats, fearing alike to vote either for or against it. You, Sir, following Mr. Webster's advice, "conquered your prejudices," and in company with _two_ more Northern Whigs, one of them a native of Virginia, cast your vote for this bill of abominations. But, although you voted for the law, you do not wish your constituents to suppose you approved of it. "It will not, I trust, be inferred from any thing I have said, that I consider the law which has passed unexceptionable. There are amendments which I strongly desire to be introduced into it." What are the exceptionable features of the law, what are the amendments you desire, you refrain from specifying. But you tell us that you would have labored for these amendments "had it been possible, but every body knows that it was _impracticable_." You allude to the _previous question_, which prevented both discussion and amendments. But why, then, did you vote for an objectionable bill which could not be amended? Here, again, we have one of your unfortunate reasons. "I deem conformity to the design of the Constitution more important than the objectionable details of the bill." So, by your own confession, had there been no previous question, you would have swallowed the bill with all its objectionable details, out of reverence for the _design_ of the Constitution, although that design neither embraced nor required a single one of those details. Did you, Sir, vote _against_ the previous question? On this point you are silent, and the minutes afford no information; but _if_ you did, your vote was a most remarkable aberration from your proslavery course in Congress. _After_ the previous question had been seconded, it was moved to lay the bill on the table. Had this motion been carried, you might have introduced another bill, omitting the "objectionable details," but you voted with the slaveholders. The slaveholders then moved that the bill be read a third time. Had this been lost, there would have been a chance of correcting the "objectionable details." Again you voted with the slaveholders, and a third time, also, on the main question.

I will now, Sir, call your attention to the disastrous influence which your law has exerted on the _moral sense_ of the community. Says Coleridge, "To dogmatize a crime, that is, to teach it as a doctrine, is itself a crime." Of this crime of dogmatizing crime, Mr. Webster, and most of our cotton politicians, and, alas! many of our fashionable, genteel divines, are guilty; nor are you innocent, Sir, who in your law require "GOOD citizens" to aid in hunting and enslaving their fellow-men.

In former years, and before Mr. Webster had undergone his metamorphosis, he thus, in a speech at New York, expressed himself in regard to the antislavery agitation at the North. "It [slavery] has arrested the _religious feeling_ of the country; it has taken strong hold of the consciences of men. He is a rash man indeed, little conversant with human nature, and especially has he a very erroneous estimate of the character of the people of this country, who supposes that a feeling of this kind is _to be trifled with or despised_." This gentleman has become the rash man shadowed forth in his speech, and is trifling with and despising the religious feeling of the North. In his street speech in Boston, in favor of slave-hunting, he avowed that he was well aware that the return of fugitives "is a topic that must excite prejudices," and that the question for Massachusetts to decide was, "whether she will conquer her own prejudice." In his letter to the citizens of Newburyport, he sneeringly alludes to the "cry that there is a rule for the government of public men and private men which is superior to the Constitution," and he scornfully intimates that Mr. Horace Mann, who had objected to your law as wicked, would do well "to appeal at once, as others do, to that high authority which sits enthroned above the Constitution and the laws"; and he gives an extract from a nameless English correspondent, in which the writer remarks, "Religion is an excellent thing except in politics," a maxim exceedingly palatable to very many of our politicians. Aware that the impiety of this sentiment was not exactly suited to the meridian of Massachusetts, he says his friend undoubtedly meant "a fantastical notion of religion." Of course, he regards the religious prejudice against hunting and enslaving men as springing from a fantastic notion of religion. Yet, with a strange fatuity, he confesses that "the teaching of Christ and his Apostles is a sure guide to duty in _politics_, as in any other concern of life," utterly oblivious of the fact, that the "higher law," which he ridicules, was proclaimed in that very teaching. Christ taught, "Fear not them [magistrates] who kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul, but rather fear HIM who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell." What taught the Apostles? "We must obey God, rather than man." Such teaching it was, that gave birth to "the noble army of martyrs," and this very teaching will induce multitudes of Christians at the present day to hazard fines and imprisonment rather than obey the wicked injunctions of your law. It was this same teaching which, on the publication of your law, induced numerous ministers of Jesus Christ, and various ecclesiastical assemblies, to denounce it as wicked, and obedience to it as rebellion against God. This expression of religious sentiment alarmed both our politicians and our merchants. How could the one expect Southern votes, or the other Southern trade, if the religious people at the North refused to catch slaves? Hence arose a mighty outcry against the blending of religion with politics, and most fearful were the anathemas against the parsons who desecrated the pulpit by preaching politics, that is, preaching that people ought to obey God rather than the Fugitive Slave Act. Such men were, in the language of one of the New York commercial journals, "clerical preachers of rebellion," and their congregations were exhorted to "leave them to naked walls." But the leaven was at work, and an antidote was greatly wanted. Supply of course follows demand, and forthwith there was a sudden advent of cotton clergyman, preaching against rebellion, and cunningly confounding a conscientious, passive disobedience with forcible resistance. Their sermons, in which virtually

