An Address to Free Coloured Americans.
by An Anti-Slavery Convention of American Women.
BELOVED BRETHREN AND SISTERS--
The sympathy we feel for our oppressed fellow-citizens who are enslaved in these United States, has called us together, to devise by mutual conference the best means for bringing our guilty country to a sense of her transgressions; and to implore the G.o.d of the oppressed to guide and bless our labors on behalf of our "countrymen in chains."
All of us have some idea what slavery is: we have formed some faint conceptions of the horrors of a system based on irresponsible power, violence, and injustice; but _to know_ what slavery is, we must see it worked out in practice--we must see the heart-strings severed one by one, and witness all the refinement of cruelty which is exercised on the body, soul, and mind of the enslaved. "Let any man of feeling," says a Southern gentleman, "cast his thoughts over this land of slavery, think of the nakedness of some, the hungry yearnings of others, the wailings and wo, the b.l.o.o.d.y cut of the keen lash, and the frightful scream that rends the very skies--and all this to gratify l.u.s.t, pride, avarice, and other depraved feelings of the human heart. THE WORST IS NOT GENERALLY KNOWN. Were all the miseries and horrors of slavery to burst at once into view, a peal of seven-fold thunder could scarce strike greater alarm." (Swain"s Address, 1830.)
We can readily believe this testimony to the physical sufferings of the slave: we apprehend these most easily, because all of us are alive to bodily pain, whilst few comparatively appreciate the mental and spiritual degradation to which our oppressed brethren are subjected; yet this is the most appalling feature of American bondage. Slavery seizes a rational and immortal being crowned by Jehovah with glory and honor, and drags him down to a level with the beasts that perish. It makes him a thing, a chattel personal, a machine to be used to all intents and purposes for the benefit of another, without reference to the good, the happiness, or the wishes of the man himself. It introduces violence and disorder, where G.o.d established harmony and peace. It would annihilate the individual worth and responsibility conferred upon man by his Creator. It deprives him of the power of self-improvement, to which he is bound by the unchangeable laws of his Maker. It prevents him from laboring in a sphere to which his capacities are adapted. It abrogates the seventh commandment, by annulling the obligations of marriage, and obliging the slaves to live in a state of promiscuous intercourse, concubinage, and adultery; thus setting at nought an inst.i.tution established by Jehovah himself, and designed to promote the happiness and virtue of his creatures. It dooms its victims to ignorance, and consequently to vice. "I think I may safely a.s.sert," says Mr. Moore, "that ignorance is the inseparable companion of slavery, and that the desire of freedom is the inevitable consequence of implanting in the human mind any useful degree of intelligence: it is therefore the policy of the master that the ignorance of his slaves should be as profound as possible; and such a state of ignorance is wholly incompatible with the existence of any moral principles or exalted feeling in the breast of the slave. (Speech of Mr. Moore, House of Delegates, Va., 1832.)
"How horrible must be that system which demands as the necessary condition of its existence, that knowledge should be shut out from the minds of those who live under it--that they should be reduced as nearly as possible to the level of brutes, or living machines--that the powers of their souls should be crushed! Let each one of us ask, Can such a system be aided, or even tolerated, without deep criminality?" (Ad. to the Pres. of Ken. by a committee of the synod of Kentucky.)
But even if slavery could be divested of all its horrible accompaniments, its ignorance, licentiousness, and other nameless abominations, we should still regard the circ.u.mstance of man holding his brother man as property as one of the blackest crimes which corrupt human nature ever invented. Mr. Moore, in the speech from which we have already quoted, is compelled to acknowledge the iniquity of this system.
"It cannot be denied," he says, "as a general principle, that it is an act of tyranny, injustice, and oppression, to hold any part of the human race in bondage against their consent.... The right to the enjoyment of liberty is one of those perfect, inherent, and inalienable rights which pertain to the whole human race, and of which they can never be divested, except by an act of gross injustice." If we would rightly estimate the wretchedness in which the perpetration of this "act of gross injustice" has involved one sixth part of the population of Republican America, we must compare the condition of our slaves with that of the freemen of their own age and country. "Things are estimated by comparison; and the man who is deprived of every natural, civil, and social right, while all around him are basking in the sunshine of freedom, must feel the fangs of slavery much more poignantly than the one who, though subjected to similar privations, beholds his lot but little below that of those who surround him." We must not, therefore, compare the situation of slaves in the United States with that of the slaves of heathen Greece and Rome, where equal laws never existed, and where the beams of liberty and Christianity never shone; but to form a correct judgment of the miseries endured by our slaves, we must compare them with the laboring cla.s.s of our population in the free states, and we may then comprehend the debasing influence of a system which produces such dreadful results as are exhibited on almost every Southern plantation, where the lash is the princ.i.p.al, if not the only stimulus.
You are, dear friends, in a peculiar manner fellow-sufferers with those who are in bondage; because the whites, having reduced their colored brethren to slavery, with a cruelty proportioned to their unjust usurpation of power, have labored to impress on the mind of the community, the unfounded calumny that the people of color are unfit for freedom: this a.s.sertion is designed, on the part of slaveholders, as a salve for their consciences, and a plea for the continuation of slavery, and is used by the adversary of all good for the diabolical purpose of shielding from merited infamy the system of American slavery.
Nothing will contribute more to break the bondman"s fetters, than an example of high moral worth, intellectual culture and religious attainments among the free people of color--living epistles known and read of all men--a standard of exalted piety, of dedication to the works of righteousness, of humble-mindedness, of Christian charity; to which abolitionists may confidently point, and ask those who are forging the manacles of hopeless servitude for our countrymen, what they can answer to the Judge of all the earth for thus robbing him of his immortal creatures; and demand of them, in view of what their slaves might be, to restore their victims to themselves, to the human family, and to G.o.d.
