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diff --git a/14555-0.txt b/14555-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0f37733 --- /dev/null +++ b/14555-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10670 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14555 *** + +[Illustration: Wm. Lloyd Garrison] + + + + +WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON + + + + + +_THE ABOLITIONIST_ + +BY ARCHIBALD H. GRIMKE, M.A. + + + +Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data + +Grimké, Archibald Henry, 1849-1930. + +William Lloyd Garrison, the abolitionist. + +Reprint of the 1891 ed. published by Funk & Wagnalls, New York. + +1. Garrison, William Lloyd, 1805-1879. + +Reprinted from the edition of 1891, New York First AMS edition published +in 1974 + + + +_To Mrs. Anna M. Day, who has been a mother to my little girl, and a +sister to me, this book is gratefully and affectionately dedicated, by_ + +_The Author_. + + + + + +PREFACE. + + +The author of this volume desires by way of preface to say just two +things:--firstly, that it is his earnest hope that this record of a hero +may be an aid to brave and true living in the Republic, so that the +problems knocking at its door for solution may find the heads, the +hands, and the hearts equal to the performance of the duties imposed by +them upon the men and women of this generation. William Lloyd Garrison +was brave and true. Bravery and truth were the secret of his marvelous +career and achievements. May his countrymen and countrywomen imitate his +example and be brave and true, not alone in emergent moments, but in +everyday things as well. + +So much for the author's firstly, now for his secondly, which is to +acknowledge his large indebtedness in the preparation of this book to +that storehouse of anti-slavery material, the story of the life of +William Lloyd Garrison by his children. Out of its garnered riches he +has filled his sack. + +HYDE PARK, MASS., May 10, 1891. + + + + + + +CONTENTS. + + + +Dedication III + +Preface V + +CHAPTER I. + +The Father of the Man 11 + +CHAPTER II. + +The Man Hears a Voice: Samuel, Samuel! 38 + +CHAPTER III. + +The Man Begins his Ministry 69 + +CHAPTER IV. + +The Hour and the Man 92 + +CHAPTER V. + +The Day of Small Things 110 + +CHAPTER VI. + +The Heavy World is Moved 118 + +CHAPTER VII. + +Master Strokes 133 + +CHAPTER VIII. + +Colorphobia 157 + +CHAPTER IX. + +Agitation and Repression 170 + +CHAPTER X. + +Between the Acts 192 + +CHAPTER XI. + +Mischief Let Loose 208 + +CHAPTER XII. + +Flotsam and Jetsam 233 + +CHAPTER XIII. + +The Barometer Continues to Fall 242 + +CHAPTER XIV. + +Brotherly Love Fails, and Ideas Abound 263 + +CHAPTER XV. + +Random Shots 292 + +CHAPTER XVI. + +The Pioneer Makes a New and Startling Departure 306 + +CHAPTER XVII. + +As in a Looking Glass 319 + +CHAPTER XVIII. + +The Turning of a Long Lane 335 + +CHAPTER XIX. + +Face to Face 356 + +CHAPTER XX. + +The Death-Grapple 370 + +CHAPTER XXI. + +The Last 385 + +Index 397 + + + + + + + + +WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. + + + +CHAPTER I. + + +THE FATHER OF THE MAN. + + +William Lloyd Garrison was born in Newburyport, Massachusetts, December +10, 1805. Forty years before, Daniel Palmer, his great-grandfather, +emigrated from Massachusetts and settled with three sons and a daughter +on the St. John River, in Nova Scotia. The daughter's name was Mary, and +it was she who was to be the future grandmother of our hero. One of the +neighbors of Daniel Palmer was Joseph Garrison, who was probably an +Englishman. He was certainly a bachelor. The Acadian solitude of five +hundred acres and Mary Palmer's charms proved too much for the +susceptible heart of Joseph Garrison. He wooed and won her, and on his +thirtieth birthday she became his wife. The bride herself was but +twenty-three, a woman of resources and of presence of mind, as she +needed to be in that primitive settlement. Children and cares came apace +to the young wife, and we may be sure confined her more and more closely +to her house. But in the midst of a fast-increasing family and of +multiplying cares a day's outing did occasionally come to the busy +housewife, when she would go down the river to spend it at her father's +farm. Once, ten years after her marriage, she had a narrow escape on one +of those rare days. She had started in a boat with her youngest child, +Abijah, and a lad who worked in her household. It was spring and the St. +John was not yet clear of ice. Higher up the river the ice broke that +morning and came floating down with the current. The boat in which Mary +Garrison and her baby rode was overtaken by the fragments and wrecked. +The mother with her child sought refuge on a piece of ice and was driven +shoreward. Wrapping Abijah in all the clothes she could spare she threw +him ashore. She and the lad followed by the aid of an overhanging willow +bough. The baby was unharmed, for she had thrown him into a snow-bank. +But the perils of the river gave place to the perils of the woods. In +them Mary Garrison wandered with her infant, who was no less a personage +than the father of William Lloyd Garrison, until at length she found the +hut of a friendly Indian, who took her in and "entertained her with his +best words and deeds, and the next morning conducted her safely to her +father's." + +The Palmers were a hardy, liberty-loving race of farmers, and Joseph +Garrison was a man of unusual force and independence of character. The +life which these early settlers lived was a life lived partly on the +land and partly on the river. They were equally at home with scythe or +oar. Amid such terraqueous conditions it was natural enough that the +children should develop a passion for the sea. Like ducks many of them +took to the water and became sailors. Abijah was a sailor. The +amphibious habits of boyhood gave to his manhood a restless, roving +character. Like the element which he loved he was in constant motion. He +was a man of gifts both of mind and body. There was besides a strain of +romance and adventure in his blood. By nature and his seafaring life he +probably craved strong excitement. This craving was in part appeased no +doubt by travel and drink. He took to the sea and he took to the cup. +But he was more than a creature of appetites, he was a man of sentiment. +Being a man of sentiment what should he do but fall in love. The woman +who inspired his love was no ordinary woman, but a genuine Acadian +beauty. She was a splendid specimen of womankind. Tall she was, graceful +and admirably proportioned. Never before had Abijah in all his +wanderings seen a creature of such charms of person. Her face matched +the attractions of her form and her mind matched the beauty of her face. +She possessed a nature almost Puritanic in its abhorrence of sin, and in +the strength of its moral convictions. She feared to do wrong more than +she feared any man. With this supremacy of the moral sense there went +along singular firmness of purpose and independence of character. When a +mere slip of a girl she was called upon to choose between regard for her +religious convictions and regard for her family. It happened in this +wise. Fanny Lloyd's parents were Episcopalians, who were inclined to +view with contempt fellow-Christians of the Baptist persuasion. To have +a child of theirs identify herself with this despised sect was one of +those crosses which they could not and would not bear. But Fanny had in +a fit of girlish frolic entered one of the meetings of these low-caste +Christians. What she heard changed the current of her life. She knew +thenceforth that God was no respecter of persons, and that the crucified +Nazarene looked not upon the splendor of ceremonies but upon the +thoughts of the heart of His disciples. Here in a barn, amid vulgar +folk, and uncouth, dim surroundings, He had appeared, He, her Lord and +Master. He had touched her with that white unspeakable appeal. The +laughter died upon the fair girlish face and prayer issued from the +beautiful lips. If vulgar folk, the despised Baptists, were good enough +for the Christ, were they not good enough for her? Among them she had +felt His consecrating touch and among them she determined to devote +herself to Him. Her parents commanded and threatened but Fanny Lloyd was +bent on obeying the heavenly voice of duty rather than father and +mother. They had threatened that if she allowed herself to be baptised +they would turn her out of doors. Fanny was baptised and her parents +made good the threat. Their home was no longer her home. She had the +courage of her conviction--ability to suffer for a belief. + +Such was the woman who subsequently became the wife of Abijah Garrison, +and the mother of one of the greatest moral heroes of the century. +Abijah followed the sea, and she for several years with an increasing +family followed Abijah. First from one place and then another she glided +after him in her early married life. He loved her and his little ones +but the love of travel and change was strong within him. He was ever +restless and changeful. During one of his roving fits he emigrated with +his family from Nova Scotia to the United States. It was in the spring +of 1805 that he and they landed in Newburyport. The following December +his wife presented him with a boy, whom they called William Lloyd +Garrison. Three years afterward Abijah deserted his wife and children. +Of the causes which led to this act nothing is now known. Soon after his +arrival in Newburyport he had found employment. He made several voyages +as sailing-master in 1805-8 from that port. He was apparently during +these years successful after the manner of his craft. But he was not a +man to remain long in one place. What was the immediate occasion of his +strange behavior we can only conjecture. Possibly an increasing love for +liquor had led to domestic differences, which his pleasure-loving nature +would not brook. Certain it was that he was not like his wife. He was +not a man in whom the moral sense was uppermost. He was governed by +impulse and she by fixed moral and religious principles. He drank and +she abhorred the habit. She tried first moral suasion to induce him to +abandon the habit, and once, in a moment of wifely and motherly +indignation, she broke up one of his drinking parties in her house by +trying the efficacy of a little physical suasion. She turned the company +out of doors and smashed the bottles of liquor. This was not the kind of +woman whom Abijah cared to live with as a wife. He was not the sort of +man whom the most romantic love could attach to the apron-strings of any +woman. And in the matter of his cup he probably saw that this was what +he would be obliged to do as the condition of domestic peace. The +condition he rejected and, rejecting it, rejected and cast-off his wife +and family and the legal and moral responsibilities of husband and +father. + +Bitter days now followed and Fanny Garrison became acquainted with grief +and want. She had the mouths of three children to fill--the youngest an +infant at her breast. The battle of this broken-hearted woman for their +daily bread was as heroic as it was pathetic. She still lived in the +little house on School street where Lloyd was born. The owner, Martha +Farnham, proved herself a friend indeed to the poor harassed soul. Now +she kept the wolf from the door by going out as a monthly nurse--"Aunt +Farnham" looking after the little ones in her absence. She was put to +all her possibles during those anxious years of struggle and want. Even +Lloyd, wee bit of a boy, was pressed into the service. She would make +molasses candies and send him upon the streets to sell them. But with +all her industry and resource what could she do with three children +weighing her down in the fierce struggle for existence, rendered tenfold +fiercer after the industrial crisis preceding and following the War of +1812. Then it was that she was forced to supplement her scant earnings +with refuse food from the table of "a certain mansion on State street." +It was Lloyd who went for this food, and it was he who had to run the +gauntlet of mischievous and inquisitive children whom he met and who +longed for a peep into his tin pail. But the future apostle of +non-resistance was intensely resistant, we may be sure, on such +occasions. For, as his children have said in the story of his life: +"Lloyd was a thorough boy, fond of games and of all boyish sport. +Barefooted, he trundled his hoop all over Newburyport; he swam in the +Merrimac in summer, and skated on it in winter; he was good at sculling +a boat; he played at bat and ball and snowball, and sometimes led the +'Southend boys' against the Northenders in the numerous conflicts +between the youngsters of the two sections; he was expert with marbles. +Once, with a playmate, he swam across the river to 'Great Rock,' a +distance of three-fourths of a mile and effected his return against the +tide; and once, in winter, he nearly lost his life by breaking through +the ice on the river and reached the shore only after a desperate +struggle, the ice yielding as often as he attempted to climb upon its +surface. It was favorite pastime of the boys of that day to swim from +one wharf to another adjacent, where vessels from the West Indies +discharged their freight of molasses, and there to indulge in stolen +sweetness, extracted by a smooth stick inserted through the bung-hole. +When detected and chased, they would plunge into the water and escape to +the wharf on which they had left their clothes." Such was the little man +with a boy's irrepressible passion for frolic and fun. His passion for +music was hardly less pronounced, and this he inherited from his mother, +and exercised to his heart's content in the choir of the Baptist Church. +These were the bright lines and spots in his strenuous young life. He +played and sang the gathering brood of cares out of his own and his +mother's heart. He needed to play and he needed to sing to charm away +from his spirit the vulture of poverty. That evil bird hovered ever over +his childhood. It was able to do many hard things to him, break up his +home, sunder him from his mother, force him at a tender age to earn his +bread, still there was another bird in the boy's heart, which sang out +of it the shadow and into it the sunshine. Whatever was his lot there +sang the bird within his breast, and there shone the sun over his head +and into his soul. The boy had unconsciously drawn around him a circle +of sunbeams, and how could the vulture of poverty strike him with its +wings or stab him with its beak. When he was about eight he was parted +from his mother, she going to Lynn, and he, wee mite of a man, remaining +in Newburyport. It was during the War of 1812, and pinching times, when +Fanny Garrison was at her wit's end to keep the wolf from devouring her +three little ones and herself into the bargain. With what tearing of the +heart-strings she left Lloyd and his little sister Elizabeth behind we +can now only imagine. She had no choice, poor soul, for unless she +toiled they would starve. So with James, her eldest son, she went forth +into the world to better theirs and her own condition. Lloyd went to +live in Deacon Ezekiel Bartlett's family. They were good to the little +fellow, but they, too, were poor. The Deacon, among other things, sawed +wood for a living, and Lloyd hardly turned eight years, followed him in +his peregrinations from house to house doing with his tiny hands what he +could to help the kind old man. Soon Fanny Lloyd's health, which had +supported her as a magic staff in all those bitter years since Abijah's +desertion of wife and children, began in the battle for bread in Lynn, +to fail her. And so, in her weakness, and with a great fear in her heart +for her babies, when she was gone from them into the dark unknown +forever, she bethought her of making them as fast as possible +self-supporting. And what better way was there than to have the boys +learn some trade. James she had already apprenticed to learn the mystery +of shoemaking. And for Lloyd she now sent and apprenticed him, too, to +the same trade. Oh! but it was hard for the little man, the heavy +lapstone and all this thumping and pounding to make a shoe. Oh! how the +stiff waxen threads cut into his soft fingers, how all his body ached +with the constrained position and the rough work of shoemaking. But one +day the little nine-year-old, who was "not much bigger than a last," was +able to produce a real shoe. Then it was probably that a dawning +consciousness of power awoke within the child's mind. He himself by +patience and industry had created a something where before was nothing. +The eye of the boy got for the first time a glimpse of the man, who was +still afar off, shadowy in the dim approaches of the hereafter. But the +work proved altogether beyond the strength of the boy. The shoemaker's +bench was not his place, and the making of shoes for his kind was not +the mission for which he was sent into the world. And now again poverty, +the great scene-shifter, steps upon the stage, and Fanny Lloyd and her +two boys are in Baltimore on that never-ending quest for bread. She had +gone to work in a shoe factory established by an enterprising Yankee in +that city. The work lasted but a few months, when the proprietor failed +and the factory was closed. In a strange city mother and children were +left without employment. In her anxiety and distress a new trouble, the +greatest and most poignant since Abijah's desertion, wrung her with a +supreme grief. James, the light and pride of her life, had run away from +his master and gone to sea. Lloyd, poor little homesick Lloyd, was the +only consolation left the broken heart. And he did not want to live in +Baltimore, and longed to return to Newburyport. So, mindful of her +child's happiness, and all unmindful of her own, she sent him from her +to Newburyport, which he loved inexpressibly. He was now in his eleventh +year. Very happy he was to see once more the streets and landmarks of +the old town--the river, and the old house where he was born, and the +church next door and the school-house across the way and the dear +friends whom he loved and who loved him. He went again to live with the +Bartletts, doing with his might all that he could to earn his daily +bread, and to repay the kindness of the dear old deacon and his family. +It was at this time that he received his last scrap of schooling. He +was, as we have seen, but eleven, but precious little of that brief and +tender time had he been able to spend in a school-house. He had gone to +the primary school, where, as his children tell us, he did not show +himself "an apt scholar, being slow in mastering the alphabet, and +surpassed even by his little sister Elizabeth." During his stay with +Deacon Bartlett the first time, he was sent three months to the +grammar-school, and now on his return to this good friend, a few more +weeks were added to his scant school term. They proved the last of his +school-days, and the boy went forth from the little brick building on +the Mall to finish his education in the great workaday world, under +those stern old masters, poverty and experience. By and by Lloyd was a +second time apprenticed to learn a trade. It was to a cabinetmaker in +Haverhill, Mass. He made good progress in the craft, but his young heart +still turned to Newburyport and yearned for the friends left there. He +bore up against the homesickness as best he could, and when he could +bear it no longer, resolved to run away from the making of toy bureaus, +to be once more with the Bartletts. He had partly executed this +resolution, being several miles on the road to his old home, when his +master, the cabinetmaker, caught up to him and returned him to +Haverhill. But when he heard the little fellow's story of homesickness +and yearning for loved places and faces, he was not angry with him, but +did presently release him from his apprenticeship. And so the boy to his +great joy found himself again in Newburyport and with the good old +wood-sawyer. Poverty and experience were teaching the child what he +never could have learned in a grammar-school, a certain acquaintance +with himself and the world around him. There was growing within his +breast a self-care and a self-reliance. It was the autumn of 1818, when, +so to speak, the boy's primary education in the school of experience +terminated, and he entered on the second stage of his training under the +same rough tutelage. At the age of thirteen he entered the office of the +Newburyport _Herald_ to learn to set types. At last his boy's hands had +found work which his boy's heart did joy to have done. He soon mastered +the compositor's art, became a remarkably rapid composer. As he set up +the thoughts of others, he was not slow in discovering thoughts of his +own demanding utterance. The printer's apprentice felt the stirrings of +a new life. A passion for self-improvement took possession of him. He +began to read the English classics, study American history, follow the +currents of party politics. No longer could it be said of him that he +was not an apt pupil. He was indeed singularly apt. His intelligence +quickened marvelously. The maturing process was sudden and swift. Almost +before one knows it the boy in years has become a man in judgment and +character. This precipitate development of the intellectual life in him, +produced naturally enough an appreciable enlargement of the _ego_. The +young eagle had abruptly awakened to the knowledge that he possessed +wings; and wings were for use--to soar with. Ambition, the desire to +mount aloft, touched and fired the boy's mind. As he read, studied, and +observed, while his hands were busy with his work, there was a constant +fluttering going on in the eyrie of his thoughts. By an instinct +analogous to that which sends a duck to the water, the boy took to the +discussion of public questions. It was as if an innate force was +directing him toward his mission--the reformation of great public +wrongs. At sixteen he made his first contribution to the press. It was a +discussion of a quasi-social subject, the relation of the sexes in +society. He was at the impressionable age, when the rosy god of love is +at his tricks. He was also at a stage of development, when boys are +least attractive, when they are disagreeably virile, full of their own +importance and the superiority of their sex. In the "Breach of the +Marriage Promise," by "An Old Bachelor," these signs of adolescence are +by no means wanting, they are, on the contrary, distinctly present and +palpable. But there were other signs besides these, signs that the youth +had had his eyes wide open to certain difficulties which beset the +matrimonial state and to the conventional steps which lead to it, and +that he had thought quite soberly, if not altogether wisely upon them. +The writer was verdant, to be sure, and self-conscious, and partial in +his view of the relations of the sexes, but there was withal a serious +purpose in the writing. He meant to expose and correct what he conceived +to be reprehensible conduct on the part of the gentler sex, bad feminine +manners. Just now he sees the man's side of the shield, a few years +later he will see the woman's side also. He ungallantly concludes "to +lead the '_single life_,' and not," as he puts it, "trouble myself about +the ladies." A most sapient conclusion, considering that this veteran +misogynist was but sixteen years old. During the year following the +publication of this article, he plied his pen with no little +industry--producing in all fifteen articles on a variety of topics, such +as "South American Affairs," "State Politics," "A Glance at Europe," +etc., all of which are interesting now chiefly as showing the range of +his growing intelligence, and as the earliest steps by which he acquired +his later mastery of the pen and powerful style of composition. In a +letter addressed to his mother about this time, the boy is full of +Lloyd, undisguisedly proud of Lloyd, believes in Lloyd. "When I peruse +them over" (_i.e._ those fifteen communications to the press), "I feel +absolutely astonished," he naïvely confesses, "at the different subjects +which I have discussed, and the style in which they are written. Indeed +it is altogether a matter of surprise that I have met with such signal +success, seeing I do not understand _one single rule of grammar_, and +having a very inferior education." The printer's lad was plainly not +lacking in the bump of approbativeness, or the quality of +self-assertiveness. The quick mother instinct of Fanny Garrison took +alarm at the tone of her boy's letter. Possibly there was something in +Lloyd's florid sentences, in his facility of expression, which reminded +her of Abijah. He, too, poor fellow, had had gifts in the use of the +pen, and what had he done, what had he come to? Had he not forsaken wife +and children by first forsaking the path of holiness? So she pricks the +boy's bubble, and points him to the one thing needful--God in the soul. +But in her closing words she betrays what we all along suspected, her +own secret pleasure in her son's success, when she asks, "Will you be so +kind as to bring on your pieces that you have written for me to see?" +Ah! was she not every inch a mother, and how Lloyd did love her. But she +was no longer what she had been. And no wonder, for few women have been +called to endure such heavy burdens, fight so hopelessly the battle for +bread, all the while her heart was breaking with grief. Disease had made +terrible inroads upon her once strong and beautiful person. Not the +shadow of the strength and beauty of her young womanhood remained. She +was far away from her early home and friends, far away from her darling +boy, in Baltimore. James, her pride, was at sea, Elizabeth, a sweet +little maiden of twelve, had left her to take that last voyage beyond +another sea, and Abijah, without one word of farewell, with the silence +of long years unbroken, he, too, also! had hoisted sail and was gone +forever. And now in her loneliness and sorrow, knowing that she, too, +must shortly follow, a great yearning rose up in her poor wounded heart +to see once more her child, the comfort and stay of her bitter life. And +as she had written to him her wish and longing, the boy went to her, saw +the striking change, saw that the broken spirit of the saintly woman was +day by day nearing the margin of the dark hereafter, into whose healing +waters it would bathe and be whole again. The unspeakable experience of +mother and son, during this last meeting is not for you and me, reader, +to look into. Soon after Lloyd's return to Newburyport a cancerous tumor +developed on her shoulder, from the effects of which she died September +3, 1823, at the age of forty-five. More than a decade after her death +her son wrote: "She has been dead almost eleven years; but my grief at +her loss is as fresh and poignant now as it was at that period;" and he +breaks out in praise of her personal charms in the following original +lines: + + "She was the masterpiece of womankind-- + In shape and height majestically fine; + Her cheeks the lily and the rose combined; + Her lips--more opulently red than wine; + Her raven locks hung tastefully entwined; + Her aspect fair as Nature could design; + And then her eyes! so eloquently bright! + An eagle would recoil before her light." + + +The influence of this superb woman was a lasting power for truth and +righteousness in the son's stormy life. For a whole year after her +death, the grief of the printer's lad over his loss, seemed to have +checked the activity of his pen. For during that period nothing of his +appeared in the _Herald_. But after the sharp edge of his sorrow had +worn off, his pen became active again in the discussion of public men +and public questions. It was a period of bitter personal and political +feuds and animosities. The ancient Federal party was _in articulo +mortis_. The death-bed of a great political organization proves +oftentimes the graveyard of lifelong friendships. For it is a scene of +crimination and recrimination. And so it happened that the partisans of +John Adams, and the partisans of John Adams's old Secretary of State, +Timothy Pickering, were in 1824 doing a thriving business in this +particular line. Into this funereal performance our printer's apprentice +entered with pick and spade. He had thus early a _penchant_ for +controversy, a soldier's scent for battle. If there was any fighting +going on he proceeded directly to have a hand in it. And it cannot be +denied that that hand was beginning to deal some manly and sturdy blows, +whose resound was heard quite distinctly beyond the limits of his +birthplace. His communications appeared now, not only in the _Herald_, +but in the Salem _Gazette_ as well. Now it was the Adams-Pickering +controversy, now the discussion of General Jackson as a presidential +candidate, now the state of the country in respect of parties, now the +merits of "American Writers," which afforded his 'prentice hand the +requisite practice in the use of the pen. He had already acquired a +perfect knowledge of typesetting and the mechanical makeup of a +newspaper. During his apprenticeship he took his first lesson in the art +of thinking on his feet in the presence of an audience. The audience to +be sure were the members of a debating club, which he had organized. He +was very ambitious and was doubtless looking forward to a political +career. He saw the value of extempore speech to the man with a future, +and he wisely determined to possess himself of its advantage. He little +dreamt, however, to what great use he was to devote it in later years. +There were other points worth noting at this time, and which seemed to +prophecy for him a future of distinction. He possessed a most attractive +personality. His energy and geniality, his keen sense of humor, his +social and bouyant disposition, even his positive and opinionated +temper, were sources of popular strength to him. People were strongly +drawn to him. His friends were devoted to him. He had that quality, +which we vaguely term magnetic, the quality of attaching others to us, +and maintaining over them the ascendency of our character and ideas. + +In the midst of all this progress along so many lines, the days of his +apprenticeship in the _Herald_ office came to an end. He was just +twenty. With true Yankee enterprise and pluck, he proceeded to do for +himself what for seven years he had helped to do for another--publish a +newspaper. And with a brave heart the boy makes his launch on the +uncertain sea of local journalism and becomes editor and publisher of a +real, wide-awake sheet, which he calls the _Free Press._ The paper was +independent in politics and proved worthy of its name during the six +months that Garrison sat in the managerial chair. Here is the tone which +the initial number of the paper holds to the public: "As to the +political course of the _Free Press_, it shall be, in the widest sense +of the term, _independent_. The publisher does not mean by this, to rank +amongst those who are of everybody's and of nobody's opinion; ... nor +one of whom the old French proverb says: _Il ne soit sur quel pied +danser_. [He knows not on which leg to dance.] Its principles shall be +open, magnanimous and free. It shall be subservient to no party or body +of men; and neither the craven fear of loss, nor the threats of the +disappointed, nor the influence of power, shall ever awe one single +opinion into silence. Honest and fair discussion it will court; and its +columns will be open to all temperate and intelligent communications +emanating from whatever political source. In fine we will say with +Cicero: 'Reason shall prevail with him more than popular opinion.' They +who like this avowal may extend their encouragement; and if any feel +dissatisfied with it, they must act accordingly. The publisher cannot +condescend to solicit their support." This was admirable enough in its +way, but it was poor journalism some will say. And without doubt when +judged by the common commercial standard it _was_ poor journalism. In +this view it is a remarkable production, but in another aspect it is +still more remarkable in that it took with absolute accuracy the measure +of the man. As a mental likeness it is simply perfect. At no time during +his later life did the picture cease to be an exact moral representation +of his character. It seems quite unnecessary, therefore, to record that +he proceeded immediately to demonstrate that it was no high sounding and +insincere declaration. For in the second number, he mentions with that +singular serenity, which ever distinguished him on such occasions, the +discontinuance of the paper on account of matter contained in the first +issue, by ten indignant subscribers. "Nevertheless," he adds, "our +happiness at the loss of such subscribers is not a whit abated. We _beg_ +no man's patronage, and shall ever erase with the same cheerfulness that +we insert the name of any individual.... Personal or political offence +we shall studiously avoid--truth _never_." Here was plainly a wholly new +species of the _genus homo_ in the editorial seat. What, expect to make +a newspaper pay and not beg for patronage? Why the very idea was enough +to make newspaperdom go to pieces with laughter. Begging for patronage, +howling for subscribers, cringing, crawling, changing color like the +chameleon, howling for Barabbas or bellowing against Jesus, all these +things must your newspaper do to prosper. On them verily hang the whole +law and all the profits of modern journalism. This is what the devil of +competition was doing in that world when William Lloyd Garrison entered +it. It took him up into an exceedingly high mountain, we may be certain, +and offered him wealth, position, and power, if he would do what all +others were doing. And he would not. He went on editing and publishing +his paper for six months regardful only of what his reason +approved--regardless always of the disapproval of others. Not once did +he palter with his convictions or juggle with his self-respect for the +sake of pelf or applause. His human horizon was contracted, to be sure. +It could hardly be otherwise in one so young. His world was his country, +and patriotism imposed limits upon his affections. "Our country, our +whole country, and nothing but our country," was the ardent motto of the +_Free Press_. The love of family comes, in the order of growth, before +the love of country; and the love of country precedes the love of all +mankind. "First the blade, then the ear, then the full corn in the ear," +is the great law of love in the soul as of corn in the soil. Besides +this contraction of the affections, there was also manifest in his first +journalistic venture a deficiency in the organ of vision, a failure to +see into things and their relations. What he saw he reported faithfully, +suppressing nothing, adding nothing. But the objects which passed across +the disk of his editoral intelligence were confined almost entirely to +the surface of things, to the superficies of national life. He had not +the ken at twenty to penetrate beneath the happenings of current +politics. Of the existence of slavery as a supreme reality, we do not +think that he then had the faintest suspicion. No shadow of its +tremendous influence as a political power seemed to have arrested for a +brief instant his attention. He could copy into his paper this atrocious +sentiment which Edward Everett delivered in Congress, without the +slightest comment or allusion. "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 musket on my shoulder +than that of putting down a servile insurrection at the South." The +reason is plain enough. Slavery was a _terra incognito_ to him then, a +book of which he had not learned the ABC. Mr. Everett's language made no +impression on him, because he had not the key to interpret its +significance. What he saw, that he set down for his readers, without +fear or favor. He had not seen slavery, knew nothing of the evil. +Acquaintance with the deeper things of life, individual or national, +comes only with increasing years, they are hardly for him who has not +yet reached his majority. Slavery was the very deepest thing in the life +of the nation sixty-four years ago. And if Garrison did not then so +understand it, neither did his contemporaries, the wisest and greatest +of them so understand it. The subject of all others which attracted his +attention, and kept his editorial pen busy, was the claim of +Massachusetts for indemnity from the general government, for certain +disbursements made by her for the defence of her sea-coast during the +war of 1812. This matter, which forms but a mere dust point in the +perspective of history, his ardent young mind mistook for a principal +object, erected into a permanent question in the politics of the times. +But the expenditure of enormous energies upon things of secondary and of +even tertiary importance, to the neglect of others of prime and lasting +interest, is supremely human. He was errant where all men go astray. But +the schoolmaster of the nation was abroad, and was training this young +man for the work he was born to do. These six months were, therefore, +not wasted, for in the university of experience he did ever prove +himself an apt scholar. One lesson he had learned, which he never needed +to relearn. Just what that lesson was, he tells in his valedictory to +the subscribers of the _Free Press_, as follows: "This is a time-serving +age; and he who attempts to walk uprightly or speak honestly, cannot +rationally calculate upon speedy wealth or preferment." A sad lesson, to +be sure, for one so young to learn so thoroughly. Perhaps some reader +will say that this was cynical, the result of disappointment. But it was +not cynical, neither was it the result of disappointment. It was +unvarnished truth, and more's the pity, but truth it was none the less. +It was one of those hard facts, which he of all men, needed to know at +the threshold of his experience with the world. Such a revelation proves +disastrous to the many who go down to do business in that world. +Ordinary and weak and neutral moral constitutions are wrecked on this +reef set in the human sea. Like a true mariner he had written it boldly +on his chart. There at such and such a point in the voyage for the +golden fleece, were the rocks and the soul-devouring dragons of the way. +Therefore, oh! my soul, beware. What, indeed, would this argonaut of the +press take in exchange for his soul? Certainly not speedy wealth nor +preferment. Ah! he could not praise where he ought to reprobate; could +not reprobate where praise should be the meed. He had no money and +little learning, but he had a conscience and he knew that he must be +true to that conscience, come to him either weal or woe. Want renders +most men vulnerable, but to it, he appeared, at this early age, +absolutely invulnerable. Should he and that almost omnipotent +inquisitor, public opinion, ever in the future come into collision upon +any principle of action, a keen student of human nature might forsee +that the young recusant could never be starved into silence or +conformity to popular standards. And with this stern, sad lesson +treasured up in his heart, Garrison graduated from another room in the +school-house of experience. All the discoveries of the young journalist +were not of this grim character. He made another discovery altogether +different, a real gem of its kind. The drag-net of a newspaper catches +all sorts of poets and poetry, good, bad, and indifferent--oftener the +bad and indifferent, rarely the good. The drag-net of the _Free Press_ +was no exception to this rule; but, one day, it fetched up from the +depths of the hard commonplaces of our New England town life a genuine +pearl. We will let Mr. Garrison tell the story in his own way: + + + "Going up-stairs to my office, one day, I observed a letter + lying near the door, to my address; which, on opening, I found + to contain an original piece of poetry for my paper, the _Free + Press_. The ink was very pale, the handwriting very small; and, + having at that time a horror of newspaper original poetry--which + has rather increased than diminished with the lapse of time--my + first impulse was to tear it in pieces, without reading it; the + chances of rejection, after its perusal, being as ninety-nine to + one; ... but summoning resolution to read it, I was equally + surprised and gratified to find it above mediocrity, and so gave + it a place in my journal.... As I was anxious to find out the + writer, my post-rider, one day, divulged the secret, stating + that he had dropped the letter in the manner described, and that + it was written by a Quaker lad, named Whittier, who was daily at + work on the shoemaker's bench, with hammer and lapstone, at East + Haverhill. Jumping into a vehicle, I lost no time in driving to + see the youthful rustic bard, who came into the room with + shrinking diffidence, almost unable to speak, and blushing like + a maiden. Giving him some words of encouragement, I addressed + myself more particularly to his parents, and urged them with + great earnestness to grant him every possible facility for the + development of his remarkable genius." + + +Garrison had not only found a true poet, but a true friend as well, in +the Quaker lad, John Greenleaf Whittier. The friendship which sprang up +between the two was to last during the lifetime of the former. Neither +of them in those days of small things could have possibly by any flight +of the imagination foreseen how their two lives, moving in parallel +lines, would run deep their shining furrows through one of the greatest +chapters of human history. But I am anticipating, and that is a vice of +which no good storyteller ought to be guilty. So, then, let me +incontinently return from this excursion and pursue the even tenor of my +tale. + +Garrison had stepped down from his elevated position as the publisher +and editor of the _Free Press_. He was without work, and, being +penniless, it behooved him to find some means of support. With the +instinct of the bright New England boy, he determined to seek his +fortunes in Boston. If his honesty and independence put him at a +disadvantage, as publisher and editor, in the struggle for existence, he +had still his trade as a compositor to fall back upon As a journeyman +printer he would earn his bread, and preserve the integrity of an +upright spirit. And so without a murmur, and with cheerfulness and +persistency, he hunted for weeks on the streets of Boston for a chance +to set types. This hunting for a job in a strange city was discouraging +enough. Twice before had he visited the place, which was to be his +future home. Once when on his way to Baltimore to see his mother, and +once afterward when on a sort of pleasure tramp with three companions. +But the slight knowledge which he was able to obtain of the town and its +inhabitants under these circumstances did not now help him, when from +office to office he went in quest of something to do. After many +failures and renewed searchings, he found what he was after, an +opportunity to practice his trade. Business was dull, which kept our +journeyman printer on the wing; first at one and then at another +printing office we find him setting types for a living during the year +1827. The winning of bread was no easy matter; but he was not ashamed to +work, neither was he afraid of hard work. During this year, he found +time to take a hand in a little practical politics. There was in July, +1827, a caucus of the Federal party to nominate a successor to Daniel +Webster in the House of Representatives. Young Garrison attended this +caucus, and made havoc of its cut and dried programme, by moving the +nomination of Harrison Gray Otis, instead of the candidate, a Mr. +Benjamin Gorham, agreed upon by the leaders. Harrison Gray Otis was one +of Garrison's early and particular idols. He was, perhaps, the one +Massachusetts politician whom the young Federalist had placed on a +pedestal. And so on this occasion he went into the caucus with a written +speech in his hat, eulogistic of his favorite. He had meant to have the +speech at his tongue's end, and to get it off as if on the spur of the +moment. But the speech stayed where it was put, in the speaker's hat, +and failed to materialize where and when it was wanted on the speaker's +tongue. As the mountain would not go to Mahomet, Mahomet like a sensible +prophet went to the mountain. Our orator in imitation of this +illustrious example, bowed to the inevitable and went to his mountain. +Pulling his extempore remarks out of his hat, he delivered himself of +them to such effect as to