"The image of God was accounted as base, And the image of Cæsar set up in its place,"

were received with mighty applause by the very men who had been striving to save the pulpit from all contaminating contact with politics, and the reverend preachers of cotton politics were elevated into patriots, and their disquisitions against the "higher law" were scattered on the wings of the commercial press broadcast over the land.[2] The theology which holds that the allegiance we owe to civil government binds the conscience to obedience to its mandates, is the same with which Shakspeare's assassin quieted his scruples when acting under the royal command,--"If a king bid a man be a villain, he is bound by the indenture of his oath to be one."

[2] In one of the most celebrated of these sermons, we find the following broad assertion:--"If God _has_ left to men the choice of the _kind_ of government they will have, he has _not_ left it to their choice whether they will obey human government or not. He has _commanded_ that obedience." Our rulers command us, when required by a commissioner's agent, to aid in hunting and seizing our innocent fellow-men, and delivering them into the hands of their task-masters. That the reverend preacher would render a cheerful obedience to such a mandate, there is little doubt. We read that the Jewish rulers, "The chief priests and Pharisees, had given a _commandment_, that, if any one knew where he (Jesus) was, he should show it, that they might take him." Strange is it, that of the college of Apostles there was but one "good citizen," who rendered obedience to the powers ordained by God; all the others suffered death for their wilful, deliberate defiance of the laws and the magistrates of the land. As a specimen of the teaching of these cotton divines, I quote from this same admired sermon the following precious piece of information, viz.:--"Nor is it true that the _fugitive slave_ is made an _outlaw_, and on that ground justifiable for bloody and murderous resistance of law. He is under _the protection of law_; and if any man injures him, or kills him, the law will avenge him, just _as soon as it would you or me_." To deny the truth of this solemn declaration, made in the house of God, would be, in the reverend gentleman's estimation, but a portion of "that perpetual abuse of our Southern brethren" of which he complains. He must, however, permit us to call his attention to the following advertisements respecting a FUGITIVE SLAVE, published in the Wilmington Journal of the 18th of October last, in pursuance of a law of the State of North Carolina.

"_State of North Carolina, New Hanover County._--Whereas complaint upon oath hath this day been made to us, two of the justice of the peace for the State and County aforesaid, by Guilford Horn, of Edgecombe County, that a certain male slave belonging to him, named HARRY,--a carpenter by trade, about 40 years old, 5 feet 5 inches high, or thereabouts, yellow complexion, stout built, with a scar on his left leg (from the cut of an axe), has very thick lips, eyes deep sunk in his head, forehead very square, tolerably loud voice, has lost one or two of his upper teeth, and has a very dark spot on his jaw, supposed to be a mark,--hath _absented_ himself from his master's service, and is _supposed_ to be lurking about in this County, committing acts of felony or other misdeeds: These are, therefore, in the name of the State aforesaid, to command said slave forthwith to surrender himself, and return home to his master; and we do hereby, by virtue of the act of Assembly in such case made and provided, intimate and declare that if the said slave Harry doth not surrender himself, and return home immediately after the publication of these presents, that any person or persons may KILL and DESTROY the said slave by such means as he may think fit, without accusation or impeachment of any crime or offence for so doing, and without incurring any penalty or forfeiture thereby.

"Given under our hands and seals, this 29th day of June, 1850.

"JAMES T. MILLER, J. P.

"W. C. BENTTENCOURT, J. P.

"ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-FIVE DOLLARS REWARD will be paid for the delivery of said HARRY to me at Tonsott Depot, Edgecombe County, or for his confinement in any jail in the State, so that I can get him; or one hundred and fifty dollars will be given for his HEAD. He was lately heard from in Newbern, where he called himself Henry Barnes (or Burns) and will be likely to continue the name or assume that of Coppage or Farmer. He has a free mulatto woman for a wife, by the name of Sally Bozeman, who has lately removed to Wilmington, and lives in that part of the town called Texas, where he will likely be lurking.