We know, and we rejoice in the knowledge, that the gift of intellect is co-extensive with the human race, and that our brethren and sisters, who are writhing under the lash of worse than Egyptian taskmasters--whose minds are beclouded by ignorance and enfeebled by suffering, need only to have the same advantages which Europeans and their descendants have enjoyed, triumphantly to refute the unfounded calumny that they are inferior in the powers of intellect, and less susceptible of mental improvement. We maintain, that the people of color are not in any respect inferior to the white man, and that under favorable circ.u.mstances they would rise again to the rank they formerly held.
The everlasting architecture of Africa still exists--the wonder of the world, though in ruins: her mighty kingdoms have yet their record in history; she has poured forth her heroes on the field, given bishops to the church, and martyrs to the fires. And for African physiognomy, as though that should shut out the light of intellect, go to your national museum, contemplate the features of the colossal head of Memnon, and the statues of the divinities on which the ancient Africans impressed their own forms, and there see, in close resemblance to their features, the mould of those countenances which once beheld as the creatures of their own immortal genius the n.o.blest and most stupendous monuments of human skill, and taste, and grandeur. In the imperishable porphyry and granite, is the unfounded and pitiful slander publicly and before all the world refuted: there we see the African under _cultivation_. If he now presents a different aspect, cultivation is wanting--that solves the whole case: for, even now, where education has been expended upon the pure and undoubted descendants of Africans, it has never been bestowed in vain. Modern times have witnessed, in their persons, Generals, Physicians, Philosophers, Linguists, Poets, Mathematicians, and Merchants--all eminent in their attainments, energetic in enterprise, and honorable in character; and the Mission schools in the West Indies exhibit a quickness of intellect, and a thirst for learning, to which the schools of this country do not always afford a parallel." (Sermon by Richard Watson, pp. 7, 8, b.u.t.terworth, 1824.)
Sacred history bears ample testimony to the learning of the Egyptians.
"Solomon"s wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the East country and all the wisdom of Egypt." Even in our own country, under the oppressive system which slavery and prejudice have reared to crush the people of color, the superiority which occasionally shines out, notwithstanding all the disabilities by which we have surrounded them, proves beyond dispute that they are the gifted children of our Heavenly Father. In proof of this, we shall adduce from numerous testimonies, that of F. A. Sayre, for nine years a teacher of one of the public schools in Cincinnati.
"Facts have been developed in the progress of the day schools and Sunday schools here, which have made me believe that the colored people are not only equal to white people in natural capacity to be taught, but that they exceed them: they do not receive instruction; they seize it as a person who has long been famishing for food--seize the smallest crumb."
I several times visited the different schools for colored children and have always been gratified to observe the good order and attention to study which the pupils manifest, and particularly with the affection with which they regard their teachers. I have, however, known more particularly the school for boys which brother W---- teaches, there I have seen boys of from 9 to 12 years of age, who had learned the alphabet within a year, who were able to exhibit to advantage, in reading and spelling, to write legibly, to recite long lessons in History, which they had been a short time studying, and to undergo an examination in Arithmetic, which when I first witnessed it, perfectly astonished me. I have taught common schools for about 15 years at intervals, and have visited many taught by others, and I must candidly say, that I have never been acquainted with one which for rapid progress in the different studies pursued, and for the interests manifested by the pupils could be compared with this, nor have I ever seen so much good feeling in the intercourse of teacher and pupils."
And, in corroboration of the above position, we shall mention a few out of many instances in which persons of color have surmounted every obstacle to mental and moral improvement. James Derham, who was originally a slave, was skilled in the languages, and became the most distinguished Physician at New Orleans. Dr. Rush, of Philadelphia, says, "I conversed with him, and found him very learned: I thought I could give him information concerning the treatment of diseases, but I learned more from him than he could expect from me." Benjamin Bannaker was a slave in Maryland: he obtained his freedom, and removed to Philadelphia.
Without any encouragement but his pa.s.sion for acquiring knowledge, and with no other books than the works of Ferguson and the tables of Tobias Mayer, he applied himself to the study of Astronomy. In 1794 and "95, he published Almanacs at Philadelphia, in which are calculated and exhibited the different aspects of the planets, a table of the motions of the sun and moon, their risings and sittings, and the courses of the bodies of the planetary system. Bannaker sent his Almanac in ma.n.u.script to Thomas Jefferson, previous to its publication, accompanied by a long and interesting letter on the condition of his brethren; and the following extracts are taken from Jefferson"s reply:--"Sir, I thank you sincerely for your letter, and for the Almanac it contained. n.o.body wishes more than I do, to see such proofs as you exhibit, that nature has given to our black brethren talents equal to those of the other colors of men; and that the appearance of the want of them is owing merely to the degraded condition of their existence, both in Africa and America. I have taken the liberty of sending your Almanac to Monsieur de Condorcet, Secretary of the Academy of Sciences at Paris, and Member of the Philanthropic Society, because I considered it a doc.u.ment to which your whole color had a right for their justification against the opinions which have been entertained of them." A late West India paper mentions the death of Mr. Watkis, a colored lawyer in Jamaica, "by which the bar was deprived of one of its brightest ornaments." In the Island of St. Kitts, the proportion of colored members is increasing every year, and several of the special magistrates are colored men. The Editor of the St. Christopher Weekly Intelligencer and Advertiser is a colored man, who has been a bold advocate of liberal principles. He is described as a thorn in the side of the planters, and a great blessing to the Island. And in the United States of America, there are men and women now living whose talents, piety, and worth, are undeniable.