create quite an Otis sentiment in the meeting. +This performance was, of course, a shocking offence in the eyes of +those, whose plans it had disturbed. With one particular old fogy he got +into something of a newspaper controversy in consequence. The +"consummate assurance" of one so young fairly knocked the breath out of +this Mr. Eminent Respectability; it was absolutely revolting to all his +"ideas of propriety, to see a stranger, a man who never paid a tax in +our city, and perhaps no where else, to possess the impudence to take +the lead and nominate a candidate for the electors of Boston!" The +"young gentleman of six months standing," was not a whit abashed or awed +by the commotion which he had produced. That was simply a case of cause +and effect. But he seemed in turn astonished at his opponent's evident +ignorance of William Lloyd Garrison. "It is true," he replied, with the +proud dignity of conscious power, "it is true that my acquaintance in +this city is limited. I have sought none. Let me assure him, however, +that if my life be spared, my name shall one day be known to the +world--at least to such extent that common inquiry shall be unnecessary. +This, I know will be deemed excessive vanity--but time shall prove it +prophetic." To the charge of youth he makes this stinging rejoinder, +which evinces the progress he was making in the tournament of language: +"The little, paltry sneers at my youth by your correspondent have long +since become pointless. It is the privileged abuse of old age--the +hackneyed allegation of a thousand centuries--the damning _crime_ to +which all men have been subjected. I leave it to metaphysicians to +determine the precise moment when wisdom and experience leap into +existence, when, for the first time, the mind distinguishes truth from +error, selfishness from patriotism, and passion from reason. It is +sufficient for me that I am understood." This was Garrison's first +experience with "gentlemen of property and standing" in Boston. It was +not his last, as future chapters will abundantly show. + + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + + +THE MAN HEARS A VOICE: SAMUEL, SAMUEL! + + +There is a moment in the life of every serious soul, when things, which +were before unseen and unheard in the world around him become visible +and audible. This startling moment comes to some sooner, to others +later, but to all, who are not totally given up to the service of self, +at sometime surely. From that moment a change passes over such an one, +for more and more he hears mysterious voices, and clearer and more clear +he sees apparitional forms floating up from the depths above which he +kneels. Whence come they, what mean they? He leans over the abyss, and +lo! the sounds to which he hearkens are the voices of human weeping and +the forms at which he gazes are the apparitions of human woe; they +beckon to him, and the voices beseech him in multitudinous accent and +heart-break: "Come over, come down, oh! friend and brother, and help +us." Then he straightway puts away the things and the thoughts of the +past and girding himself with the things, and the thoughts of the divine +OUGHT and the almighty MUST, he goes over and down to the rescue. + +Such an epochal first moment came to William Lloyd Garrison in the +streets of Boston. Amid the hard struggle for bread he heard the abysmal +voices, saw the gaunt forms of misery. He was a constant witness of the +ravages of the demon of drink--saw how strong men succumbed, and weak +ones turned to brutes in its clutch. And were they not his brothers, the +strong men and the weak ones alike? And how could he, their keeper, see +them desperately beset and not fly to their help? Ah! he could not and +did not walk by on the other side, but, stripling though he was, rushed +to do battle with the giant vice, which was slaying the souls and the +bodies of his fellow citizens. Rum during the three first decades of the +present century was, like death, no respecter of persons, entering with +equal freedom the homes of the rich, and the hovels of the poor. It was +in universal demand by all classes and conditions of men. No occasion +was esteemed too sacred for its presence and use. It was an honored +guest at a wedding, a christening, or a funeral. The minister whose +hands were laid in baptismal blessing on babes, or raised in the holy +sacrament of love over brides, lifted also the glass; and the selfsame +lips which had spoken the last words over the dead, drank and made merry +presently afterward among the decanters on the side-board. It mattered +not for what the building was intended--whether for church, school, or +parsonage, rum was the grand master of ceremonies, the indispensable +celebrant at the various stages of its completion. The party who dug the +parson out after a snow-storm, verily got their reward, a sort of +prelibation of the visionary sweets of that land, flowing not, according +to the Jewish notion, with milk and _honey_, but according to the +revised version of Yankeedom, with milk and _rum_. Rum was, forsooth, a +very decent devil, if judged by the exalted character of the company it +kept. It stood high on the rungs of the social ladder and pulled and +pushed men from it by thousands to wretchedness and ruin. So flagrant +and universal was the drinking customs of Boston then that dealers +offered on the commons during holidays, without let or hindrance, the +drunkard's glass to the crowds thronging by extemporized booths and +bars. Shocking as was the excesses of this period "nothing comparatively +was heard on the subject of intemperance--it was seldom a theme for the +essayist--the newspapers scarcely acknowledged its existence, excepting +occasionally in connection with some catastrophes or crimes--the +Christian and patriot, while they perceived its ravages, formed no plans +for its overthrow--and it did not occur to any that a paper devoted +mainly to its suppression, might be made a direct and successful engine +in the great work of reform. Private expostulations and individual +confessions were indeed sometimes made; but no systematic efforts were +adopted to give precision to the views or a bias to the sentiments of +the people." Such was the state of public morals and the state of public +sentiment up to the year 1826, when there occurred a change. This change +was brought about chiefly through the instrumentality of a Baptist city +missionary, the Rev. William Collier. His labors among the poor of +Boston had doubtless revealed to him the bestial character of +intemperance, and the necessity of doing something to check and put an +end to the havoc it was working. With this design he established the +_National Philanthropist_ in Boston, March 4, 1826. The editor was one +of Garrison's earliest acquaintances in the city. Garrison went after +awhile to board with him, and still later entered the office of the +_Philanthropist_ as a type-setter. The printer of the paper, Nathaniel +H. White and young Garrison, occupied the same room at Mr. Collier's. +And so almost before our hero was aware, he had launched his bark upon +the sea of the temperance reform. Presently, when the founder of the +paper retired, it seemed the most natural thing in the world, that the +young journeyman printer, with his editorial experience and ability, +should succeed him as editor. His room-mate, White, bought the +_Philanthropist_, and in April 1828, formally installed Garrison into +its editorship. Into this new work he carried all his moral earnestness +and enthusiasm of purpose. The paper grew under his hand in size, +typographical appearance, and in editorial force and capacity. It was a +wide-awake sentinel on the wall of society; and week after week its +columns bristled and flashed with apposite facts, telling arguments, +shrewd suggestions, cogent appeals to the community to destroy the +accursed thing. No better education could he have had as the preparation +for his life work. He began to understand then the strength of +deep-seated public evils, to acquaint himself with the methods and +instruments with which to attack them. The _Philanthropist_ was a sort +of forerunner, so far as the training in intelligent and effective +agitation was concerned, of the _Genius of Universal Emancipation_ and +of the _Liberator_. One cannot read his sketch of the progress made by +the temperance reform, from which I have already quoted, and published +by him in the _Philanthropist_ in April, 1828, without being struck by +the strong similitude of the temperance to the anti-slavery movement in +their beginnings. "When this paper was first proposed," the young +temperance editor records, "it met with a repulsion which would have +utterly discouraged a less zealous and persevering man than our +predecessor. The moralist looked on doubtfully--the whole community +esteemed the enterprise desperate. Mountains of prejudice, overtopping +the Alps, were to be beaten down to a level--strong interest, connected +by a thousand links, severed--new habits formed; Every house, and almost +every individual, in a greater or less degree, reclaimed. Derision and +contumely were busy in crushing this sublime project in its +birth--coldness and apathy encompassed it on every side--but our +predecessor, nevertheless, went boldly forward with a giant's strength +and more than a giant's heart--conscious of difficulties and perils, +though not disheartened, armed with the weapons of truth--full of +meekness, yet certain of a splendid victory--and relying on the promises +of God for the issue." What an inestimable object-lesson to Garrison was +the example of this good man going forth singlehanded to do battle with +one of the greatest evils of the age! It was not numerical strength, but +the faith of one earnest soul that is able in the world of ideas and +human passions to remove mountains out of the way of the onward march of +mankind. This truth, we may be sure, sunk many fathoms deep into the +mind of the young moralist. And no wonder. For the results of two years +agitation and seed sowing were of the most astonishing character. "The +change which has taken place in public sentiment," he continues, "is +indeed remarkable ... incorporated as intemperance _was_, and still +_is_, into our very existence as a people.... A regenerating spirit is +everywhere seen; a strong impulse to action has been given, which, +beginning in the breasts of a few individuals, and then affecting +villages, and cities, and finally whole States, has rolled onward +triumphantly through the remotest sections of the republic. As union and +example are the levers adopted to remove this gigantic vice, temperance +societies have been rapidly multiplied, many on the principle of entire +abstinence, and others making it a duty to abstain from encouraging the +distillation and consumption of spirituous liquors. Expressions of the +deep abhorrence and sympathy which are felt in regard to the awful +prevalence of drunkenness are constantly emanating from legislative +bodies down to various religious conventions, medical associations, +grand juries, etc., etc. But nothing has more clearly evinced the +strength of this excitement than the general interest taken in this +subject by the conductors of the press. From Maine to the Mississippi, +and as far as printing has penetrated--even among the Cherokee +Indians--but one sentiment seems to pervade the public papers, viz., the +necessity of strenuous exertion for the suppression of intemperance." +Such a demonstration of the tremendous power of a single righteous soul +for good, we may be sure, exerted upon Garrison lasting influences. What +a revelation it was also of the transcendent part which the press was +capable of playing in the revolution of popular sentiment upon moral +questions; and of the supreme service of organization as a factor in +reformatory movements. The seeds sowed were faith in the convictions of +one man against the opinions, the prejudices, and the practices of the +multitude; and knowledge of and skill in the use of the instruments by +which the individual conscience may be made to correct and renovate the +moral sense of a nation. But there was another seed corn dropped at this +time in his mind, and that is the immense utility of woman in the work +of regenerating society. She it is who feels even more than man the +effects of social vices and sins, and to her the moral reformer should +strenuously appeal for aid. And this, with the instinct of genius, +Garrison did in the temperance reform, nearly seventy years ago. His +editorials in the _Philanthropist_ in the year 1828 on "Female +Influence" may be said to be the _courier avant_ of the Woman's +Christian Temperance Union of to-day, as they were certainly the +precursors of the female anti-slavery societies of a few years later. + +But now, without his knowing it, a stranger from a distant city entered +Boston with a message, which was to change the whole purpose of the +young editor's life. It was Benjamin Lundy, the indefatigable friend of +the Southern slave, the man who carried within his breast the whole +menagerie of Southern slavery. He was fresh from the city which held the +dust of Fanny Garrison, who had once written to her boy in Newburyport, +how the good God had cared for her in the person of a colored woman. +Yes, she had written: "The ladies are all kind to me, and I have a +colored woman that waits on me, that is so kind no one can tell how kind +she is; and although a slave to man, yet a free-born soul, by the grace +of God. Her name is Henny, and should I never see you again, and you +should come where she is, remember her, for your poor mother's sake." +And now, without his dreaming of it, this devoted Samaritan in black, +who, perhaps, had long ago joined her dear friend in the grave, was +coming to that very boy, now grown to manhood, to claim for her race +what the mother had asked for her, the kind slave-woman. Not one of all +those little ones of the nation but who had a home in the many-mansioned +heart of Lundy. He had been an eye and ear witness of the barbarism of +slavery. "My heart," he sobbed, "was deeply grieved at the gross +abomination; I heard the wail of the captive; I felt his pang of +distress, and the iron entered my soul." With apostolic faith and zeal +he had for a decade been striving to free the captive, and to tie up his +bruised spirit. Sadly, but with a great love, he had gone about the +country on his self-imposed task. To do this work he had given up the +business of a saddler, in which he had prospered, had sacrificed his +possessions, and renounced the ease that comes with wealth; had courted +unheard-of hardships, and wedded himself for better and worse to poverty +and unremitting endeavor. Nothing did he esteem too dear to relinquish +for the slave. Neither wife nor children did he withhold. Neither the +summer's heat nor the winter's cold was able to daunt him or turn him +from his object. Though diminutive and delicate of body, no distance or +difficulty of travel was ever able to deter him from doing what his +humanity had bidden him do. From place to place, through nineteen +States, he had traveled, sowing as he went the seeds of his holy +purpose, and watering them with his life's blood. Not Livingstone nor +Stanley on the dark continent exceeded in sheer physical exertion and +endurance the labors of this wonderful man. He belongs in the category +of great explorers, only the irresistible passion and purpose, which +pushed him forward, had humanity, not geography, as their goal. Where, +in the lives of either Stanley or Livingstone do we find a record of +more astonishing activity and achievement than what is contained in +these sentences, written by Garrison of Lundy, in the winter of 1828? +"Within a few months he has traveled about twenty-four hundred miles, of +which upwards of nineteen hundred were performed _on foot!_ during which +time he has held nearly fifty public meetings. Rivers and mountains +vanish in his path; midnight finds him wending his solitary way over an +unfrequented road; the sun is anticipated in his rising. Never was moral +sublimity of character better illustrated." Such was the marvelous man, +whose visit to Boston, in the month of March, of the year 1828, dates +the beginning of a new epoch in the history of America. The event of +that year was not the "Bill of Abominations," great as was the national +excitement which it produced; nor was it yet the then impending +political struggle between Jackson and Adams, but the unnoticed meeting +of Lundy and Garrison. Great historic movements are born not in the +whirlwinds, the earthquakes, and the pomps of human splendor and power, +but in the agonies and enthusiasms of grand, heroic spirits. Up to this +time Garrison had had, as the religious revivalist would say, no +"realizing sense" of the enormity of slave-holding. Occasionally an +utterance had dropped from his pen which indicated that his heart was +right on the subject, but which evinced no more than the ordinary +opposition to its existence, nor any profound convictions as to his own +or the nation's duty in regard to its extinction. His first reference to +the question appeared in connection with a notice made by him in the +_Free Press_ of a spirited poem, entitled "Africa," in which the +authoress sings of: + + "The wild and mingling groans of writhing millions, + Calling for vengeance on my guilty land." + + +He commended the verses "to all those who wish to cherish female genius, +and whose best feelings are enlisted in the cause of the poor oppressed +sons of Africa." He was evidently impressed, but the impression belonged +to the ordinary, transitory sort. His next recorded utterance on the +subject was also in the _Free Press_. It was made in relation with some +just and admirable strictures on the regulation Fourth of July oration, +with its "ceaseless apostrophes to liberty, and fierce denunciations of +tyranny." Such a tone was false and mischievous--the occasion was for +other and graver matter. "There is one theme," he declares, "which +should be dwelt upon, till our whole country is free from the curse--it +is slavery." The emphasis and energy of the rebuke and exhortation lifts +this second allusion to slavery, quite outside of merely ordinary +occurrences. It was not an ordinary personal occurrence for it served to +reveal in its lightning-like flash the glow and glare of a conscience +taking fire. The fire slumbered until a few weeks before Lundy entered +Boston, when there were again the glow and glare of a moral sense in the +first stages of ignition on the enormity of slave institutions. The act +of South Carolina in making it illegal to teach a colored person to read +and write struck this spark from his pen: "There is something +unspeakably pitiable and alarming," he writes in the _Philanthropist_, +"in the state of that society where it is deemed necessary, for +self-preservation, to seal up the mind and debase the intellect of man +to brutal incapacity.... Truly the alternatives of oppression are +terrible. But this state of things cannot always last, nor ignorance +alone shield us from destruction." His interest in the question was +clearly growing. But it was still in the gristle of sentiment waiting to +be transmuted into the bone and muscle of a definite and determined +purpose, when first he met Lundy. This meeting of the two men, was to +Garrison what the fourth call of God was to Samuel, the Hebrew lad, who +afterward became a prophet. As the three previous calls of God and the +conversations with Eli had prepared the Jewish boy to receive and +understand the next summons of Jehovah, so had Garrison's former +experience and education made him ready for the divine message when +uttered in his ears by Lundy. All the sense of truth and the passion for +righteousness of the young man replied to the voice, "Here am I." The +hardening process of growth became immediately manifest in him. Whereas +before there was sentimental opposition to slavery, there began then an +opposition, active and practical. When Lundy convened many of the +ministers of the city to expose to them the barbarism of slavery, +Garrison sat in the room, and as Lundy himself records, "expressed his +approbation of my doctrines." The young reformer must needs stand up and +make public profession of his new faith and of his agreement with the +anti-slavery principles of the older. But it was altogether different +with the assembled ministers. Lundy, as was his wont on such occasions, +desired and urged the formation of an anti-slavery society, but these +sons of Eli of that generation were not willing to offend their +slave-holding brethren in the South. Eyes they had, but they refused to +see; ears, which they stopped to the cry of the slave breaking in +anguish and appeal from the lips of this modern man of God. Garrison, +eleven years later, after the lips, which were eloquent then with their +great sorrow, were speechless in the grave, told the story of that +ministers' meeting. And here is the story: + +"He (Lundy) might as well have urged the stones in the streets to cry +out in behalf of the perishing captives. Oh, the moral cowardice, the +chilling apathy, the criminal unbelief, the cruel skepticism, that were +revealed on that memorable occasion! My soul was on fire then, as it is +now, in view of such a development. Every soul in the room was heartily +opposed to slavery, but, it would terribly alarm and enrage the South to +know that an anti-slavery society existed in Boston. But it would do +harm rather than good openly to agitate the subject. But _perhaps a +select_ committee might be formed, to be called by some name that would +neither give offence, nor excite suspicion as to its real design! One or +two only were for bold and decisive action; but as they had neither +station nor influence, and did not rank among the wise and prudent, +their opinion did not weigh very heavily, and the project was finally +abandoned. Poor Lundy! that meeting was a damper to his feelings." There +is no doubt that Garrison was one of the very few present, who "were for +bold and decisive action" against the iniquity. The grief and +disappointment of his brave friend touched his heart with a brother's +affection and pity. The worldly wisdom and lukewarmness of the clergy +kindled a righteous indignation within his freedom-loving soul. This was +his first