"GUILFORD HORN.

"_June 29, 1850._"

It is amusing to observe with what awful reverence our merchants and brokers regard the sanctity of human law, when it commands them to catch slaves; a reverence not always felt by them for the statute of usury when the money market is tight.

A vast deal of nonsense and impiety has been recently thrown upon the public in relation to the "higher law," by men who had political and pecuniary interests depending on the good-will of the slaveholders. The whole subject is perfectly simple and intelligible, and has been intentionally misrepresented and mystified.

Human government is indispensable to the happiness and progress of human society. Hence God, in his wisdom and benevolence, wills its existence; and in this sense, and this alone, the powers that be are ordained by him. But civil government cannot exist, if each individual may, at his pleasure, forcibly resist its injunctions. Therefore Christians are required to _submit_ to the powers that be, whether a Nero or a slave-catching Congress. But obedience to the civil ruler often necessarily involves rebellion to God. Hence we are warned by Christ and his Apostles, and by the example of saints in all ages, in such cases, not to obey, but to submit and suffer. We are to hold fast our allegiance to Jehovah, but at the same time not take up arms to defend ourselves against the penalties imposed by the magistrate for our disobedience. Thus the Divine sovereignty and the authority of human government are both maintained. Revolution is not the abolition of human government, but a change in its form, and its lawfulness depends on circumstances. What was the "den" in which John Bunyan had his glorious vision of the Pilgrim's Progress? A prison to which he was confined for years for refusing obedience to human laws. And what excuse did this holy man make for conduct now denounced as wicked and rebellious? "I cannot obey, but I can suffer." The Quakers have from the first refused to obey the law requiring them to bear arms; yet have they never been vilified by our politicians and cotton clergymen, as rebels against the powers that be, nor sneered at for their acknowledgment of a "higher" than human law. The Lord Jesus Christ, after requiring us to love God and our neighbour, added, "There is none other commandment greater than these"; no, not even a slave-catching act of Congress, which requires us to hunt our neighbour, that he may be reduced to the condition of a beast of burden. Rarely has the religious faith of the community received so rude a shock as that which has been given it by your horrible law, and the principles advanced by its political and clerical supporters. Cruelty, oppression, and injustice are elevated into virtues, while justice, mercy, and compassion are ridiculed and vilified.

But lately, the business of catching slaves was regarded as one of the lowest grades of scoundrelism. Now, great pains are taken by our gentlemen of property and standing to ennoble it; and men of eminence in the legal profession are stooping to take the wages of iniquity, and lending themselves to consign to the horrors of American slavery men whom they know to be innocent of crime. Nay, we have seen in New York a committee of gentlemen actually _raising money by voluntary contribution_ to furnish a slave-catcher with professional services gratis;--a free gift, not to mitigate human misery, but to aggravate the hardships of the poor and friendless a thousandfold. Can men of standing in the community thus openly espouse the cause of cruelty and oppression, and, from commercial and political views, trample upon every principle of Christian benevolence, without corrupting the moral sense of the people to the extent of their influence? When gentlemen club together to hire a lawyer to assist a slave-catcher, no wonder that the commercial press should teem with the vilest abuse of all who feel sympathy for the fugitive. One of the most malignant proslavery journals in New York is edited by your colleague and fellow-Whig, the Honorable Mr. Brooks, and his brother. I copy, Sir, for your consideration, the following article from the _New York Evening Express_, published during the late trial in that city of Henry Long, an alleged fugitive:--

"Two fugitive cases are now before our courts; one that of the negro Henry Long, and the other that of three white Frenchmen, under the extradition treaty with France. The negro's case makes a great deal of noise, because he is black; the three white Frenchmen are hardly heard of. The three white French people pay their own counsel: they may have committed a robbery in Paris, or may not; are perhaps innocent, though possibly guilty; but here they are on trial, with no chance of a trial before a jury! If they are sent back, and are convicted, they go to the galleys, and are slaves for life. The negro, Henry Long, lucky fellow for being black! lives in clover here, and has one of the best speakers in the city, on the best fee, interests all the Abolitionists in all quarters, who contribute money freely for his defence, and if he is returned, leaves here canonized as a martyr, and goes back to the condition he was born in, to fatten on hog and hominy, better fed and better clothed than nine tenths of the farm laborers in Great Britain. Another consideration strikes us, and that is, the cost of defending Long will buy his freedom three times over. The very fee of his counsel would purchase his freedom. But to buy him and pay for him, _not steal_ him, would leave no room for agitation. And where does this money come from, that cares for Long and neglects the three Frenchmen? From England, in the main, we believe. The Abolitionists here do not _contribute it_."