If we contemplate the moral character of the colored man we shall meet with even more frequent demonstrations of the kind care of our beneficent Creator who hath made of one blood all nations, and bestowed upon his rational creatures those qualities of the heart which are the brightest ornament of human nature. "In maternal, filial and fraternal affections," says Wadstrom, "I scruple not to p.r.o.nounce them superior to any Europeans I was ever among." "Of all the people I have ever met I think they are the kindest, they will let none of their people want for victuals, they will lend and not look for it again, they will even lend clothes to each other if they want to go any where, if strangers come to them they will give them victuals for nothing, they will go out of their beds that strangers may sleep in them."--We not unfrequently have the evidence of slaveholders themselves to the faithfulness and tender attachment of their slaves. In a sermon preached by George W. Freeman, Rector of Christ Church, Raleigh, North Carolina, in which he endeavors to prove that slavery is a Bible inst.i.tution we find the following testimony to the moral worth of those whom he calls a different race of men." "To _many_ of our servants, to _them_ who serve us faithfully, who are ever attentive to our wants, who cheerfully fulfil our commands, who labor abroad for us when we are in health, and who come at our call to nurse us in our sickness, and who, laying aside, as it were, all regard to their own comforts, submit without murmuring, or impatience to the most wearying and exhausting of all employments, complying with our most unreasonable whims, and meekly bearing with our fretfulness and caprices; _to them_, and I must do this cla.s.s of people the justice to say there are _many such_ among us--_to such of our domestics as these we surely owe a debt of grat.i.tude, which all our kindliest acts, should we even live beyond the age of man would scarce suffice to discharge_.
n.o.ble instances are recorded of their self-denial and liberality.--"Jasmin Thoumazeau was born in Africa, brought to St.
Domingo and sold for a slave when he was 22 years of age, but afterwards obtaining his freedom he established a Hospital at the Cape, in 1756 for poor persons of color. More than forty years were devoted by himself and his wife to this benevolent inst.i.tution, and his fortune was subservient to their wants. The only regret they felt, while their time and substance was devoted to these dest.i.tute objects, arose from a fear that after they were gone the Hospital might be abandoned." Joseph Rachel, a trader, who resided in the island of Barbadoes went to a man who had lost his property and to whom in the early part of his life he owed some obligations and gave him the fragment of his burnt bond for 60 and his discharged account for a considerable sum, telling him he was sensibly affected with his misfortunes and releasing him from all obligation to pay the debts. The philanthropists of England take pleasure in speaking of him. Having become rich by commerce, he consecrated all his fortune to acts of benevolence. The unfortunate without DISTINCTION OF COLOR had a claim on his affections. He gave to the indigent, lent to those who could not make a return--visited prisoners, gave them good advice and endeavored to bring back the guilty to virtue." Two slaves in New Orleans who by industry and economy had purchased their freedom and laid up about $400, bought with their earnings the freedom of another slave.--One day as the wife was sitting in the door of her cottage she said to herself "I have so much money and if I can make it the instrument of redeeming one of my fellow-beings from slavery, then I can say to my soul "depart in peace." She accordingly purchased one for $250 and in order to place her in a situation where she would hear the gospel preached, she brought her to the city of New-York. A more n.o.ble instance of genuine benevolence does not adorn the annals of philanthropy than is exhibited in this illiterate daughter of Africa, who gave nearly her all to redeem one captive sister. We have in this city a colored sister well known and beloved who by the labor of her own hands has ransomed eleven slaves.--But for her they would probably have dragged out their lives in hopeless bondage.--Her "witness is in heaven, her record is on high.[1]
Similar accounts might be multiplied but enough has been said to prove to any candid mind the truth of our position, we will therefore only add the testimony of some of our Southern sisters who affirm that they have known slaves of exalted piety, high intelligence and warm affections, who under circ.u.mstances the most trying have exhibited a degree of practical Christianity they have rarely witnessed.
[1] In citing these instances of benevolence we wish it understood, that while we approve of _redeeming_ a captive from bondage, we utterly deny the _right_ of the master to _sell_ or _hold_ the slave as property, just as we deny the right of the Corsair to the persons of his prisoners, or the ransom which may be offered for their redemption.
We cannot forbear mentioning in connection with this subject the n.o.ble example which the colored slaveholders of Martinique have set to their white brethren by pet.i.tioning the French Chamber of Deputies to abolish slavery in that island, stating that they regarded it as an act not only of justice but of policy.--This is the only record on the page of history of such an act of mercy but we hope it may stimulate slaveholders in these United States to pet.i.tion Congress to exert her influence in destroying the horrible system of American Slavery by abolishing it in the District of Columbia and in Florida, and by exterminating the interstate slave trade.
We earnestly entreat you to emulate the conduct of your brethren in Martinique by letting your righteousness exceed the righteousness of our white fellow-citizens. "That whereas they speak evil against you as evil doers, they may by your good works which they shall behold glorify G.o.d.
For so is the will of G.o.d that with well doing ye may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men." Your situation is in some respects more favorable to the growth of piety than that of the whites, you are in the furnace of affliction, and adversity has a much more salutary influence on the mind than prosperity. We believe that our Almighty Father has permitted your unparallelled sufferings, because he designs to bring you up to his a.s.sistance in regenerating our guilty country--he has been at infinite pains to refine you as silver is refined, that you may reflect more perfectly in your conduct and conversation the image of Jesus Christ. "Beloved think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you, but rejoice in as much as ye are partakers of Christ"s sufferings." You have the advantage of standing aloof from the political chicanery and wickedness which seem inseparable from public life, you are shielded from many of those temptations which encircle the fashionable world, and in a measure from the love of money, which is the root of all evil, because the acquisition of wealth is not with you as with your paler brethren, the certain means of worldly distinction. You may examine with a philosophic and impartial eye, the baneful effect of all these influences upon our white population, and as you rise from under the unhallowed prejudice which now crushes you to the earth, remember the solemn responsibilities which rest upon you and keep yourselves unspotted from the world, that your praise may be of G.o.d and not of men.