bitter lesson from the clergy. There were, alas, many and +bitterer experiences to follow, but of them he little recked at the +time. As this nineteenth-century prophet mused upon the horrible thing +the fires of a life purpose burned within him. And oftener thenceforth +we catch glimpses of the glow and glare of a soul bursting into flame. +The editorials in the _Philanthropist_, which swiftly followed Lundy's +visit, began to throw off more heat as the revolving wheels of an +electrical machine throw off sparks. The evil that there was in the +world, under which, wherever he turned, he saw his brother man +staggering and bleeding, was no longer what it had been, a vague and +shadowy apparition, but rather a terrible and tremendous reality against +which he must go forth to fight the fight of a lifetime. And so he +girded him with his life purpose and flung his moral earnestness against +the triple-headed curse of intemperance, slavery, and war. A mighty +human love had begun to flow inward and over him. And as the tide +steadily rose it swallowed and drowned all the egoism of self and race +in the altruism of an all-embracing humanity. When an apprentice in the +office of the Newburyport _Herald_, and writing on the subject of South +American affairs he grew hot over the wrongs suffered by American +vessels at Valparaiso and Lima. He was for finishing "with cannon what +cannot be done in a conciliatory and equitable manner, where justice +demands such proceedings." This was at seventeen when he was a boy with +the thoughts of a boy. Six years later he is a man who has looked upon +the sorrows of men. His old boy-world is far behind him, and the +ever-present sufferings of his kind are in front of him. War now is no +longer glorious, for it adds immeasurably to the sum of human misery. +War ought to be abolished with intemperance and slavery. And this duty +he began to utter in the ears of his country. "The brightest traits in +the American character will derive their luster, not from the laurels +picked from the field of blood, not from the magnitude of our navy and +the success of our arms," he proclaimed, "but from our exertions to +banish war from the earth, to stay the ravages of intemperance among all +that is beautiful and fair, to unfetter those who have been enthralled +by chains, which we have forged, and to spread the light of knowledge +and religious liberty, wherever darkness and superstition reign.... The +struggle is full of sublimity, the conquest embraces the world." Lundy +himself did not fully appreciate the immense gain, which his cause had +made in the conversion of Garrison into an active friend of the slave. +Not at once certainly. Later he knew. The discovery of a kindred spirit +in Boston exerted probably no little influence in turning for the second +time his indefatigable feet toward that city. He made it a second visit +in July, 1828, where again he met Garrison. His experience with the +ministers did not deter him from repeating the horrible tale wherever he +could get together an audience. This time he secured his first public +hearing in Boston. It was in the Federal Street Baptist Church. He spoke +not only on the subject of slavery itself, the growth of anti-slavery +societies, but on a new phase of the general subject, viz., the futility +of the Colonization Society as an abolition instrument. Garrison was +present, and treasured up in his heart the words of his friend. He did +not forget how Lundy had pressed upon his hearers the importance of +petitioning Congress for the abolition of slavery in the District of +Columbia, as we shall see further on. But poor Lundy was unfortunate +with the ministers. He got this time not the cold shoulder alone but a +clerical slap in the face as well. He had just sat down when the pastor +of the church, Rev. Howard Malcolm, uprose in wrath and inveighed +against any intermeddling of the North with slavery, and brought the +meeting with a high hand to a close. This incident was the first +collision with the church of the forlorn hope of the Abolition movement. +Trained as Garrison was in the orthodox creed and sound in that creed +almost to bigotry, this behavior of a standard-bearer of the church, +together with the apathy displayed by the clergy on a former occasion, +caused probably the first "little rift within the lute" of his creed, +"that by and by will make the music mute, and, ever widening, slowly +silence all." For in religion as in love, "Unfaith in aught is want of +faith in all." The Rev. Howard Malcolm's arbitrary proceeding had +prevented the organization of an anti-slavery committee. But this was +affected at a second meeting of the friends of the slave. Garrison was +one of the twenty gentlemen who were appointed such a committee. His +zeal and energy far exceeded the zeal and energy of the remaining +nineteen. He did not need the earnest exhortation of Lundy to impress +upon his memory the importance of "activity and steady perseverance." He +perceived almost at once that everything depended on them. And so he had +formed plans for a vigorous campaign against the existence of slavery in +the District of Columbia. But before he was ready to set out along the +line of work, which he had laid down for Massachusetts, the scene of his +labors shifted to Bennington, Vermont. Before he left Boston, Lundy had +recognized him as "a valuable coadjutor." The relationship between the +two men was becoming beautifully close. The more Lundy saw of Garrison, +the more he must have seemed to him a man after his own heart. And so no +wonder that he was solicitous of fastening him to his cause with hooks +of steel. The older had written the younger reformer a letter almost +paternal in tone--he must do thus and thus, he must not be disappointed +if he finds the heavy end of the burthen borne by himself, while those +associated with him do little to keep the wheels moving, he must +remember that "a few will have the labor to perform and the honor to +share." Then there creeps into his words a grain of doubt, a vague fear +lest his young ally should take his hands from the plough and go the way +of all men, and here are the words which Paul might have written to +Timothy: "I hope you will persevere in your work, steadily, but not make +too large calculations on what may be accomplished in a particularly +stated time. You have now girded on a holy warfare. Lay not down your +weapons until honorable terms are obtained. _The God of hosts is on your +side._ Steadiness and faithfulness will most assuredly overcome every +obstacle." The older apostle had yet to learn that the younger always +did what he undertook in the field of morals and philanthropy. + +But the scene had shifted from Boston to Bennington, and with the young +reformer goes also his plan of campaign for anti-slavery work. The +committee of twenty, now nineteen since his departure, slumbered and +slept in the land of benevolent intentions, a practical illustration of +Lundy's pungent saying, that "philanthropists are the slowest creatures +breathing. They think forty times before they act." The committee never +acted, but its one member in Vermont did act, and that promptly and +powerfully as shall shortly appear. Garrison had gone to Bennington to +edit the _Journal of the Times_ in the interest of the reelection of +John Quincy Adams to the Presidency. For this object he was engaged as +editor of the paper. What he was engaged to do he performed faithfully +and ably, but along with his fulfillment of his contract with the +friends of Mr. Adams, he carried the one which he had made with humanity +likewise. In his salutatory he outlined his intentions in this regard +thus: "We have three objects in view, which we shall pursue through +life, whether in this place or elsewhere--namely, the suppression of +intemperance and its associate vices, the gradual emancipation of every +slave in the republic, and the perpetuity of national peace. In +discussing these topics what is wanting in vigor shall be made up in +zeal." From the issue of that first number if the friends of Adams had +no cause to complain of the character of his zeal and vigor in their +service, neither had the friends of humanity. What he had proposed doing +in Massachusetts as a member of the anti-slavery committee of twenty, he +performed with remarkable energy and success in Vermont. It was to +obtain signatures not by the hundred to a petition for the abolition of +slavery in the District of Columbia, but by the thousands, and that from +all parts of the State. He sent copies of the petition to every +postmaster in Vermont with the request that he obtain signatures in his +neighborhood. Through his exertions a public meeting of citizens of +Bennington was held and indorsed the petition. The plan for polling the +anti-slavery sentiment of the State worked admirably. The result was a +monster petition with 2,352 names appended. This he forwarded to the +seat of Government. It was a powerful prayer, but as to its effect, +Garrison had no delusions. He possessed even then singularly clear ideas +as to how the South would receive such petitions, and of the course +which it would pursue to discourage their presentation. He was no less +clear as to how the friends of freedom ought to carry themselves under +the circumstances. In the _Journal of the Times_ of November, 1828, he +thus expressed himself: "It requires no spirit of prophecy to predict +that it (the petition) will create great opposition. An attempt will be +made to frighten Northern 'dough-faces' as in case of the Missouri +question. There will be an abundance of furious declamation, menace, and +taunt. Are we, therefore, to approach the subject timidly--with half a +heart--as if we were treading on forbidden ground? No, indeed, but +earnestly, fearlessly, as becomes men, who are determined to clear their +country and themselves from the guilt of oppressing God's free and +lawful creatures." About the same time he began to make his assaults on +the personal representatives of the slave-power in Congress, cauterizing +in the first instance three Northern "dough-faces," who had voted +against some resolutions, looking to the abolition of the slave-trade +and slavery itself in the District of Columbia. So while the South thus +early was seeking to frighten the North from the agitation of the +slavery question in Congress, Garrison was unconsciously preparing a +countercheck by making it dangerous for a Northern man to practice +Southern principles in the National Legislature. He did not mince his +words, but called a spade a spade, and sin, sin. He perceived at once +that if he would kill the sin of slave-holding, he could not spare the +sinner. And so he spoke the names of the delinquents from the housetop of +the _Journal of the Times_, stamping upon their brows the scarlet letter +of their crime against liberty. He had said in the October before: "It +is time that a voice of remonstrance went forth from the North, that +should peal in the ears of every slaveholder like a roar of thunder.... +For ourselves, we are resolved to agitate this subject to the utmost; +nothing but death shall prevent us from denouncing a crime which has no +parallel in human depravity; we shall take high ground. _The alarm must +be perpetual._" A voice of remonstrance, with thunder growl +accompaniment, was rising higher and clearer from the pen of the young +editor. His tone of earnestness was deepening to the stern bass of the +moral reformer, and the storm breath of enthusiasm was blowing to a +blaze the glowing coals of his humanity. The wail of the fleeing +fugitive from the house of bondage sounded no longer far away and unreal +in his ears, but thrilled now right under the windows of his soul. The +masonic excitement and the commotion created by the abduction of Morgan +he caught up and shook before the eyes of his countrymen as an object +lesson of the million-times greater wrong daily done the slaves. "All +this fearful commotion," he pealed, "has arisen from the abduction of +_one man_. More than two millions of unhappy beings are groaning out +their lives in bondage, and scarcely a pulse quickens, or a heart leaps, +or a tongue pleads in their behalf. 'Tis a trifling affair, which +concerns nobody. Oh! for the spirit that rages, to break every fetter of +oppression!" Such a spirit was fast taking possession of the writer. + +Of this Lundy was well informed. He had not lost sight of his young +coadjutor, but had watched his course with great hope and growing +confidence. In him he found what he had discovered in no one else, +anti-slavery activity and perseverance. He had often found men who +protested loudly their benevolence for the negro, but who made not the +slightest exertion afterward to carry out their good wishes. "They will +pen a paragraph, perhaps an article, or so--and then--_the subject is +exhausted!_" It was not so with his young friend, the Bennington editor. +He saw that "argument and useful exertion on the subject of African +emancipation can never be exhausted until the system of slavery itself +be totally annihilated." He was faithful among the faithless found by +Lundy. To reassure his doubting leader, Garrison took upon himself +publicly a vow of perpetual consecration to the slave. "Before God and +our country," he declares, "we give our pledge that the liberation of +the enslaved Africans shall always be uppermost in our pursuits. The +people of New England are interested in this matter, and they must be +aroused from their lethargy as by a trumpet-call. They shall not quietly +slumber while we have the management of a press, or strength to hold a +pen." The question of slavery had at length obtained the ascendency over +all other questions in his regard. And when Lundy perceived this he set +out from Baltimore to Bennington to invite Garrison to join hands with +him in his emancipation movement at Baltimore. He performed the long +journey on foot, with staff in hand in true apostolic fashion. The two +men of God met among the mountains of Vermont, and when the elder +returned from the heights the younger had resolved to follow him to the +vales where men needed his help, the utmost which he could give them. He +agreed to join his friend in Baltimore and there edit with him his +little paper with the grand name (_The Genius of Universal +Emancipation_), devoted to preaching the gospel of the gradual +abolishment of American slavery. Garrison was to take the position of +managing editor, and Lundy to look after the subscription list. The +younger to be resident, the elder itinerant partner in the publication +of the paper. Garrison closed his relations with the _Journal of the +Times_, March 27, 1829, and delivered his valedictory to its readers. +This valedictory strikes with stern hammer-stroke the subject of his +thoughts. "Hereafter," it reads, "the editorial charge of this paper +will devolve on another person. I am invited to occupy a broader field, +and to engage in a higher enterprise; that field embraces the whole +country--that enterprise is in behalf of the slave population." + +"To my apprehension, the subject of slavery involves interests of +greater moment to our welfare as a republic, and demands a more prudent +and minute investigation than any other which has come before the +American people since the Revolutionary struggle--than all others which +now occupy their attention. No body of men on the face of the earth +deserve their charities, and prayers, and united assistance so much as +the slaves of this country; and yet they are almost entirely neglected. +It is true many a cheek burns with shame in view of our national +inconsistency, and many a heart bleeds for the miserable African. It is +true examples of disinterested benevolence and individual sacrifices are +numerous, particularly in the Southern States; but no systematic, +vigorous, and successful measures have been made to overthrow this +fabric of oppression. I trust in God that I may be the humble instrument +of breaking at least one chain, and restoring one captive to liberty; it +will amply repay a life of severe toil." The causes of temperance and +peace came in also for an earnest parting word, but they had clearly +declined to a place of secondary importance in the writer's regard. To +be more exact, they had not really declined, but the slavery question +had risen in his mind above both. They were great questions, but it was +_the_ question--had become _his_ cause. + +Lundy, after his visit to Garrison at Bennington, started on a trip to +Hayti with twelve emancipated slaves, whom he had undertaken to colonize +there. Garrison awaited in Boston the return of his partner to +Baltimore. The former, meanwhile, was out of employment, and sorely in +need of money. Never had he been favored with a surplusage of the root +of all evil. He was deficient in the money-getting and money-saving +instinct. Such was plainly not his vocation, and so it happened that +wherever he turned, he and poverty walked arm in arm, and the +interrogatory, "wherewithal shall I be fed and clothed on the morrow?" +was never satisfactorily answered until the morrow arrived. This led him +at times into no little embarrassment and difficulty. But since he was +always willing to work at the case, and to send his "pride on a +pilgrimage to Mecca," the embarrassment was not protracted, nor did the +difficulty prove insuperable. + +The Congregational societies of Boston invited him in June to deliver +before them a Fourth of July address in the interest of the Colonization +Society. The exercises took place in Park Street Church. Ten days before +this event he was called upon to pay a bill of four dollars for failure +to appear at the May muster. Refusing to do so, he was thereupon +summoned to come into the Police Court on the glorious Fourth to show +cause why he ought not to pay the amercement. He was in a quandary. He +did not owe the money, but as he could not be in two places at the same +time, and, inasmuch as he wanted very much to deliver his address before +the Congregational Societies, and did not at all long to make the +acquaintance of his honor, the Police Court Judge, he determined to pay +the fine. But, alack and alas! he had "not a farthing" with which to +discharge him from his embarrassment. Fortunately, if he wanted money he +did not want friends. And one of these, Jacob Horton, of Newburyport, +who had married his "old friend and playmate, Harriet Farnham," came to +his rescue with the requisite amount. + +On the day and place appointed Garrison appeared before the +Congregational Societies with an address, to the like of which, it is +safe to say, they had never before listened. It was the Fourth of July, +but the orator was in no holiday humor. There was not, in a single +sentence of the oration the slightest endeavor to be playful with his +audience. It was rather an eruption of human suffering, and of the +humanity of one man to man. What the Boston clergy saw that afternoon, +in the pulpit of Park Street Church, was the vision of a soul on fire. +Garrison burned and blazed as the sun that July afternoon burned and +blazed in the city's streets. None without escaped the scorching rays of +the latter, none within was able to shun the fervid heat of the former. +Those of my readers who have watched the effects of the summer's sun on +a track of sandy land and have noted how, about midday, the heat seems +to rise in sparkling particles and exhalations out of the hot, +surcharged surface, can form some notion of the moral fervor and passion +of this Fourth of July address, delivered more than sixty years ago, in +Boston. Through all the pores of it, over all the length and breadth of +it, there went up bright, burning particles from the sunlit sympathy and +humanity of the young reformer. + +In beginning, he animadverted, among other things, on the spread of +intemperance, of political corruption, on the profligacy of the press, +and, amid them all, the self-complacency and boastfulness of the +national spirit, as if it bore a charmed life. + +"But," he continued, "there is another evil which, if we had to contend +against nothing else, should make us quake for the issue. It is a +gangrene preying upon our vitals--an earthquake rumbling under our +feet--a mine accumulating material for a national catastrophe. It should +make this a day of fasting and prayer, not of boisterous merriment and +idle pageantry--a day of great lamentation, not of congratulatory joy. +It should spike every cannon, and haul down every banner. Our garb +should be sack-cloth--our heads bowed in the dust--our supplications for +the pardon and assistance of Heaven. + +"Sirs, I am not come to tell you that slavery is a curse, debasing in +its effects, cruel in its operations, fatal in its continuance. The day +and the occasion require no such revelation. I do not claim the +discovery as my own, that 'all men are born equal,' and that among their +inalienable rights are 'life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.' +Were I addressing any other than a free and Christian assembly, the +enforcement of this truth might be pertinent. Neither do I intend to +analyze the horrors of slavery for your inspection, nor to freeze your +blood with authentic recitals of savage cruelty. Nor will time allow me +to explore even a furlong of that immense wilderness of suffering which +remains unsubdued in our land. I take it for granted that the existence +of these evils is acknowledged, if not rightly understood. My object is +to define and enforce our duty, as Christians and philanthropists." + +This was, by way of exordium, the powerful skirmish line of the address. +Assuming the existence of the evil, he advanced boldly to his theme, +viz., the duty of abolishing it. To this end he laid down four +propositions, as a skillful general plants his cannon on the heights +overlooking and commanding his enemies' works. The first, broadly +stated, asserted the kinship of the slave to the free population of the +republic. They were men; they were natives of the country; they were in +dire need. They were ignorant, degraded, morally and socially. They were +the heathen at home, whose claims far outranked those in foreign lands; +they were higher than those of the "Turks or Chinese, for they have the +privileges of instruction; higher than the Pagans, for they are not +dwellers in a Gospel land; higher