It would be difficult to find in the Satanic press a more clumsy piece of malignant falsehood. We have here, from the same pen, and in the same article, the assertions, that the Abolitionists, in all quarters, we are assured, "contribute money freely for his defence"; and then the money, it is believed, comes mainly from England. "The Abolitionists here do not contribute it." To contribute money for the legal defence of a fugitive is _stealing him_. The cost of defending Long amounted to three times the price that would be asked for him. Long, after his return, sold in Richmond for $750; of course his defence cost $2,250. To whom, and for what, was this money paid? Long could not be bought in New York, all advances for the purpose being peremptorily repulsed. His counsel's fee was $300, being all contributed in New York, and about $100 of it being raised by the free colored people. While $300 were thus raised to give Long the chance of a legal defence, gentlemen of the New York Union Safety Committee, of which your colleague has the honor of being a member, contributed $500 to aid the slave-catcher in reducing to bondage a man unaccused of crime!

I am inclined to believe, Sir, that you have little cause to congratulate yourself, that, in voting for the Fugitive Slave Law, you have advanced the cause of truth, justice, humanity, or religion.

A refusal to _obey_ your wicked law has been artfully represented as a determination to _resist_ its execution. Very few of our white population have intimated the most distant intention of resorting to illegal violence. Very many ecclesiastical bodies have denounced your law as so iniquitous, that they could not in conscience obey it; but I challenge you to point to a _single instance_ in which such a body has recommended forcible resistance. To the vast accumulation of impiety uttered in support of your law has been added a fiendish ridicule of the benevolent and Christian feeling arrayed against it. It is true, that some of our free blacks and fugitives have declared, that they would, at the hazard of their lives, defend themselves against the kidnapper. Whatever may be thought of the wisdom of such a determination, be assured it will tax your logical powers to the utmost to prove that God has conferred the right of self-defence exclusively upon white men. The slave is a prisoner of war, and instead of being protected by law, he is subjected by it to every conceivable outrage. When murdered, his owner seeks in the courts _damages_ at the hands of the murderer, as he would for the death of his horse. For no possible injury committed on his person, either by his owner or others, can he receive compensation, although the law may profess to punish cruelty to him as to other animals. Now it has never been regarded as immoral, by those who admit the right of self-defence, for a prisoner of war to effect his escape by slaying his guard. All this, I know, will horrify a certain class of our divines and politicians. But let them be patient. I am not laying down a doctrine, but stating _facts_, which they may disprove if they can. Let them remember, that all the slavery which they delight to find in the Bible was the slavery of _white_ men, and that the Roman slaves in the time of Christ, whose bondage, we are told, he and his Apostles approved, were held by the _right of war_. White Americans have been held as slaves by the same holy and Scriptural tenure. Let us, then, inquire how the escape and resistance of white slaves have heretofore been regarded. In 1535, the _white_ slaves in Tunis alone amounted to twenty thousand. Cervantes, who had himself been a slave in Algiers, says in his writings, "For liberty we ought to risk life itself; slavery being the greatest evil that can fall to the lot of man." Acting upon this precept, he himself, while a slave, planned a general insurrection of the slaves. Yet Cervantes was recognized as a faithful son of the Church, and the license prefixed to his works declares they contain nothing contrary to the Christian religion. The Annual Register for 1763 announces, that, "last month, the Christian slaves at Algiers, to the number of four thousand, rose and killed their guards, and massacred all who came in their way." The insurrection was suppressed, but no one in Europe denounced the insurgents as bloodthirsty wretches, nor regarded their effort as an impious and anti-Christian rebellion against the powers ordained of God. In the reign of Elizabeth, one John Fox, a slave on the Barbary coast, slew his master, and, effecting his escape with a number of his fellow-slaves, arrived in England. The queen, instead of looking upon him as a murderer, testified her admiration of his exploit by allowing him a pension.[3]