With deep regret we have heard that some of our colored brethren and sisters in our great cities frequent the theatre. This is a sink of vice from which we earnestly beseech you to keep yourselves entirely separate. Let the language of every one amongst you be, "Oh my soul, come not thou into their secret, unto their a.s.sembly mine honor, be not thou united." Sometimes in these scenic representations, your "countrymen in chains" are held up to the scorn and derision of an unfeeling mult.i.tude; the poor slave is introduced to be the object of heartless mirth. Can any colored man or woman voluntarily witness these dreadful pictures of the degradation of their brethren, and does not your presence identify you with the oppressors, who thus wantonly hold up to public contempt those whom they have first debased, and then despised.
Permit us to offer you a few remarks on the subject of personal decoration--this is a snare which Satan still triumphantly lays, even for professing Christians who indulge in fashionable and extravagant apparel, forgetful of the apostolic injunction, "Let your adorning not be that outward adorning, of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel; but let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of G.o.d of great price." Our hearts have been comforted in our intercourse with you, by observing that there is little gaudy or superfluous dress to be seen, in such places of worship as we have visited; we regard it as one evidence of the purity of your morals, and your just sense of that decorum which ought to characterise every Christian a.s.sembly. A Christian legislator has said that the trappings of the vain world would clothe the naked, and we affectionately entreat you to cultivate such a sense of your accountability to G.o.d, and the allegiance you owe to Him, that your dress may be such as becomes men and women professing G.o.dliness. To you this branch of religious duty is of double importance. A large proportion of you are obliged to obtain a subsistence by your daily labor; some of you are filling the responsible office of teachers, and it is of great consequence that you expend in the most judicious and profitable manner what is thus hardly earned, and that you set an example of Christian moderation and simplicity to your companions and your pupils.
Another reason for the practice of Christian economy in all your expenditures, is, that extravagance either in living or in apparel, has a deleterious influence on the poorer cla.s.ses of our community, both colored and white; it draws a line of division between the rich and the poor, which is destructive of that equality, that sweet fellowship of feeling, which G.o.d designed should exist among his creatures; it creates fact.i.tious distinctions in society, which are utterly at variance with the law of love that Christ gave as a governing principle to his disciples. When he designed to do us good, he took upon himself the form of a servant--surely we should love and honor this office, He took his station at the bottom of society, He voluntarily identified himself with the poor and the despised, He manifested a peculiar interest in those cla.s.ses which we are wont to treat as our inferiors, because He designed to elevate them, to give a moral impulse to their character, and to make them new creatures. He wanted them to behold in Him a model to imitate, as well as to give them the unspeakable advantage of mingling with Him in near and intimate communion. This was no doubt a powerful incentive to them to emulate their divine friend, and render themselves worthy companions of the Lord Jesus. None of us can stoop as low as our Saviour did, because the same infinite distance cannot exist between created beings; but we may as far as our frailty admits, imitate His blessed example; we may like Him, make ourselves of no reputation; we may, like Him, sit down at the table of the despised publican and sinner, and cheer the abodes of the humble and the poor by our presence and our love. This interchange of social visits, this meeting together as suppliants at a throne of grace, will form a bond of union stronger than any that can exist, while the rich and the educated stand at a distance from the poor, and invite them to come up, without advancing near enough to stretch forth the hand to a.s.sist their efforts. Our minds are solemnly impressed with the necessity of practising this duty, both among the colored and white population, and it would gladden our hearts to see you taking the lead in this Christ-like enterprise. We are persuaded that if we would labor effectually for the moral and intellectual elevation of the poor, we must condescend to men of low estate; we must identify ourselves with them, and place ourselves on their level; we must, by our example as well as our precepts, teach them that moral worth is our standard of excellence, and that we are living in the practical acknowledgement of that sublime precept "One is your master, even Christ, and all ye are brethren." Whilst we press this duty upon our colored brethren and sisters, we feel that it is equally inc.u.mbent upon all, and desire through divine a.s.sistance to be strengthened to perform it.
We wish also to suggest the importance of cultivating the virtue of personal and domestic neatness; we believe it contributes essentially to the purity of the heart, and that attention to the neatness of our persons, and the order of our habitations, has a happy influence on the temper and the understanding, as well as the morals. We are aware that it is often difficult, where necessity compels us to use one apartment for every purpose, to preserve that order and cleanliness which is desirable, but we believe where the wish prevails, much may be accomplished, even in very unfavorable circ.u.mstances. Many of you sustain the relations of servants in families; this places you in a very responsible situation, because it brings you under the daily observation of those, who have been educated with deep-rooted prejudices against you, and it affords the best opportunity of proving that these prejudices are as unfounded, as they are unjust--of exhibiting in your deportment, that moral loveliness which will constrain those who regard themselves as your superiors, to acknowledge that worth can neither be determined by the color of the skin, nor by the station occupied. You have it in your power, by a faithful and conscientious discharge of your duties, to secure the highest wages for your services, and by a prudent and economical use of those wages, to obtain for your children, if not for yourselves, the blessing of a good education, but we affectionately exhort you not to enter into any engagements as domestics, which will deprive you of the privilege of reading the Scriptures, and attending a place of worship, this being a duty which is imperatively called for as an evidence of our allegiance to the King of kings. Carefully avoid families which pay little or no respect to the Sabbath, that you may escape the contamination arising from such intercourse. We have regretted seeing so many of our colored friends engaged as servants in hotels and steam-boats; these places are not calculated to cherish moral and religious feeling, and they afford few facilities for the cultivation of the mind. Agricultural pursuits would contribute more to independence and elevation of character, and however much we may be disposed to aid you, it will be after all by your own exertions that you will rise to that situation in society, which we desire to see you occupy.