than our red men of the forest, for we +do not bind them with gyves, nor treat them as chattels." + +Then he turned hotly upon the Church, exclaiming: "What has Christianity +done by direct effort for our slave population? Comparatively nothing. +She has explored the isles of the ocean for objects of commiseration; +but, amazing stupidity! she can gaze without emotion on a multitude of +miserable beings at home, large enough to constitute a nation of +freemen, whom tyranny has heathenized by law. In her public services +they are seldom remembered, and in her private donations they are +forgotten. From one end of the country to the other her charitable +societies form golden links of benevolence, and scatter their +contributions like rain drops over a parched heath; but they bring no +sustenance to the perishing slave. The blood of souls is upon her +garments, yet she heeds not the stain. The clanking of the prisoner's +chains strike upon her ear, but they cannot penetrate her heart." + +Then, with holy wrath upon the nation, thus: + +"Every Fourth of July our Declaration of Independence is produced, with +a sublime indignation, to set forth the tyranny of the mother country, +and to challenge the admiration of the world. But what a pitiful detail +of grievances does this document present, in comparison with the wrongs +which our slaves endure? In the one case it is hardly the plucking of a +hair from the head; in the other, it is the crushing of a live body on +the wheel--the stings of the wasp contrasted with the tortures of the +Inquisition. Before God I must say that such a glaring contradiction as +exists between our creed and practice the annals of six thousand years +cannot parallel. In view of it I am ashamed of my country. I am sick of +our unmeaning declamation in praise of liberty and equality; of our +hypocritical cant about the inalienable rights of man. I would not for +my right hand stand up before a European assembly, and exult that I am +an American citizen, and denounce the usurpations of a kingly government +as wicked and unjust; or, should I make the attempt, the recollection of +my country's barbarity and despotism would blister my lips, and cover my +cheeks with burning blushes of shame." + +Passing to his second proposition, which affirmed the right of the free +States to be in at the death of slavery, he pointed out that slavery was +not sectional but national in its influence. If the consequences of +slave-holding did not flow beyond the limits of the slave section, the +right would still exist, on the principle that what affected injuriously +one part must ultimately hurt the whole body politic. But it was not +true that slavery concerned only the States where it existed--the parts +where it did not exist were involved by their constitutional liability +to be called on for aid in case of a slave insurrection, as they were in +the slave representation clause of the national compact, through which +the North was deprived of its "just influence in the councils of the +nation." And, furthermore, the right of the free States to agitate the +question inhered in the principle of majority rule--the white population +of the free States being almost double that of the slave States, "and +the voice of this overwhelming majority should be potential." He +repelled in strong language the wrongfulness of allowing the South to +multiply the votes of those freemen by the master's right to count three +for every five slaves, "because it is absurd and anti-republican to +suffer property to be represented as men, and _vice versa_, because it +gives the South an unjust ascendancy over other portions of territory, +and a power which may be perverted on every occasion." + +He looked without shrinking upon the possibility of disunion even then. + +"Now I say that, on the broad system of equal rights," he declared, +"this inequality should no longer be tolerated. If it cannot be speedily +put down--not by force but by fair persuasion--if we are always to +remain shackled by unjust, constitutional provisions, when the emergency +that imposed them has long since passed away; if we must share in the +guilt and danger of destroying the bodies and souls of men _as the price +of our Union_; if the slave States will haughtily spurn our assistance, +and refuse to consult the general welfare, then the fault is not ours if +a separation eventually takes place." + +Considering that he was in his twenty-fourth year, and that the +Abolition movement had then no actual existence, the orator evinced +surprising prescience in his forecast of the future, and of the strife +and hostility which the agitation was destined to engender. + +"But the plea is prevalent," he said, "that any interference by the free +States, however benevolent or cautious it might be, would only irritate +and inflame the jealousies of the South, and retard the cause of +emancipation. If any man believes that slavery can be abolished without +a struggle with the worst passions of human nature, quietly, +harmoniously, he cherishes a delusion. It can never be done, unless the +age of miracles returns. No; we must expect a collision, full of sharp +asperities and bitterness. We shall have to contend with the insolence, +and pride, and selfishness of many a heartless being. + +"Sirs, the prejudices of the North are stronger than those of the South; +they bristle like so many bayonets around the slaves; they forge and +rivet the chains of the nation. Conquer them and the victory is won. The +enemies of emancipation take courage from our criminal timidity.... We +are ... afraid of our own shadows, who have been driven back to the wall +again and again; who stand trembling under their whips; who turn pale, +retreat, and surrender at a talismanic threat to dissolve the Union...." +But the difficulties did not daunt him, nor the dangers cow him. He did +not doubt, but was assured, that truth was mighty and would prevail. +"Moral influence when in vigorous exercise," he said, "is irresistible. +It has an immortal essence. It can no more be trod out of existence by +the iron foot of time, or by the ponderous march of iniquity, than +matter can be annihilated. It may disappear for a time; but it lives in +some shape or other, in some place or other, and will rise with +renovated strength. Let us then be up and doing. In the simple and +stirring language of the stout-hearted Lundy, all the friends of the +cause must go to work, keep to work, hold on, and never give up." The +closing paragraph is this powerful peroration: "I will say, finally, +that I despair of the republic while slavery exists therein. If I look +up to God for success, no smile of mercy or forgiveness dispels the +gloom of futurity; if to our own resources, they are daily diminishing; +if to all history our destruction is not only possible but almost +certain. Why should we slumber at this momentous crisis? If our hearts +were dead to every thought of humanity; if it were lawful to oppress, +where power is ample; still, if we had any regard for our safety and +happiness, we should strive to crush the vampire which is feeding upon +our life-blood. All the selfishness of our nature cries aloud for a +better security. Our own vices are too strong for us, and keep us in +perpetual alarm; how, in addition to these, shall we be able to contend +successfully with millions of armed and desperate men, as we must, +eventually, if slavery do not cease?" Exit the apprentice, enter the +master. The period of preparation is ended, the time of action begun. +The address was the fiery cry of the young prophet ere he plunged into +the unsubdued wilderness of American slavery. + + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + + +THE MAN BEGINS HIS MINISTRY. + + +Some time in August, 1829, Garrison landed in Baltimore, and began with +Lundy the editorship of _The Genius of Universal Emancipation_. Radical +as the Park Street Church address was, it had, nevertheless, ceased to +represent in one essential matter his anti-slavery convictions and +principles. The moral impetus and ground-swell of the address had +carried him beyond the position where its first flood of feeling had for +the moment left him. During the composition of the address he was +transported with grief and indignation at the monstrous wrong which +slavery did the slaves and the nation. He had not thought out for +himself any means to rid both of the curse. The white heat of the +address destroyed for the instant all capacity for such thinking. "Who +can be amazed, temperate, and furious--in a moment? No man. The +expedition of his violent love outran the pauser reason" He had accepted +the colonization scheme as an instrument for removing the evil, and +called on all good citizens "to assist in establishing auxiliary +colonization societies in every State, county, and town"; and implored +"their direct and liberal patronage to the parent society." He had not +apparently, so much as dreamed of any other than gradual emancipation. +"The emancipation of all the slaves of this generation is most assuredly +out of the question," he said; "the fabric which now towers above the +Alps, must be taken away brick by brick, and foot by foot, till it is +reduced so low that it may be overturned without burying the nation in +its ruins. Years may elapse before the completion of the achievement; +generations of blacks may go down to the grave, manacled and lacerated, +without a hope for their children." He was on the Fourth of July a firm +and earnest believer in the equity and efficacy of gradualism. But after +that day, and some time before his departure for Baltimore, he began to +think on this subject. The more he thought the less did gradualism seem +defensible on moral grounds. John Wesley had said that slavery was the +"sum of all villainies"; it was indeed the sin of sins, and as such +ought to be abandoned not gradually but immediately. Slave-holding was +sin and slaveholders were sinners. The sin and sinner should both be +denounced as such and the latter called to instant repentance, and the +duty of making immediate restitution of the stolen liberties of their +slaves. This was the tone ministers of religion held every where toward +sin and sinners, and this should be the tone held by the preachers of +Abolition toward slavery, and slaveholders. To admit the principle of +gradualism was for Abolition to emasculate itself of its most virile +quality. Garrison, consequently rejected gradualism as a weapon, and +took up instead the great and quickening doctrine of immediatism. Lundy +did not know of this change in the convictions of his coadjutor until +his arrival in Baltimore. Then Garrison frankly unburdened himself and +declared his decision to conduct his campaign against the national +iniquity along the lines of immediate and unconditional emancipation. +The two on this new radicalism did not see eye to eye. But Lundy with +sententious shrewdness and liberality suggested to the young radical: +"Thee may put thy initials to thy articles and I will put my initials to +mine, and each will bear his own burden." And the arrangement pleased +the young radical, for it enabled him to free his soul of the necessity +which was then sitting heavily upon it. The precise state of his mind in +respect of the question at this juncture in its history and in his own +is made plain enough in his salutatory address in _The Genius of +Universal Emancipation_. The vow made in Bennington ten months before to +devote his life to philanthrophy, and the dedication of himself made six +months afterward to the extirpation of American slavery, he solemnly +renews and reseals in Baltimore. He does not hate intemperance and war +less, but slavery more, and those, therefore, he formally relegates +thenceforth to a place of secondary importance in the endeavors of the +future. It is obvious that the colonization scheme has no strong hold +upon his intelligence. He does not conceal his respect for it as an +instrument of freedom, but he puts no high value on its utility. "It may +pluck a few leaves," he remarks, "from the Bohon Upas, but can neither +extract its roots nor destroy its withering properties. Viewed as an +auxiliary, it deserves encouragement; but as a remedy it is altogether +inadequate." But this was not all. As a remedy, colonization was not +only altogether inadequate, its influence was indirectly pernicious, in +that it lulled the popular mind into "a belief that the monster has +received his mortal wound." He perceived that this resultant +indifference and apathy operated to the advantage of slavery, and to the +injury of freedom. Small, therefore, as was the good which the +Colonization Society was able to achieve, it was mixed with no little +ill. Although Garrison has not yet begun to think on the subject, to +examine into the motives and purposes of the society, it does not take a +prophet to foresee that some day he will. He had already arrived at +conclusions in respect of the rights of the colored people "to choose +their own dwelling place," and against the iniquity of their +expatriation, which cut directly at the roots of the colonization +scheme. Later the pro-slavery character of the society will be wholly +revealed to him. But truth in the breast of a reformer as of others must +needs follow the great law of moral growth, first the blade, then the +ear, and then the full corn in the ear. It is enough that he has made +the tremendous step from gradual to immediate and unconditional +emancipation on the soil. + +At this period he tested the disposition of slaveholders to manumit +their slaves. The Colonization Society had given it out that there was +no little desire on the part of many masters to set their slaves free. +All that was wanted for a practical demonstration in this direction was +the assurance of free transportation out of the country for the +emancipated slaves. Lundy had made arrangement for the transportation of +fifty slaves to Hayti and their settlement in that country. So he and +Garrison advertised this fact in the _Genius_, but they waited in vain +for a favorable response from the South--notwithstanding the following +humane inducement which this advertisement offered: "THE PRICE OF +PASSAGE WILL BE ADVANCED, and everything furnished of which they may +stand in need, until they shall have time to prepare their houses and +set in to work." No master was moved to take advantage of the +opportunity. This was discouraging to the believers in the efficacy of +colonization as a potent anti-slavery instrument. But Garrison was no +such believer. With unerring moral instinct he had from the start placed +his reliance "on nothing but the eternal principles of justice for the +speedy overthrow of slavery." + +He obtained at this period an intimate personal knowledge of the free +colored people. He saw that they were not essentially unlike other +races--that there was nothing morally or intellectually peculiar about +them, and that the evil or the good which they manifested was the common +property of mankind in similar circumstances. He forthwith became their +brave defender against the common slanders of the times. "There is a +prevalent disposition among all classes to traduce the habits and morals +of our free blacks," he remarked in the _Genius_. "The most scandalous +exaggerations in regard to their condition are circulated by a thousand +mischievous tongues, and no reproach seems to them too deep or +unmerited. Vile and malignant indeed is this practice, and culpable are +they who follow it. We do not pretend to say that crime, intemperance, +and suffering, to a considerable extent, cannot be found among the free +blacks; but we do assert that they are as moral, peaceable, and +industrious as that class of the whites who are, like them, in indigent +circumstances--and far less intemperate than the great body of foreign +immigrants who infest and corrupt our shores." This idea of the natural +equality of the races he presented in the _Genius_ a few weeks before +with Darwinian breadth in the following admirable sentences: "I deny the +postulate that God has made, by an irreversible decree, or any inherent +qualities, one portion of the human race superior to another. No matter +how many breeds are amalgamated--no matter how many shades of color +intervene between tribes or nations give them the same chances to +improve, and a fair start at the same time, and the result will be +equally brilliant, equally productive, equally grand." + +At the same time that he was making active, personal acquaintance with +the free colored people, he was making actual personal acquaintance with +the barbarism of slavery also. "The distinct application of a whip, and +the shrieks of anguish" of the slave, his residence in Baltimore had +taught him was "nothing uncommon" in that city. Such an instance had +come to him while in the street where the office of the _Genius_ was +located. It was what was occurring at almost all hours of the day and in +almost all parts of the town. He had not been in Baltimore a month when +he saw a specimen of the brutality of slavery on the person of a negro, +who had been mercilessly flogged. On his back were thirty-seven gashes +made with a cowskin, while on his head were many bruises besides. It was +a Sunday morning, fresh from his terrible punishment, that the poor +fellow had found the editors of the _Genius_, who, with the compassion +of brothers, took him in, dressed his wounds, and cared for him for two +days. Such an experience was no new horror to Lundy, but it was +doubtless Garrison's first lesson in that line, and it sank many fathoms +deep into his heart. + +Maryland was one of the slave-breeding States and Baltimore a slave +emporium. There was enacted the whole business of slavery as a +commercial enterprise. Here the human chattels were brought and here +warehoused in jails and other places of storage and detention. Here they +were put up at public auction, and knocked down to the highest bidder, +and from here they were shipped to New Orleans, the great distributing +center for such merchandise. He heard what Lundy had years before heard, +the wail of captive mothers and fathers, wives, husbands and children, +torn from each other; like Lundy, "he felt their pang of distress; and +the iron entered his soul." He could not hold his peace in the midst of +such abominations, but boldly exposed and denounced them. His +indignation grew hot when he saw that Northern vessels were largely +engaged in the coastwise slave-trade; and when, to his amazement, he +learned that the ship _Francis_, owned by Francis Todd, a Newburyport +merchant, had sailed for New Orleans with a gang of seventy-five slaves, +his indignation burst into blaze. He blazoned the act and the name of +Francis Todd in the _Genius_, and did verily what he had resolved to do, +viz., "to cover with thick infamy all who were concerned in this +nefarious business," the captain as well as the owner of the +ill-freighted ship. He did literally point at these men the finger of +scorn. Every device known to the printer's art for concentrating the +reader's attention upon particular words and sentences, Garrison made +skillful use of in his articles--from the deep damnation of the heavy +black capitals in which he printed the name Francis Todd, to the small +caps in which appeared the words, "sentenced to solitary confinement for +life," and which he flanked with two terrible indices. But the articles +did not need such embellishment. They were red hot branding irons +without them. One can almost smell the odor of burning flesh as he reads +the words: "It is no worse to fit out piratical cruisers or to engage in +the foreign slave-trade, than to pursue a similar trade along our coast; +and the men who have the wickedness to participate therein, for the +purpose of keeping up wealth should be ==>SENTENCED TO SOLITARY +CONFINEMENT FOR LIFE; <==_they are the enemies of their own +species--highway robbers, and murderers_; and their final doom will be, +unless they speedily repent, _to occupy the lowest depths of perdition_. +I know that our laws make a distinction in this matter. I know that the +man who is allowed to freight his vessel with slaves at home, for a +distant market, would be thought worthy of death if he should take a +similar freight on the coast of Africa; but I know, too, that this +distinction is absurd, and at war with the common sense of mankind, and +that God and good men regard it with abhorrence. + +"I recollect that it was always a mystery in Newburyport how Mr. Todd +contrived to make profitable voyages to New Orleans and other places, +when other merchants, with as fair an opportunity to make money, and +sending to the same ports at the same time invariably made fewer +successful speculations. The mystery seems to be unravelled. Any man can +gather up riches if he does not care by what means they are obtained." + +A copy of the _Genius_, containing this article Garrison sent to the +owner of the ship _Francis_. What followed made it immediately manifest +that the branding irons of the reformer had burned home with scarifying +effect. Mr. Todd's answer to the strictures was a suit at law against +the editors of the _Genius_ for five thousand dollars in damages. But +this was not all. The Grand Jury for Baltimore indicted them for +publishing "a gross and malicious libel against Francis Todd and +Nicholas Brown." This was at the February Term, 1830. On the first day +of March following, Garrison was tried. He was ably and eloquently +defended by Charles Mitchell, a young lawyer of the Baltimore Bar. But +the prejudice of judge and jury rendered the verdict of guilty a +foregone conclusion. April 17, 1830, the Court imposed a penalty of +fifty dollars and costs, which, with the fine amounted in all to nearly +one hundred dollars. The fine and costs Garrison could not pay, and he +was therefore committed to jail as a common malefactor. His confinement +lasted seven weeks. He did not languish during this period. His head and +hands were in fact hardly ever more active than during the term of his +imprisonment. Shut out by Maryland justice from work without the jail, +he found and did that which needed to be done within "high walls and +huge." He was an extraordinary prisoner and was treated with +extraordinary consideration by the Warden. He proved himself a genuine +evangel to the prisoners, visiting them in their cells, cheering them by +his bouyant and benevolent words, giving them what he had, a brother's +sympathy, which to these ill-fated ones, was more than gold or silver. +He indited for such of them as he deemed deserving, letters and +petitions to the Governor praying their pardon; and he had the great +satisfaction of seeing many of his efforts in this regard crowned with +success. + +But more than this his imprisonment afforded him an opportunity for a +closer acquaintance with the barbarism of slavery than he could possibly +have made had he lived otherwise in Baltimore. A Southern jail was not +only the place of detention of offenders against social justice, but of +slaves waiting for the next market-day, of recaptured fugitives waiting +for their owners to reclaim them. Here they were huddled and caged, +pitiful and despairing in their misery. Such scenes sickened the young +reformer every day. God had opened to him the darkest chapter in the +book of the negroes' wrongs. Here is a page from that black volume of +oppression and cruelty, the record of which he has preserved in the +following graphic narrative: "During my late incarceration in Baltimore +prison, four men came to obtain a runaway slave. He was brought out of +his cell to confront his master, but pretended not to know him--did not +know that he had ever seen him before--could not recollect his name. Of +course the master was exceedingly irritated. 'Don't you remember,' said +he, 'when I gave you not long since thirty-nine lashes under the +apple-tree? Another time when I gave you a sound flogging in the barn? +Another time when you was scourged for giving me the lie, by saying that +the horse was in a good condition?' 'Yes,' replied the slave, whose +memory was thus quickened, 'I do recollect. You have beaten me cruelly +without cause; you have not given me enough to eat and drink; and I +don't want to go back again. I wish you to sell me to another master. I +had rather even go to Georgia than to return home!' + +"'I'll let you know, you villain,' said the master, 'that my wishes and +not _yours_, are to be consulted. I'll learn you how to run away +again.'" + +The other men advised him to take the black home, and cut him up in inch +pieces for his impudence, obstinacy, and desertion--swearing +tremendously all the while. The slave was ordered back to his cell. Then +ensued the following colloquy between Garrison and the master: + +G.--"Sir, what right have you to that poor creature?" + +M.--"My father left him to me." + +G.--"Suppose your father had broken into a bank and stolen ten thousand +dollars, and safely bequeathed that as a legacy; could you +conscientiously keep the money? For myself, I had rather rob any bank to +an indefinite amount than kidnap a fellow-being, or hold him in bondage; +the sin would be less injurious to society, and less sinful in the sight +of God." + +M.--"Perhaps you would like to buy the slave and give him his liberty?" + +G.--"Sir, I am a poor man; and were I ever so opulent, it would be +necessary, on your part, to make out a clear title to the services of +the slave before I could conscientiously make a bargain." + +M--"Well, sir, I can prove from the Bible that slavery is right." + +G.--"Ah! that is a precious book--the rule of conduct. I have always +supposed that its spirit was directly opposed to everything in the shape +of fraud and oppression. However, sir, I should be glad to hear your +text." + +M. (hesitatingly)--"Ham--Noah's curse, you know." + +G. (hastily)--"Oh, sir, you build on a very slender foundation. Granting +even--what remains to be proved--that the Africans are the descendants +of Ham, Noah's curse was a _prediction_ of future servitude, and not an +injunction to oppress. Pray, sir, is it a careful desire to fulfill the +Scriptures, or to make money, that induces you to hold your fellow-men +in bondage?" + +M. (excitedly)--"Why, sir, do you really think that the slaves are +beings like ourselves?--that is, I mean do you believe that they possess +the same faculties and capacities as the whites?" + +G. (energetically)--"Certainly, sir, I do not know that there is any +moral or intellectual quality in the curl of the hair, or the color of +the skin. I cannot conceive why a black man may not as reasonably object +to my color, as I to his. Sir, it is not a black face that I detest, but +a black heart--and I find it very often under a white skin." + +M. (derisively)--"Well, sir, how should you like to see a black man +President of the United States?" + +G. (severely)--"As to that, sir, I am a true Republican, and bow to the +will of the majority. If the people prefer a black President, I should +cheerfully submit; and if he be qualified for the station, may +peradventure give him my vote." + +M. (triumphantly)--"How should you like to have a black man marry your +daughter?" + +G. (making a home thrust and an end of the dialogue)--"I am not +married--I have no daughter. Sir, I am not familiar with _your_ +practices; but allow me to say, that slaveholders generally should be +the last persons to affect fastidiousness on that point; for they seem +to be enamored with _amalgamation_." + +Garrison's pen was particularly busy during the term of his +imprisonment. He paid his respects to the State's Attorney who +prosecuted him, to the judge who condemned him, and to Francis Todd, the +owner of the ship _Francis_. He prepared and scattered broadcast a true +account of his trial, showing how the liberty of the press had been +violated in the case. He did not doubt that it would astonish Europe if +it were known there "that _an American citizen lies incarcerated in +prison, for having denounced slavery and its abettors in his own +country_." The fact created no little astonishment in America. Slavery +became distinctly connected for the first time with abridgments of the +freedom of the press, and the right of free speech. And the cause of the +slave became involved with the Constitutional liberties of the republic. +In punishing Garrison, the Abolitionist, the rights of Garrison the +white freeman were trampled on. And white freemen in the North, who +cared nothing for Abolitionism, but a great deal for their right to +speak and write freely, resented the outrage. This fact was the most +important consequence, which flowed from the trial and imprisonment of +the young editor of _The Genius of Universal Emancipation_. "As the news +of my imprisonment became extensively known," he wrote, "and the merits +of the case understood, not a mail rolled into the city but it brought +me consolatary letters from individuals hitherto unknown to me, and +periodicals of all kinds from every section of the Union (not even +excepting the South), all uniting to give me a triumphant acquittal--all +severely reprehending the conduct of Mr. Todd--and all regarding my +trial as a mockery of justice." This unexpected result was one of those +accidents of history, which "have laws as fixed as planets have." + +The prosecution and imprisonment of Garrison was without doubt designed +to terrorize him into silence on the subject of slavery. But his +persecutors had reckoned without a knowledge of their victim. Garrison +had the martyr's temperament and invincibility of purpose. His +earnestness burned the more intensely with the growth of opposition and +peril. Within "gloomy walls close pent," he warbled gay as a bird of a +freedom which tyrants could not touch, nor bolts confine: + + "No chains can bind it, and no cell enclose, + Swifter than light, it flies from pole to pole, + And in a flash from earth to heaven it goes!" + + +or with deep, stern gladness sang he to "The Guiltless Prisoner" how: + + "A martyr's crown is richer than a king's! + Think it an honor with thy Lord to bleed, + And glory 'midst intensest sufferings; + Though beat--imprisoned--put to open shame + Time shall embalm and magnify thy name." + + +"Is it supposed by Judge Brice," the guiltless prisoner wrote from his +cell, "that his frowns can intimidate me, or his sentence stifle my +voice on the subject of African oppression? He does not know me. So long +as a good Providence gives me strength and intellect, I will not cease +to declare that the existence of slavery in this country is a foul +reproach to the American name; nor will I hesitate to proclaim the guilt +of kidnappers, slave abettors, or slaveowners, wheresoever they may +reside, or however high they may be exalted. I am only in the _alphabet_ +of my task; time shall perfect a useful work. It is my shame that I have +done so little for the people of color; yea, before God, I feel humbled +that my feelings are so cold, and my language so weak. A few white +victims must be sacrificed to open the eyes of this nation, and to show +the tyranny of our laws. I expect and am willing to be persecuted, +imprisoned, and bound for advocating African rights; and I should +deserve to be a slave myself if I shrunk from that duty or danger." The +story of the trial of William Lloyd Garrison, from which the above brave +words are taken, fell into the hands of that noble man and munificent +merchant, Arthur Tappan, of New York. From the reading of it he rose +"with that deep feeling of abhorrence of slavery and its abettors which +every one must feel who is capable of appreciating the blessings of +liberty," and thereupon notified Lundy to draw upon him for one hundred +dollars if that amount would give the young editor his liberty. The fine +and costs of court were accordingly paid and just forty-nine days after +entering Baltimore jail a prisoner, Garrison recovered his freedom. The +civil action of Todd against him was still pending. Nothing daunted +Garrison went North two days after his discharge to obtain certain +evidence deemed important by his counsel to his defence. He took with +him an open letter from Lundy looking to the renewal of the weekly +_Genius_ under their joint control. Prior to Garrison's trial the paper +had fallen into great stress for want of money. Lundy and he had made a +division of their labors, the latter doing the editorial and office +work, while the former traveled from place to place soliciting +subscriptions and collecting generally the sinews of war. But the +experiment was not successful from a business standpoint. For as +Garrison playfully observed subsequently: "Where friend Lundy could get +one new subscriber, I could knock a _dozen_ off, and I did so. It was +the old experiment of the frog in the well, that went two feet up and +fell three feet back, at every jump." Where the income of the paper did +not exceed fifty dollars in four months and the weekly expenditure +amounted to at least that sum, the financial failure of the enterprise +was inevitable. This unhappy event did actually occur six weeks before +the junior editor went to jail; and the partnership was formally +dissolved in the issue of the _Genius_ of March 5, 1830. But when Arthur +Tappan made his generous offer of a hundred dollars to effect Garrison's +release, he made at the same time an offer of an equal amount to aid the +editors in reëstablishing the _Genius_. This proposition led to hopes on +the part of the two friends to a renewal of their partnership in the +cause of emancipation. And so Garrison's visit to the North was taken +advantage of to test the disposition of Northern philanthropy to support +such a paper. But what he found was a sad lack of interest in the slave. +Everywhere he went he encountered what appeared to him to be the most +monstrous indifference and apathy on the subject. The prejudices of the +free States seemed to him stronger than were those of the South. Instead +of receiving aid and encouragement to continue the good work of himself +and coadjutor, and for the doing of which he had served a term of seven +weeks in prison, men, even his best friends sought to influence him to +give it up, and to persuade him to forsake the slave, and to turn his +time and talents to safer and more profitable enterprises nearer home. +He was informed by these worldly wise men and Job's counselors that his +"scheme was visionary, fanatical, unattainable." "Why should he make +himself," they argued, "an exile from home and all that he held dear on +earth, and sojourn in a strange land, among enemies whose hearts were +dead to every noble sentiment?" Ah! he himself confessed that all were +against his return to Baltimore. But his love of the slave was stronger +than the strength of the temptation. He put all these selfish objections +behind him. As he has recorded the result of this experience: +"Opposition served only to increase my ardor, and confirm my purpose." +Strange and incomprehensible to his fellows is the man who prefers +"persecution, reproach, and poverty" with duty, to worldly ease and +honor and riches without it. When a man appears in society who is not +controlled by motives which usually govern the conduct of other men he +becomes at first an object of pity, then of contempt, and, lastly, of +hate. Garrison we may be sure at the end of this visit had made rapid +transit from the first to the second of these stages in the esteem of +his generation. + +His experience was not all of this deplorable kind. He left Baltimore +without the money required to pay his way North, depending literally +upon the good God to provide for him the necessary means to complete his +journey. And such help was more than once providentially afforded the +young apostle of liberty. At New York, when he did not know how he was +to go farther for want of means, he met a Mr. Samuel Leggett who gave +him a pass on the "splendid steamboat _President_." It seems that this +friend in his need had read with indignation the story of his trial. The +bread which he had scattered from his prison on the waters of public +sentiment had thus returned to him after many days in the timely +assistance of a sympathetic soul. And then, again, when he was in Boston +in sore distress for a little money, suddenly, beautifully, the desire +of his heart was satisfied. But let him tell the incident in his own +touching way. His face was turned toward Baltimore: "But how was I to +return?" he asks. "I had not a dollar in my pocket, and my time was +expired. No one understood my circumstances. I was too proud to beg, and +ashamed to borrow. My friends were prodigal of pity, but of nothing +else. In the extremity of my uneasiness, I went to the Boston +post-office, and found a letter from my friend Lundy, inclosing a draft +for $100 from a stranger and as a remuneration for my poor inefficient +services in behalf of the slaves!" The munificent stranger was Ebenezer +Dole, of Hallowell, Maine. Money thus acquired was a sacred trust to +this child of Providence. "After deducting the expenses of traveling," +he goes on to say, "the remainder of the above-named sum was applied in +discharging a few of the debts incurred by the unproductiveness of the +_Genius_." + +Garrison returned to Baltimore, but he did not tarry long in that +slave-ruled city. Todd's suit against him was tried after his departure, +and the jury soothed the Newburyport merchant's wounded pride with a +verdict for a thousand dollars. He never attempted, however, to enforce +the payment of the same being content probably with the "vindication," +which his legal victory gave him. + +Before the reformer left Baltimore he had definitely abandoned the plans +looking to a revival of his interest in the _Genius_. He determined +instead to publish a sheet devoted to the abolition of slavery under his +sole management and control. This paper he proposed to call the _Public +Liberator_, and to issue from Washington. The prospectus of this +journalistic project bearing date, August, 1830, declares in its opening +sentence its "primary object" to be "the abolition of slavery, and the +moral and intellectual elevation of our colored population." "I shall +spare no efforts," he pledged himself, "to delineate the withering +influence of slavery upon our national prosperity and happiness, its +awful impiety, its rapid extension, and its inevitable consequences if +it be suffered to exist without hindrance. It will also be my purpose to +point out the path of safety, and a remedy for the disease." This +comprehensive and aggressive plan of campaign signalized the rise of an +Abolitionism wholly unlike the Abolitionism of any previous time in the +history of the country. It did in fact date the opening of a new era in +the slavery struggle in America. + +With Northern indifference and apathy on the subject of emancipation, +Garrison's previous visit to the North had acquainted him. Their +existence he saw interposed the main obstacle to the success of his new +venture in journalism. "The cause of this callous state of feeling," he +believed, "was owing to their exceeding ignorance of the horrors of +slavery." He accordingly made up his mind to throw the light which he +possessed into the midst of this darkness. He had written in prison +three lectures on "Slavery and Colonization." What better could he now +do than to deliver those lectures at the North? If the good people and +their religious leaders knew what he knew, they would presently feel as +he did on the question. He was loath to leave Baltimore without giving +this testimony against slavery. But unable to procure a room for this +purpose was finally compelled to content himself with the witness he had +already borne in the _Genius_ and in prison in behalf of the slave. In +Philadelphia he well-nigh failed to obtain a hall for his lectures, but +did finally succeed in getting the Franklin Institute, where, to small +audiences, he lifted up his voice against the iniquity of the times. He +repeated his lectures in New York, New Haven, and Hartford. But not many +came out to hear him. The nation, its churches, and politicians had +thrust their fingers in their ears to every cry coming up from the +slave. Why should they go to sup with a madman on horrors, with which as +patriotic people they were forbidden to concern themselves. And so for +the most part Garrison could do nothing with communities, which had +eyes, but obstinately refused to see with them upon any subject relating +to the abominations of slavery. In his own town of Newburyport, officers +of Christian churches not only refused to hear his message themselves, +but debarred others from listening to the woes and wrongs of +fellow-creatures in bondage. As Mr. Garrison truly said at the time: "If +I had visited Newburyport to plead the cause of twenty white men in +chains, every hall and every meeting-house would have been thrown open, +and the fervor of my discourses anticipated and exceeded by my +fellow-townsmen. The fact that two millions of colored beings are +groaning in bondage, in this land of liberty, excites no interest nor +pity." If these damning facts are remembered sixty years after their +occurrence to the shame of the trustees of the two churches, viz., the +Presbyterian Church on Harris street and the Second Congregational +Church, it is also remembered to the honor of the two pastors, Rev. Dr. +Daniel Dana, and the Rev. Dr. Luther F. Dimmick, that they had thrown +open to the prophet the doors of their meeting-houses, which the +trustees afterward slammed in his face. + +In Boston the same hard luck followed him. In all that city of Christian +churches he could not obtain the use of a single meeting-house, "in +which to vindicate the rights of TWO MILLIONS of American citizens, who +are now groaning in servile chains in this boasted land of liberty; and +also to propose just, benevolent, and constitutional measures for their +relief." So ran an advertisement in the Boston _Courier_ of the sorely +tried soul. For two weeks he had gone up and down the town in search of +a room free of cost, in which to deliver his message. The door of every +sanctuary was locked against his cause. It was then, as a final +recourse, that he turned to the _Courier_, and made his last appeal to +the Christian charity of the city. The prayer of the prophet was +answered from an unexpected quarter. It was that ecclesiastical dragon +of the times, Abner Kneeland, and his society of "blasphemers," who +proved afresh the truth of that scripture which says: "Not every one +that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; +but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven." It was they +that gave to liberty a hearing, to the prophet of righteousness a chance +to deliver his message. It was in their meeting-house, in Julian Hall, +that Garrison gave his lectures, giving the first one on the evening of +October 15, 1830. + +Samuel J. May, who was present, has preserved his impressions of the +lecture and lecturer. "Never before," he records many years afterward, +"was I so affected by the speech of man. When he had ceased speaking I +said to those around me: 'That is a providential man; he is a prophet; +he will shake our nation to its center, but he will shake slavery out of +it. We ought to know him, we ought to help him. Come, let us go and give +him our hands.' Mr. Sewall and Mr. Alcott went up with me and we +introduced each other. I said to him, 'Mr. Garrison, I am not sure that +I can indorse all you have said this evening. Much of it requires +careful consideration. But I am prepared to embrace you. I am sure you +are called to a great work, and I mean to help you.' Mr. Sewall +cordially assured him of his readiness also to cooperate with him. Mr. +Alcott invited him to his home. He went and we sat with him until twelve +that night, listening to his discourse, in which he showed plainly that +_immediate, unconditional emancipation, without expatriation, was the +right of every slave, and could not be withheld by his master an hour +without sin_. That night my soul was baptised in his spirit, and ever +since I have been a disciple and fellow-laborer of William Lloyd +Garrison." A new force had arisen in our history, and a new epoch had +broken bolts for humanity. + + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + + +THE HOUR AND THE MAN. + + +The providential man was not yet twenty-five. In personal appearance he +was quite the reverse of his friend Lundy. Garrison was gifted with a +body that matched his mind, strong, straight, sound in every part, and +proportioned in every member. As he stood he was much above the medium +height. His dark hair had already partially left the crown of the high +dome-shaped head. His