The establishment of good schools is another very important means of aiding in the great work of moral and intellectual elevation; to promote this object every exertion should be made. On the rising generation depends in a great measure the success of that enterprise, which aims at establishing Christian and Republican equality among the citizens of these United States. Let us then labor to implant in the minds of our children a love for useful learning, to imbue them thoroughly with religious feeling, to train them to habits of thinking, of industry and economy, to lead them to the contemplation of n.o.ble and benevolent objects, that they may regard themselves as responsible beings upon whom high and holy duties devolve. Let them come up to the help of the Lord in the mighty work in which we are engaged, prepared by education and enlightened piety to aid in the great moral conflict between light and darkness, which now agitates our guilty country. Anti-Slavery Societies, embracing in their Const.i.tutions, abstinence from slave labor products, as far as this can be done. Peace Societies, based on the principle that all war is inconsistent with the gospel. Temperance Societies, on the principle of abstinence from all that can intoxicate, and Moral Reform Societies should be organized throughout our land wherever it is practicable. The formation of Maternal a.s.sociations, Dorcas Societies, Reading & Conversation Companies, and above all, Meetings for Prayer will have a salutary influence in combining efforts for improvement.
Whenever you can unite with white a.s.sociations, it will be productive of reciprocal benefit, because it will tend to remove that unchristian prejudice which "bites like a serpent, and stings like an adder." You may have to suffer much in thus commingling, but we entreat you to bear hardness as good soldiers of Jesus Christ, that your children, and your children"s children, may be spared the anguish you are compelled to endure on this account. To carry forward these various schemes of elevation and improvement, money is absolutely requisite, and if all that is saved from unnecessary expenses be lent to the Lord to advance the great work of Reformation, as well as devoted to charitable purposes it will be treasure laid up in heaven, which neither moth nor rust can corrupt.
Another subject which is worthy of your consideration is the consistency of abstaining, as Abolitionists, from the use of slave labor products, as far as is practicable. The conviction that this is a duty, is gaining ground among the friends of emanc.i.p.ation, and we doubt not that the self-denial which it will probably demand on our part, will arouse the conscience of the slaveholder, by demonstrating that we are willing to sacrifice interest and convenience to principle. To the toil-worn slave, it will minister unspeakable consolation, to hear, while bending over the rice, or sugar, or cotton field, and writhing under the lash, that his friends at the North feel a sympathy so deep for his sufferings, that they cannot partake of the proceeds of his unrequited toil. Think you not it would cheer his agonized heart, and impart renewed strength to endure his affliction, to know that his blood was not spilt for the gratification of those who are trying to obtain for him the blessing of liberty. We entreat you to give this evidence of your love to those who have emphatically fallen among thieves, then, although you cannot pour the wine and the oil into their corporeal wounds, nor dress with mollifying ointment, the b.l.o.o.d.y gash of the drivers" whip, you may minister to their mental comfort, and soothe their broken hearts. Let it not be imagined that the slaves of the South are dest.i.tute of intelligence, or ignorant of what is doing at the North; many a n.o.ble mind is writhing there in bondage, and panting for deliverance, as the hart panteth after the water brooks. Mr. Goode, in the legislature of Virginia in 1832, when he brought in the resolution which produced the celebrated debate in that body, "earnestly pressed upon the House, the effect of what was pa.s.sing upon the minds of the slaves themselves. Many of them he represented as wise and intelligent men, constantly engaged in reflection, informed of all that was occurring, and having their attention fixed upon the Legislature." And we have been informed on good authority, that a slave in one of the Southern states, one of those whose soul never bowed to the yoke of bondage, said, that himself and his fellow sufferers spent many a midnight hour in discussing the probable results of the abolition movements, and were firmly persuaded that their redemption from bondage would finally be effected, though they knew not exactly by what means it would be accomplished. Every fugitive slave who is carried back, bears to his unhappy countrymen an account of all that is doing. Every freeman who falls into the ruthless fangs of the kidnapper, spreads information at the South, of all our efforts for the abolition of slavery, and we put it to any one of ourselves, whether, if we were wasting our energies, and toiling in cheerless bondage, it would not be some alleviation to know, that there were those who loved us so tenderly, and felt for us so keenly, that they would not partic.i.p.ate in the luxuries which were the fruit of our extorted and unrequited labor.
It has been urged, and with some plausibility, that the use of the products of slave labor, is one of the "little things" connected with the great cause of abolition. Admitting it to be little, is it therefore unimportant? Does not the reproof of our Redeemer exactly apply to this case, when in speaking of the t.i.the of mint, annise and c.u.mmin, and the weightier matters of the law, he says, "This ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone;" but however small it may appear, it involves a great principle, because it really encourages the traffic in human flesh, by offering to the slaveholder an inducement to perpetuate the system of oppression from which he derives his unrighteous gains.