forehead combined height with breadth, which, +taken in connection with the brown eyes covered with the now habitual +glasses, lent to his countenance a striking air of moral serenity and +elevation. Force, firmness, no ordinary self-reliance and courage found +masterly expression in the rest of the face. There was through the whole +physical man a nice blending of strength and delicacy of structure. The +impression of fineness and finish was perhaps mainly owing to the +woman-like purity and freshness of skin and color, which overspread the +virile lines and features of the face from brow to chin. What one saw in +that face was the quality of justice made flesh, good-will to men +personified. + +This characterization of the reformer's countenance may be considered +absurd by some readers. But absurd it is not. People who had read his +stern denunciations of slave-holding and slaveholders, and who had +formed their image of the man from his "hard language" and their own +prejudices could not recognize the original when they met him. His +manner was peculiarly winning and attractive, and in personal +intercourse almost instantly disarmed hostility. The even gentleness of +his rich voice, his unfailing courtesy and good temper, his quick eye +for harmless pleasantries, his hearty laugh, the Quaker-like calmness, +deliberateness, and meekness, with which he would meet objections and +argue the righteousness of his cause, his sweet reasonableness and +companionableness were in strange contrast to popular misconceptions and +caricatures of him. No one needed to be persuaded, who had once +conversed with him, that there was no hatred or vindictiveness in his +severities of language toward slaveholders. That he was no Jacobin, no +enemy of society, was perceived the moment one looked into his grave, +kind face, or caught the warm accents of his pacific tones, or listened +to the sedate intensity, and humanity of his discourses on the enormity +of American slavery as they fell from him in conversations between man +and man. Here is a case in point, a typical incident in the life of the +reformer; it occurred, it is true, when he was twenty-seven, but it +might have occurred at twenty-five quite as well; it is narrated by +Samuel J. May in his recollections of the anti-slavery conflict: On his +way from New York to Philadelphia with Garrison, Mr. May fell into a +discussion with a pro-slavery passenger on the vexed question of the +day. There was the common pro-slavery reasoning, which May answered as +well as he was able. Presently Mr. Garrison drew near the disputants, +whereupon May took the opportunity to shift the anti-slavery burden of +the contention to his leader's shoulders. All of his most radical and +unpopular Abolition doctrines Garrison immediately proceeded to expound +to his opponent. "After a long conversation," says Mr. May, "which +attracted as many as could get within hearing, the gentleman said, +courteously: 'I have been much interested, sir, in what you have said, +and in the exceedingly frank and temperate manner in which you have +treated the subject. If all Abolitionists were like you, there would be +much less opposition to your enterprise. But, sir, depend upon it, that +hair-brained, reckless, violent fanatic, Garrison, will damage, if he +does not shipwreck, any cause.' Stepping forward, I replied, 'Allow me, +sir, to introduce you to Mr. Garrison, of whom you entertain so bad an +opinion. The gentleman you have been talking with is he.'" + +Or take Harriet Martineau's first impressions on seeing him. "His aspect +put to flight in an instant what prejudices his slanderers had raised in +me. I was wholly taken by surprise. It was a countenance glowing with +health, and wholly expressive of purity, animation and gentleness. I did +not wonder at the citizen who, seeing a print of Garrison at a shop +window without a name to it, went in and bought it, and framed it as the +most saintlike of countenances." + +The appearance of such a man on the stage of our history as a nation, at +this hour, was providential. His coming was in the fulness of time. A +rapid review of events anterior to the advent of Garrison will serve to +place this matter more clearly before the general reader. To begin, +then, at the beginning we have two ships off the American coast, the one +casting anchor in Plymouth harbor, the other discharging its cargo at +Jamestown. They were both freighted with human souls. But how different! +Despotism landed at Jamestown, democracy at Plymouth. Here in the germ +was the Southern idea, slave labor, slave institutions; and here also +was the Northern idea, free labor, free institutions. Once planted they +grew, each seed idea multiplying after its kind. In course of time there +arose on one side an industrial system in which the plantation +principle, race-rule and race-slavery, were organic centers; and, on the +other, a social system in which the principle of popular power and +government, the town meeting, and the common school were the ganglia of +social expansion. Contrary ideas beget naturally enough contrary +interests and institutions. So it is no matter for surprise that the +local interests and institutions of the thirteen revolted colonies +lacked homogeneity and identity. What was calculated to promote the +general welfare of the Northern one, it was quite possible might work a +totally opposite result in the Southern. For, indeed, while there were +slaves in them all, the slave system had taken root in Southern soil +only; and while on the other hand the spirit of freedom was existent in +each, free labor had rooted itself in Northern ground solely. + +As the war of the Revolution was an uprising against arbitrary power, +and for the establishment of political liberty, it pushed easily into +the foreground the larger subject of human rights. Most of the leading +actors felt the inconsistency of keeping some men in bondage, when they +were fighting to rid themselves of a tyranny which, in comparison to the +other, was a state of honorable freedom. Their humanity condemned +African slavery, and they earnestly desired its extinction. The +Declaration of Independence proves to how high a level the tide of +freedom rose in the colonies. The grand truths by it proclaimed the +signers of that instrument did not restrict in their application to some +men to the exclusion of other men. They wrote "All men," and they meant +exactly what they wrote. Too simply honest and great they were to mean +less than their solemn and deliberate words. + +On political as well as on moral grounds they desired emancipation. But +there was a difficulty which at the time proved insuperable. The +nation-making principle, the idea of country, was just emerging out of +the nebulous civil conditions and relations of the ante-Revolutionary +epoch. There was no existent central authority to reach the evil within +the States except the local governments of the States respectively. And +States in revolt against the central authority of the mother country +would hardly be disposed to divest themselves of any part of their newly +asserted right to govern themselves for the purpose of conferring the +same upon any other political body. To each State, then, the question +was necessarily left for settlement. + +The war, during its continuance, absorbed the united resources and +energies of the people and their leaders. The anti-slavery movement made +accordingly but small progress. Reforms thrive only when they get a +hearing. Public attention is the food on which they thrive. But precious +little of this food was the Abolition cause able to snatch in those +bitter years. It could not grow. It remained in the gristle--hardly more +than a sentiment. But the sentiment was a seed, the promise and potency +of kindlier times. With the close of the long struggle other questions +arose; got the people's ears; fixed the attention of the leaders. Scant +notice could emancipation extort from men who had to repair the ravages +of an exhausting war, reconstruct shattered fortunes, restore civil +society in parts tumbling into ruinous disorder. The instinct of +self-preservation was altogether too masterful for the moral starveling. +It succumbed to circumstances, content to obtain an occasional sermon, +an annual address, a few scattered societies to keep a human glow in the +bosom of the infant Confederacy. + +The Confederation failed. The formation of a more perfect union was +demanded and undertaken. This transcendent task straightway thrust into +the background every other enterprise and interest. The feeble activity +of the freedom-making principle was checked, for the time being, by the +energy of the nation-making power. They were not antagonistic +forces--only in the natural order of things, the earliest stages in the +evolution of the former had to come after the first steps were taken in +the development of the latter. Before there could start a general +movement against American slavery there must needs be an American +nation. An American nation was, in the year 1787, in process of +successful development. With the adoption of the Constitution, the +national principle entered on a period of marvelous expansion and +activity. + +Let it not, however, be hastily concluded that freedom meanwhile was in +total eclipse, that the anti-slavery sentiment was absolutely without +influence. For it unquestionably inspired the Ordinance of 1787. The +Northwest Territory, out of which were subsequently organized the States +of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin, was thereby, +forever secured to the Northern idea, and free labor. Supplementary to +this grand act was the Constitutional prohibition of the African +slave-trade after the year 1808. Together they were intended to +discourage the growth of slavery--the first by restricting its +territorial extension, the second, by arresting its numerical increase. +And without doubt they would have placed the evil in the way of ultimate +extinction had other and far reaching causes not intervened to produce +adverse social and political conditions. + +The first of these causes, in point of time, were certain labor-saving +inventions in England, which vastly enhanced the demand for raw cotton. +Arkwright's invention of the spinning machine about twenty years prior +to the adoption of the Constitution, perfected by the spinning-jenny of +Hargreaves, and the mule of Crompton, "turned Lancashire," the historian +Green says, "into a hive of industry." The then rapid demand for cotton +operated in time as a stimulus to its production in America. Increased +productivity raised the value of slave property and slave soil. But the +slow and tedious hand method of separating the fiber of the cotton bulb +from the seed greatly limited the ability of the Cotton States to meet +and satisfy the fast growing demand of the English manufacturers, until +Eli Whitney, in 1793, by an ingenious invention solved the problem of +supply for these States. The cotton gin was not long in proving itself +the other half--the other hand of the spinning machine. + +From that year the slave interests of the South rose in market value, +and its industrial system assumed unexpected importance in the economic +world. The increased production of cotton led directly to increased +demand for slave labor and slave soil. The increased demand for slave +labor the Constitutional provision relating to the African slave trade +operated in part to satisfy. The increased demand for slave soil was +likewise satisfied by the cession to the United States by Georgia and +North Carolina of the Southwest Territory, with provisos practically +securing it to slavery. Out of this new national territory were +subsequently carved the slave States of Tennessee, Mississippi, and +Alabama. + +Slave soil unlike free soil, is incapable of sustaining a dense +population. Slave labor calls for large spaces within which to multiply +and prosper. The purchase of Louisiana and the acquisition of Florida +met this agrarian necessity on the part of the South. Immense, unsettled +areas thus fell to the lot of the slave system at the crisis of its +material expansion and prosperity. The domestic slave-trade under the +impetus of settling these vast regions according to the plantation +principle, became an enormous and spreading industry. The crop of slaves +was not less profitable than the crop of cotton. A Southern white man +had but to buy a score of slaves and a few hundred acres to get "rich +beyond the dreams of avarice." So at least calculated the average +Southern man. + +This revival of slavery disappointed the humane expectation of its +decline and ultimate extinction entertained by the founders of the +republic. It built up instead a growing and formidable slave class, and +interest in the Union. With the rise of giant slave interests, there +followed the rise of a power devoted to their encouragement and +protection. + +Three far-reaching concessions the slave States obtained in the +convention of 1787, viz., the right to import slaves from Africa until +1808; the rendition of fugitive slaves escaping into the free States, +and the three-fifths slave representation clause of the +Constitution--all of which added vastly to the security and value of +this species of property, and as a consequence contributed to the slave +revival. + +The equality of the States in the upper branch of the National +Legislature, taken in connection with the right of the slave States to +count five slaves as three freemen in the apportionment of +representatives to the lower House of Congress, gave the Southern +section an almost immediate ascendency in the Federal Government. To the +South was thus opened by an unexpected combination of circumstances a +wide avenue for the acquisition of fabulous wealth, and to Southern +public men an incomparable arena for the exercise of political abilities +and leadership. An institution, which thus ministered to two of the +strongest passions of mankind--avarice and ambition--was certain to +excite the most intense attachment. Its safety naturally, therefore, +became among the slave class an object of prime importance. Southern +jealousy in this regard ultimated inevitably in Southern narrowness, +Southern sectionalism, which early manifested themselves in the +exclusion from lead in national affairs of Northern public men, reputed +to be unfriendly to slavery. Webster as late as 1830, protested warmly +against this intolerance. Like begets like. And the proscribing of +anti-slavery politicians by the South, created in turn not a little +sectional feeling at the North, and helped to stimulate there a +consciousness of sectional differences, of antagonism of interests +between the two halves of the Union. + +Discontent with the original basis of the Union, which had given the +South its political coign of vantage, broke out first in New England. +The occasion, though not the cause, of this discontent was, perhaps, the +downfall of the Federal party, whose stronghold was in the East. The +commercial and industrial crisis brought on by the embargo, and which +beggared, on the authority of Webster, "thousands of families and +hundreds of thousands of individuals" fanned this Eastern +dissatisfaction into almost open disaffection towards a government +dominated by Southern influence, and directed by Southern statesmanship. +To the preponderance of this Southern element in national legislation +New England traced her misfortunes. She was opposed to the War of 1812, +but was overruled to her hurt by the South. In these circumstances New +England went for correcting the inequalities of the original basis of +the Union, which gave to the South its undue preponderance in shaping +national laws and policies. This was the purpose of the Hartford +Convention, which proposed the abrogation of the slave representation +clause of the Constitution, and the imposition of a check upon the +admission of new States into the Union. The second proposition did not +say "new slave States," but new slave States was, nevertheless, intended +by the Convention. Here in point of time and magnitude, was the first +distinct collision of the two sets of ideas and interests of the +Republic. + +Following the Treaty of Ghent other and imperious questions engaged the +public attention--questions of the tariff, of finance, internal +improvements, national defence, a new navy, forts and fortifications. +Hard times, too, engrossed an enormous share of this attention. The +immediate needs and problems of the hour pushed into the background all +less pressing ones. The slavery question amidst the clamor and babel of +emergent and material interests, lost something of its sectional heat +and character. But its fires were not extinguished, only banked as +events were speedily to reveal. + +The application of Missouri for admission into the Union as a slave +State four years after the Hartford Convention blew to a blaze the +covered embers of strife between the sections. The North was violently +agitated. For the admission of a new slave State meant two more slave +votes in the Senate, and an increase on the old inequitable basis of +slave representation in the lower House of Congress. It meant to the +Northern section indefinite Southern ascendency, prolonged Southern lead +in national legislation. All the smouldering passions of the earlier +period, of embargo, and non-intercourse, and the war of 1812, flamed +suddenly and fiercely in the heart of the free States. + +The length and bitterness of that controversy excited the gravest +apprehensions for the stability of the Union. The dread of disunion led +to mutual concessions, to the Missouri Compromise. The slave-holding +section got its immediate claim allowed, and the free States secured the +erection of a line to the north of which slavery was forever prohibited. +And besides this, the admission of Maine was supposed to neutralize +whatever political advantages, which would accrue to the South from the +admission of Missouri as a slave State. Both sections were content, and +the slavery question was thought to be permanently settled. With this +final disposition of an ugly problem, the peace and permanence of the +Union were viewed universally as fixed facts. Still, considering the +gravity of the case, a little precaution would not go amiss. The slavery +question had shaken men's faith in the durability of the republic. It +was therefore adjudged a highly dangerous subject. The political +physicians with one accord prescribed on the ounce-of-prevention +principle, _quiet_, SILENCE, and OBLIVION, to be administered in large +and increasing doses to both sections. Mum was the word, and mum the +country solemnly and suddenly became from Maine to Georgia. But, alas! +beneath the ashes of this Missouri business, deep below the unnatural +silence and quiet, inextinguishable fires were burning and working again +to the surface of politics. In such circumstances a fresh outbreak of +old animosities must occur as soon as the subterranean heat should reach +the point of highest combustibility in the federal system. The tariff +proved to be that point of highest combustibility. + +Alexander Hamilton inaugurated the policy of giving governmental aid to +infant manufactures. The wisdom of diversifying the industries of the +young nation was acquiesced in by the leading statesmen of both +sections. Beset as the republic then was by international forces hostile +to democratic institutions, it was natural enough that the great men who +presided over its early years should seek by Federal legislation to +render it, as speedily and completely as possible, industrially +self-dependent and self-supporting. The war of 1812 enforced anew upon +the attention of statesmen the importance of industrial independence. +The war debt, together with certain governmental enterprises and +expenditures growing out of the war, was largely, if not wholly, +responsible for the tariff of 1816. This act dates the rise of our +American system of protection. It is curious to note that Southern men +were the leaders of this new departure in the national fiscal policy. +Calhoun, Clay, and Lowndes were the guiding spirits of that period of +industrial ferment and activity. They little dreamt what economic evils +were to fall in consequence upon the South. That section was not slow to +feel the unequal action of the protective principle. The character of +its labor incapacitated the South from dividing the benefits of the new +revenue policy with its free rival. The South of necessity was +restricted to a single industry, the tillage of the earth. Slave labor +did not possess the intelligence, the skill, the patience, the +mechanical versatility to embark successfully in manufacturing +enterprises. Free labor monopolised the protected industries, and +Northern capital caught all the golden showers of fiscal legislation. +What the South needed, from an economic point of view, was unrestricted +access to the markets of the world for her products, and the freest +competition of the world in her own markets. The limitations imposed +upon the slave States by their industrial system was in itself a +tremendous handicap in their struggle for an advantageous place in the +New World of the nineteenth century; in their struggle with their free +sisters for political leadership in the Union. But with the development +of the protective principle those States fell into sore financial +distress, were ground between the upper millstone of the protective +system and the nether millstone of their own industrial system. +Prosperity and plenty did presently disappear from that section and +settled in the North. In 1828 Benton drew this dark picture of the state +of the South: + +"In place of wealth, a universal pressure for money was felt; not enough +for common expenses; the price of all property down; the country +drooping and languishing; towns and cities decaying, and the frugal +habits of the people pushed to the verge of universal self-denial for +the preservation of their family estates." + +He did not hesitate to charge to Federal legislation the responsibility +for all this poverty and distress, for he proceeds to remark that: + +"Under this legislation the exports of the South have been made the +basis of the Federal revenue. The twenty odd millions annually levied +upon imported goods are deducted out of the price of their