Another hackneyed objection is, that our abstaining will not lessen the quant.i.ty grown, and other consumers will soon be found. With this we have nothing to do; we might on the same premises, purchase and hold slaves, because if we do not, others will. No doubt much inconvenience and some privation must be endured, but this will be continually decreasing, as West India productions will furnish a subst.i.tute. In some instances the use of cotton cannot perhaps be avoided by the poor, but still much may be done, and those of us who have made the experiment can testify that our abstinence has strengthened us for the work we are engaged in, and that there is a sweet feeling of conscious integrity that gladdens our hearts. "I will wash mine hands in innocency, so will I compa.s.s thine altar, oh Lord." In proportion as the demand for free labor products increases, the supply will increase, and the greater the quant.i.ty of such articles which is thrown into the market, the more their price will lessen. Besides "allowing the labor of a slave for six years, to produce all the various slave-grown products which anyone may use during the course of his life, would not he who was so occupied be in effect the slave of such an one during the time he was thus employed?" This is a solemn and affecting consideration, and can be most correctly weighed when we are on our knees before G.o.d; it is a matter between Him and every individual soul, and he alone can settle it.
We believe it was the want of that principle which we have been endeavoring to inculcate, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,"
that gave birth to the scheme of expatriating our colored brethren to Africa. We do not design to attribute unhallowed motives to all who engaged in this crusade against the rights and happiness of free American citizens; many, we believe, like our beloved brother, Gerrit Smith, embarked in this enterprise without examining the principles of the Society, deluded by the false, though plausible a.s.sertion, that the colored man could not rise in his native land to an equality with his white compatriots, and desirous to do them all the good that circ.u.mstances admitted. Nevertheless, we are constrained to believe what you have so often a.s.serted, and so keenly felt, that "The Colonization Society originated in hatred to the free people of color." We rejoice that you early detected the fallacy and the iniquity of this scheme; that you arose in the dignity of conscious rights, in the majesty of moral power, in the boldness of injured innocence, and exposed the cruelty and unrighteousness of a project, which, had it been carried fully into execution, would have robbed America of some of her best and most valuable citizens, and exiled from our sh.o.r.es, those whose hearts are bound to their country by no common bonds, even by the holy bonds of sympathy for their "countrymen in chains." A project which would have poured upon the sh.o.r.es of Pagan Africa, a broken hearted population, prepared by mental suffering to sink into a premature grave. A band of exiles, who had been exposed against their judgment and their will, to all the nameless trials which belong to the settlement of colonial establishments, and all that anguish which must have been endured under the reflection that they had been banished from the land of their birth, merely to gratify an unhallowed prejudice when their country needed their services, when there was abundant room in the land, though not in the hearts of their countrymen. We admire your n.o.ble and uncompromising resistance to this scheme of oppression, and your children will thank you to the latest generation. We honor you for the undaunted and generous resolutions which you pa.s.sed soon after the Colonization Society came into existence, when the spontaneous language of your hearts was embodied in the following sentiments:
"Whereas, our ancestors (not of choice) were the first successful cultivators of the wilds of America, we their descendants, feel ourselves ent.i.tled to partic.i.p.ate in the blessings of her luxuriant soil, which their blood and sweat manured, and that any measure, or system of measures, having a tendency to banish us from her bosom, would not only be cruel, but would be in direct violation of those principles which have been the boast of this republic.
_Resolved_, That we view with deep abhorrence the unmerited stigma attempted to be cast upon the reputation of the free people of color, by the promoters of this measure, "that they are a dangerous and useless part of the community." When in the state of disfranchis.e.m.e.nt in which they live, in the hour of danger they ceased to remember their wrongs, and rallied round the standard of their country.
_Resolved_, That we will never separate ourselves from the slave population in this country: they are our brethren by the ties of consanguinity, of suffering, and of wrong; and we feel that there is more virtue in suffering privations with them, than enjoying fancied advantages for a season.
_Resolved_, That having the strongest confidence in the justice of G.o.d, and in the philanthropy of the free states, we cheerfully submit our destinies to the guidance of Him who suffers not a sparrow to fall to the ground without his special Providence."
We praise the Lord, that while the white man slumbered over the wrongs of his enslaved countrymen, or stretched out his hands to rivet the bondman"s chains, or to thrust his brother from his side, your sympathy and your compa.s.sion, like that of the beneficent Redeemer, was wakeful and active, and called forth from the depths of your souls the following soul-stirring appeal. Where, oh! where were the hearts of Americans, that they responded not to your call?
"We _humbly_, respectfully, and fervently entreat and beseech your disapprobation of the plan of colonization now offered by the "American Society for Colonizing the Free People of Color of the United States." Here, in the city of Philadelphia, where the voice of the suffering sons of Africa was first heard--where was first commenced the work of abolition on which heaven has smiled (for it could have success only from the great Master); let not a purpose be a.s.sisted which will stay the cause of the entire abolition of slavery in the United States, and which may defeat it altogether--which proffers to those who do not ask for them what it calls _benefits_, but which they consider _injuries_--and which must ensure to the mult.i.tude, whose prayers can only reach you through us, _misery_, _sufferings_, and _perpetual slavery_."
Nor can we pa.s.s by unnoticed the n.o.ble conduct of our sister in Ohio, who, when her father proposed to bring her to the North, where she might pa.s.s for a white woman, and settle upon her a comfortable independence, replied that she would never forsake her people--that she would rather suffer with them than enjoy all the advantages he promised. We do homage to the virtue which preferred to endure affliction with the oppressed, rather than to bask in the sunshine of worldly prosperity and popular favor.
But for the dignified opposition which you manifested--but for the developments which you made of the real designs and fearful consequences of colonization, your guilty country would probably have added to her manifold transgressions against the descendants of Africa, the transcendant crime of banishing from her sh.o.r.es those whom she has deeply injured, and whom she is bound by every law of justice and of mercy to cherish with peculiar tenderness. But for your virtuous and uncompromising hostility to the Colonization Society, a portion of our countrymen might never have been disabused of the idle and fallacious expectation, that this scheme would cure the moral evil of slavery, and put an end to the horrible slave traffic carried on on the coast of Africa. You saw that the root of the evil was in our own land, and that the expatriation of the best part of our colored population, so far from abolishing slavery, would render the condition of the enslaved tenfold more hopeless. You saw that the only means of destroying the slave trade, was to destroy the spirit of slavery; and how just have been your conclusions, let the following testimonies declare--we extract from an official communication to the secretary of the Navy, by Captain Joseph J. Nicholson of the Navy:--"The slave trade, within the last three years, has seriously injured the colony. Not only has it diverted the industry of the natives, but it has effectually cut off the communication with the interior. The war parties being in the habit of plundering and kidnapping for slaves all whom they meet, whether parties to the war or not, the daring of the slaver increases with the demand for slaves, which could not of late be supplied by the usual means; and within a year four slave factories have been established almost within sight of the Colony."
The following statement is taken from the "Colored American:"--A vessel arrived at Halifax on the 12th ult., from Kingston, Jamaica, which reports, that when two days out she fell in with a Spanish slaver bound to Havana, having four hundred poor wretched beings on board, in a state of starvation. Forty had died for want of food. The captain stated that the poor creatures had, during the past month, subsisted on rice water."
Had we not been blinded by interest and by prejudice, our reason might have taught us that as long as the republic of the U. S. is a mart where human flesh and souls of men are bought and sold, so long will European and American cupidity furnish human merchandise for this detestable commerce. Thousands of slaves have been introduced into the United States through the island of Cuba, since the slave trade was declared piracy by our national legislature. We stand before the world as a nation of hypocrites, and you are equally concerned, as American citizens, to labor to bring your country to a sense of her crimes. You are equally concerned to do all that can be done, to arrest the progress of the spirit of colonization, which takes our countrymen from their native land without their consent, by giving them the cruel alternative of slavery or banishment, breaks up the tenderest ties of nature and casts them on a foreign soil. And what is our international slave trade, but compulsory colonization. "There have been transported--doubtless without their consent--from the older slave states to Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Arkansas, during the year 1836, the enormous number of two hundred and fifty thousand slaves."--_Eman._
We deeply deplore the situation of our free colored citizens in the slaveholding states, we sympathize in their trials, we know that the oppressive laws enacted against them are to use the language of a writer in the Richmond Whig of March 21, 1832, "A code of penal laws in many respects worthy the temper of Draco, written indeed in blood.... By this code information to them is proscribed, social intercourse interdicted, religious worship in most of its forms prohibited." We know that these unrighteous decrees have driven many of our Southern brethren to a foreign land in the hope of finding on the sh.o.r.es of heathen Africa, a degree of liberty, independence and happiness which they saw no human probability of enjoying in Christian America, but while we sympathize with them in their sufferings, of which the free people of color in the non-slaveholding States largely partic.i.p.ate, yet we believe that patient submission to these cruel inflictions, would have identified their interests more with that portion of our countrymen who are toiling in bonds, and would have advanced the cause of emanc.i.p.ation. The cruel policy of the slaveholder to separate as much as possible the free people of color from the slaves, to prevent all coalition between them, to destroy all sympathy of feeling and oneness of interest, has succeeded but too well--the free colored people of the South stand by themselves, unacknowledged as men by their haughty superiors, unknown as brethren by their down-trodden "countrymen in chains," a few of them have even been tempted to join hands with the oppressor and rivet bonds on those for whose deliverance they should have toiled and wept and prayed. One of the results of this crafty policy has been, that many have been seduced to abandon their country and their enslaved brethren, to seek for themselves and their families an asylum from the _oppression_ of Christian, Republican, America. These, however unintentionally, have, we believe, fully answered the designs of the subtle politicians of the South and have bound more firmly around the quivering limbs of their kindred the manacles of slavery.--The desertion of such has added strength to the Colonization interest, and cherished the insane hope that all our valuable free colored citizens might in time be transported to Africa. We, therefore, deprecate the departure of every free colored American, _unless impelled by a sense of duty_, because it is injurious to the interests of the slave and contributes to foster in the bosoms of their white fellow-citizens that prejudice which Satan created and which he is now using as one of the most powerful engines to prevent the elevation of the free and the enfranchis.e.m.e.nt of the enslaved.
Our brethren and sisters in bondage have their eyes fixed with the deepest intensity of interest upon their friends in the Northern States, they are looking unto us as unto "Saviours who shall come up on Mount Zion" to deliver them out of the hand of the spoiler. Jehovah has entrusted us with a high and holy commission he has commanded us to "Defend the poor and fatherless, to do justice to the afflicted and needy, to deliver the poor and needy; to rid them out of the hand of the wicked" and we believe G.o.d will bless our efforts in this righteous cause, if we are willing to endure the reproach, the calumny, the self-denial which is involved in this Reformation, but beloved friends let us keep ever in mind, that unless we are men and women of prayer, we shall not be able to effect what we profess so earnestly to desire, viz., that G.o.d would melt the hearts of the slaveholders thro" the powerful influence of his Holy Spirit that they may "let their captives go," "not for price nor reward," but for their own peace sake and because the love of G.o.d is shed abroad in their hearts. When the Redeemer of men was about to ascend to the bosom of the Father and resume the glory which he had with Him before the world was, he promised his disciples that the power of the Holy Ghost should come upon them, and that they should be witnesses for Him to the uttermost parts of the earth. What was the effect upon their minds?" "They all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication with the women." Stimulated by the confident expectation that Jesus would fulfil his gracious promise, they poured out their hearts in fervent supplications, probably for strength to do the work which he had appointed them unto, for they felt that without Him they could do nothing and they consecrated themselves on the altar of G.o.d, to the great and glorious enterprize of preaching the unsearchable riches of Christ to a lost and perishing world. Have we less precious promises in the Scriptures of Truth, may we not claim of our G.o.d the blessing promised unto those who consider the poor, the Lord will preserve them and keep them alive and they shall be blessed upon the earth. Does not the language "Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye did it unto me," belong to all who are rightly engaged in endeavoring to unloose the bondman"s fetters? Shall we not then do as the Apostles did, shall we not in view of the two millions of heathen in our very midst, in view of the souls that are going down in an almost unbroken phalanx to utter perdition, continue in prayer and supplication that G.o.d will grant us the supplies of his Spirit to prepare us for that work which he has given us to do. Shall not the wail of the mother as she surrenders her only child to the grasp of the ruthless kidnapper, or the trader in human blood, animate our devotions. Shall not the manifold crimes and horrors of slavery excite more ardent outpourings at the throne of grace to grant repentance to our guilty country and permit us to aid in preparing the way for the glorious second Advent of the Messiah, by preaching deliverance to the captives and the opening of the prison doors to those who are bound.
But not alone for the down-trodden slave should we be engaged to labor, our country from Maine to Florida is more or less connected with, and involved in, the awful sin of slavery, "the blood of the poor innocents is found in our skirts," the free states are partakers with those who rob G.o.d of his creatures, for although most of them have nominally no slaves on their soil, they do deliver unto slaveholders the servant that is escaped from his master, in direct violation of the command of Jehovah "Hide the outcasts: bewray not him that wandereth.--Let mine outcasts dwell with thee; be thou a covert to them from the face of the spoiler."--The unhappy fugitive goaded almost to madness by oppression finds no resting place for the sole of his foot until he reaches the icy sh.o.r.es of Canada. An exile from his native land, because his soul cannot bow down to the unbridled pa.s.sions of his fellow-worm; because he n.o.bly dares to take the freedom which Jehovah gave him with the first inspiration of his vital breath, because rather than be a slave he braves the storm and plunges through the flood and suffers hunger and thirst and nakedness and cold. For thus magnanimously recoiling from unjust usurpation he is branded as a fugitive, and hunted through our free states with all the fierceness of savage barbarity, while no measures are adopted to procure the repeal of these unrighteous decrees.
Oh when in this proud republic G.o.d maketh inquisition for blood, when he remembereth the cry of the humble--where shall we appear? will not the language be uttered against us "the land is full of blood; the iniquity is exceeding great, mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity, but I will recompense their way upon their head."
Nor is the church less corrupt than the state, she exhibits now just such a departure from primitive purity as is described by the prophet Ezekiel in speaking of the Jewish Church.--"Thou didst trust in thine own beauty, because of thy renown. Thou hast also taken thy fair jewels of my gold and my silver which I had given thee, and madest to thyself images of men, and didst commit wh.o.r.edom with them. And tookest thy broidered garments and covered them, and thou hast set mine oil and mine incense before them." Is it not the fear and the _idolatry of man_ which makes so many of those who fill the sacred office of ministers of Jesus Christ stand dumb on the watch-tower; so many unclose their sacrilegious lips to stigmatize the G.o.d of Love as the founder of the system of American slavery--what but the deep corruption of the church could tempt her to cast over this b.l.o.o.d.y moloch her broidered garment, and try by s.n.a.t.c.hing a few jewels to adorn her diadem from Ceylon and the Sandwich Islands, from Burmah, and from the Rocky Mountains, to turn away the public gaze from the leprosy which consumes her vitals.
Let us not be deceived by the seeming prosperity of our country. Babylon was filled with gold and with silver, and Belshazzars impious feast was crowned with wine and luxurious delicacies, yet even then the hand-writing on the wall was appointed, the doom of that great empire was decided in the court of heaven, and the irreversible sentence was soon p.r.o.nounced upon her haughty monarch, "Thou hast lifted up thyself, G.o.d hath numbered thy kingdom and finished it." Let us not be deceived by the fair appearances of the church, her efforts, and her revivals.
Slavery is the master sin of our country; it is twined around the horns of the altar--it is couched beneath the table on which are laid the sacramental elements--it rises rampant in our pulpits--its spirit may be seen stalking with unblushing effrontery through almost every temple of benevolence, every seminary of learning,[2] every Church of G.o.d where the white and the colored are as carefully separated as though the one was washed and made white in the blood of the Lamb, and the other was an unclean thing, whose very touch was contamination. We feel constrained to enter our solemn protest against this unrighteous practice in all its forms.--"G.o.d has created of ONE BLOOD all the nations to dwell on all the face of the earth," and whoever interposes a barrier to their living as brethren, breaks the harmony which He has established. Let the Church in America deck herself as she may with the Lord"s jewels, so long as she cherishes the Hydra-headed monster slavery in her bosom, so long will her oblations on heathen sh.o.r.es be vain, her incense an abomination, her solemn meetings a mockery. Our souls are drawn out in tender sympathy to our dear brothers and sisters who are the victims of this cruel prejudice, may you experience that peace which the world can neither give nor take away, and rejoice in the promise that the last shall be first.
[2] We mention as an example worthy of imitation the n.o.ble individuals who took the lead at Lane Seminary in contending for the rights of our colored citizens, and when their work there was accomplished, went among their colored brethren and sisters, and met them as equals bearing the impress of that G.o.d who stampt his image on his creature man. If each of our seminaries could boast of such champions of Human Rights, our colleges and schools might soon be regenerated, and our temples of science be thrown open to all our citizens irrespective of color or condition.