cotton, rice, +and tobacco, either in the diminished prices which they receive for +those staples in foreign ports, or in the increased price which they pay +for the articles they have to consume at home." + +A suffering people are not apt to reason clearly or justly on the causes +which have brought them to indigence. They feel their wretchedness and +reach out for a victim. And the law-making power usually happens to be +that victim. As the distress of the South increased, the belief that +Federal legislation was responsible for it increased likewise. The +spread and deepening of this conviction in the Southern States +precipitated among them an ominous crisis in their attachment to the +Union. Nullification and an embittered sectionalism was the hateful +legacy bequeathed to the republic by the tariff controversy. It left the +South in a hyper-sensitive state in all matters relating to her domestic +interests. It left the North in a hyper-sensitive condition on all +matters touching the peace and stability of the Union. The silence and +oblivion policy on the subject of slavery was renewed with tenfold +intensity. Ulysses-like the free States bound themselves, their right of +free speech, and their freedom of the press on this subject, for fear of +the Siren voices which came thrilling on every breeze from the South. +Quiet was the word, and quiet the leaders in Church and State sought to +enforce upon the people, to the end that the vision of "States +dissevered, discordant, belligerent, of a land rent with civil feuds, or +drenched it may be, in fraternal blood," might not come to pass for +their "glorious Union." + +The increasing friction and heat between the sections during twenty-five +years, had effected every portion of the Federal system, and created +conditions favorable to a violent explosion. Sectional differences of a +political and industrial complexion, forty years had sufficed to +develop. Sectional differences of a moral and social character forty +years had also sufficed to generate. To kindle all those differences, +all that mass of combustible feelings and forces into a general +conflagration a spark only was wanted. And out of the glowing humanity +of one man the spark was suddenly struck. + +It is curious to note that in the year 1829, the very year in which +William Lloyd Garrison landed in Baltimore, and began the editorship of +_The Genius of Universal Emancipation_, the American Convention, or +national assembly of the old State societies for the abolition of +slavery, fell into desuetude. It was as if Providence was clearing the +debris of an old dispensation out of the way of the new one which his +prophet was beginning to herald, as if guarding against all possibility +of having the new wine, then soon to be pressed from the moral vintage +of the nation, put into old bottles. The Hour for a new movement against +slavery had come, and with its arrival the Man to hail it had also come. + +Other men had spoken and written against slavery, and labored for the +freedom of the slave before Garrison had thought upon the subject at +all. Washington and Jefferson, Franklin, Jay, and Hamilton had been +Abolitionists before he was born, but theirs was a divided interest. The +establishment of a more perfect union was the paramount object of their +lives. John Wesley had denounced slavery in language quite as harsh as +Garrison's, but his, too, was a divided interest, the religious revival +of the eighteenth century being his distinctive mission. Benezet, +Woolman, and Lundy were saints, who had yearned with unspeakable +sympathy for the black bondmen, and were indefatigable in good works in +his behalf, but they had not that stern and iron quality without which +reforms cannot be launched upon the attention of mankind. What his +predecessors lacked, Garrison possessed to a marvelous degree--the +undivided interest, the supremacy of a single purpose, the stern stuff +out of which the moral reformer is made, and in which he is panoplied. +They were all his, but there was another besides--immediatism. This +element distinguished the movement against slavery, started by him, from +all other movements begun before he arrived on the stage, for the +emancipation of the slaves in the Union. + +This doctrine of immediate as opposed to gradual emancipation, was not +original with Garrison, nor was he the first to enunciate it. More than +a dozen years before he was converted to it, Rev. George Bourne, in "The +Book and Slavery Irreconcilable," had shown that "the system (of +slavery) is so entirely corrupt that it admits of no cure but by a +_total and immediate abolition_. For a gradual emancipation is a virtual +recognition of the right, and establishes the rectitude of the practice. +If it be just for one moment, it is hallowed forever; and if it be +inequitable, not a day should it be tolerated." In 1824, eight years +after the publication of Bourne's book, and five years before Garrison +announced the doctrine in the _Genius_, the Rev. James Duncan maintained +it, in his "Treatise on Slavery," with no uncertainty of sense or +conviction. But neither Bourne nor Duncan had been able to effect an +incarnation of the doctrine, without which the good which it aimed at +could not be achieved. What they failed to effect, it is the glory of +Garrison that he achieved in his own person. He was "_total and +immediate Abolition_" personified. "Truth is mighty and will prevail," +is a wise saying and worthy of acceptation. But this ultimate prevailing +of TRUTH depends mainly upon individual effort, applied not +intermittently, but steadily to a particular segment of the circle of +conduct. It is the long, strong, never-ending pull and tug upon the +wheels of conduct, which marks the great reformer. He finds his age or +country stuck in some Serbonian bog of iniquity. He prays, but he prays +with his shoulders braced strenuously against the body of society, and +he does not cease his endeavors until a revolution in conduct places his +age or country on firm ground beyond its Serbonian bog. The coming of +such a man is no accident. When the Hour is ready and the Man comes, a +new epoch in the life of a people arises from the conjunction. Of such +vast consequence verily was the coming into American history of William +Lloyd Garrison. + + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + + +THE DAY OF SMALL THINGS. + + +After leaving Baltimore, Garrison clung pathetically to the belief that, +if he told what he had seen of the barbarism of slavery to the North, he +would be certain to enlist the sympathy and aid of its leaders, +political and ecclesiastical, in the cause of emancipation. The sequel +to his efforts in this regard proved that he was never more mistaken in +his life. He addressed letters to men like Webster, Jeremiah Mason, +Lyman Beecher, and Dr. Channing, "holding up to their view the +tremendous iniquity of the land, and begging them, ere it should be too +late, to interpose their great power in the Church and State, to save +our country from the terrible calamities which the sin of slavery was +bringing upon us." But there is no evidence that this appeal produced +the feeblest ripple in the lives of the two first; and upon the two last +it was equally barren of result. Dr. Channing, indeed, did not take the +trouble to hear any one of the three lectures of the young +philanthropist. Dr. Beecher, however, was at the pains to be present at +the first lecture given at Julien Hall. But he betrayed no real interest +in the subject. He had no time to devote to anti-slavery, had, in fine, +too many irons in the fire already. To this impotent apology of the +great preacher of immediatism in his dealing with all kinds of sin, +except the sin of slave-holding, for not espousing the cause of the +slave, Mr. Garrison made his famous retort: + + + "Then you had better let all your irons burn than neglect your + duty to the slave." + + +What more did this poor and friendless man, with his one idea and his +harsh language, know of duties and dangers than Daniel Webster, who was +busy saving the Union; than Lyman Beecher, who was not less busy saving +souls; or than Dr. Channing, who was quite as busy saving liberalism in +matters of religion? What folly and presumption it must have seemed to +these mighty men this attempt of Garrison to impress upon them a proper +sense of their obligations to their country. + +"Your zeal," said Dr. Beecher to him, with unlimited condescension of +tone--"your zeal is commendable, but you are misguided. If you will give +up your fanatical notions and be guided by us (the clergy) we will make +you the Wilberforce of America." + +And so what was the young man, burning up with his one idea, to do in +presence of such a failure to win these men to the leadership of the +anti-slavery movement? He could not hold his peace; his message he was +compelled to deliver in the ears of the nation whether its leaders would +hear or forbear. Perhaps the common people would hearken to what the +wise and powerful had rejected. At any rate they should hear what was +resting upon his soul with the weight of a great woe, the force of a +supreme command. But how was he, penniless and friendless, to roll from +his bosom the burden which was crushing it; to pause long enough in the +battle for bread to fight the battle of the slave? Ah, if he had money! +but no money did he have, not a dollar in his pocket! Oh, if he had rich +friends who would dedicate their riches to the preaching of the gospel +of freedom! but alas! rich friends there were none. Oh, if he could cry +to the Church for help in this hour of his need! but it was slowly +dawning on him that not from the Church would help come to his cause; +for a grievous thing had happened to the Church. The slave gorgon sat +staring from the pews, and turning the pulpits to stone, turning also to +stone the hearts of the people. + +Undismayed by the difficulties which were closing in around him, +Garrison resolutely set himself to accomplish his purpose touching the +establishment of a weekly paper devoted to the abolition of slavery. He +had promised in his _Prospectus_ to issue the first number of the +_Public Liberator_ "as soon as subscriptions thereto may authorize the +attempt." But had he waited for the fulfillment of this condition, the +experiment could never have been tried. When subscribers did not come +in, the paper, he determined should go forth all the same. But there are +some things in the publication of a paper which no man can dispense +with, which indispensable somethings are: types, a press, an office, and +an assistant. All these requisites were wanting to the man whose sole +possession seemed an indomitable will, a faith in himself, and in the +righteousness of his cause, which nothing could shake, nor +disappointment nor difficulty, however great, was able to daunt or +deter. To such an unconquerable will, to such an invincible faith +obstacles vanish; the impossible becomes the attainable. As Garrison +burned to be about his work, help came to him from a man quite as +penniless and friendless as himself. The man was Isaac Knapp, an old +companion of his in Newburyport, who had also worked with him in the +office of the _Genius_, in Baltimore. He was a practical printer, and +was precisely the sort of assistant that the young reformer needed at +this juncture in the execution of his purpose; a man like himself +acquainted with poverty, and of unlimited capacity for the endurance of +unlimited hardships. Together they worked out the financial problems +which blocked the way to the publication of the paper. The partners took +an office in Merchants' Hall building, then standing on the corner of +Congress and Water streets, Boston, which gave their joint enterprise a +local habitation. It had already a name. They obtained the use of types +in the printing office of the _Christian Examiner_, situated in the same +building. The foreman, Stephen Foster, through his ardent interest in +Abolition, made the three first numbers of the paper possible. The +publishers paid for the use of the types by working during the day at +the case in the _Examiner's_ office. They got the use of a press from +another foreman with Abolition sympathies, viz., James B. Yerrington, +then the printer of the Boston _Daily Advocate_. Thus were obtained the +four indispensables to the publication of the _Liberator_--types, a +press, an office, and an assistant. + +When at length the offspring of such labor and sacrifices made its +appearance in the world, which was on January 1, 1831, it was, in point +of size, insignificant enough. It did not look as if its voice would +ever reach beyond the small dark chamber where it saw the light. +Picture, oh! reader, a wee sheet with four columns to the page, +measuring fourteen inches one way and nine and a quarter the other, and +you will get an idea of the diminutiveness of the _Liberator_ on the day +of its birth. The very paper on which it was printed was procured on +credit. To the ordinary observer it must have seemed such a weakling as +was certain to perish from inanition in the first few months of its +struggle for existence in the world of journalism. It was domiciled +during successive periods in four different rooms of the Merchant's Hall +building, until it reached No. 11, "under the eaves," whence it issued +weekly for many years to call the nation to repentance. A photographic +impression of this cradle-room of the anti-slavery movement has been +left by Oliver Johnson, an eye-witness. Says Mr. Johnson: "The dingy +walls; the small windows, bespattered with printer's ink; the press +standing in one corner; the composing-stands opposite; the long +editorial and mailing table, covered with newspapers; the bed of the +editor and publisher on the floor--all these make a picture never to be +forgotten." For the first eighteen months the partners toiled fourteen +hours a day, and subsisted "chiefly upon bread and milk, a few cakes, +and a little fruit, obtained from a baker's shop opposite, and a petty +cake and fruit shop in the basement," and, alas, "were on short commons +even at that." Amid such hard and grinding poverty was the _Liberator_ +born. But the great end of the reformer glorified the mean surroundings: + + "O truth! O Freedom! how are ye still born + In the rude stable, in the manger nursed; + What humble hands unbar those gates of morn + Through which the splendors of the New Day burst." + + +About the brow of this "infant crying in the night," shone aureole-like +the sunlit legend: _Our country is the world--our countrymen are +mankind._ The difference between this motto of the _Liberator_ and that +of the _Free Press_: _Our country, our whole country, and nothing but +our country_--measures the greatness of the revolution which had taken +place in the young editor. The grand lesson he had learned, than which +there is none greater, that beneath diversities of race, color, creed, +language, there is the one human principle, which makes all men kin. He +had learned at the age of twenty-five to know the mark of brotherhood +made by the Deity Himself: "Behold! my brother is man, not because he is +American or Anglo-Saxon, or white or black, but because he is a +fellow-man," is the simple, sublime acknowledgment, which thenceforth he +was to make in his word and life. + +It was Mr. Garrison's original design, as we have seen, to publish the +_Liberator_ from Washington. Lundy had, since the issue of the +_Prospectus_ for the new paper, removed the _Genius_ to the capital of +the nation. This move of Lundy rendered the establishment of a second +paper devoted to the abolition of slavery in the same place, of doubtful +utility, but, weighty as was this consideration from a mere business +point of view, in determining Garrison to locate the _Liberator_ in +another quarter, it was not decisive. Just what was the decisive +consideration, he reveals in his salutatory address in the _Liberator_. +Here it is: + +"During my recent tour for the purpose of exciting the minds of the +people by a series of discourses on the subject of slavery," he confides +to the reader, "every place that I visited gave fresh evidence of the +fact, that a greater revolution in public sentiment was to be effected +in the free States--_and particularly in New England_--than at the +South. I found contempt more bitter, opposition more active, detraction +more relentless; prejudice more stubborn, and apathy more frozen than +among slaveowners themselves. Of course there were individual exceptions +to the contrary. This state of things afflicted, but did not dishearten +me. I determined, at every hazard, to lift up the standard of +emancipation in the eyes of the nation, _within sight of Bunker Hill, +and in the birthplace of liberty_." This final choice of Boston as a +base from which to operate against slavery was sagacious, and of the +greatest moment to the success of the experiment and to its effective +service to the cause. + +If the reformer changed his original intention respecting the place of +publication for his paper, he made no alteration of his position on the +subject of slavery. "I shall strenuously contend," he declares in the +salutatory, "for the immediate enfranchisement of our slave population." +"In Park Street Church," he goes on to add, "on the Fourth of July, +1829, in an address on slavery, I unreflectingly assented to the popular +but pernicious doctrine of _gradual_ abolition. I seize this opportunity +to make a full and unequivocal recantation, and thus publicly to ask +pardon of my God, of my country, and of my brethren, the poor slaves, +for having uttered a sentiment so full of timidity, injustice, and +absurdity." + +To those who find fault with his harsh language he makes reply: "I +_will_ be as harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. On this +subject, I do not wish to think, or speak, or write, with moderation. +No! no! Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell +him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of the ravisher; tell +the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it +has fallen--but urge me not to use moderation in a cause like the +present. I am in earnest--I will not equivocate--I will not excuse--I +will not retreat a single inch--AND I WILL BE HEARD." Martin Luther's +"Here I take my stand," was not braver or grander than the "I will be +heard," of the American reformer. It did not seem possible that a young +man, without influence, without money, standing almost alone, could ever +make good those courageous words. The country, in Church and State, had +decreed silence on the subject of slavery; the patriotism of the North, +its commerce, its piety, its labor and capital had all joined hands to +smother agitation, and stifle the discussion of a question that +imperilled the peace and durability of Webster's glorious Union. But one +man, tearing the gag from his lips, defying all these, cried, "Silence, +there shall not be!" and forthwith the whole land began to talk on the +forbidden theme: + + "O small beginnings ye are great and strong, + Based on a faithful heart and weariless brain! + Ye build the future fair, ye conquer wrong. + Ye earn the crown, and wear it not in vain!" + + + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + + +THE HEAVY WORLD IS MOVED. + + +Archimedes with his lever desired a place to stand that he might move +the world of matter. Garrison with his paper, having found a place for +his feet, demonstrated speedily his ability to push from its solid base +the world of mind. His plan was very simple, viz., to reveal slavery as +it then existed in its naked enormity, to the conscience of the North, +to be "as harsh as truth and as uncompromising as justice." And so, week +after week, he packed in the columns of the _Liberator_ facts, the most +damning facts, against slaveholders, their cruelty and tyranny. He +painted the woes of the slaves as if he, too, had been a slave. For the +first time the masters found a man who rebuked them as not before had +they been rebuked. Others may have equivocated, but this man called +things by their proper names, a spade, a spade, and sin, sin. Others may +have contented themselves with denunciations of the sins and with +excuses for the sinner, as a creature of circumstances, the victim of +ancestral transgressions, but this man offered no excuses for the +slave-holding sinner. Him and his sin he denounced in language, which +the Eternal puts only into the mouths of His prophets. It was, as he had +said, "On this subject I do not wish to think, or speak, or write, with +moderation." The strength and resources of his mother-tongue seemed to +him wholly inadequate for his needs, to express the transcendent +wickedness of slave-holding. All the harsh, the stern, the terrible and +tremendous energies of the English speech he drew upon, and launched at +slaveholders. Amid all of this excess of the enthusiast there was the +method of a calculating mind. He aimed to kindle a conflagration because +he had icebergs to melt. "The public shall not be imposed upon," he +replied to one of his critics, "and men and things shall be called by +their right names. I retract nothing, I blot out nothing. My language is +exactly such as suits me; it will displease many, I know; to displease +them is my intention." He was philosopher enough to see that he could +reach the national conscience only by exciting the national anger. It +was not popular rage, which he feared but popular apathy. If he could +goad the people to anger on the subject of slavery he would soon be rid +of their apathy. And so week after week he piled every sort of +combustible material, which he was able to collect on board the +_Liberator_ and lighting it all, sent the fiery messenger blazing among +the icebergs of the Union. Slaveholders were robbers, murderers, +oppressors; they were guilty of all the sins of the decalogue, were in a +word the chief of sinners. At the same moment that the reformer denied +their right of property in the slave, he attacked their character also, +held them up in their relation of masters to the reprobation of the +nation and of mankind as monsters of injustice and inhumanity. The tone +which he held toward them, steadily, without shadow of change, was the +tone of a righteous man toward the workers of iniquity. The +indifference, the apathy, the pro-slavery sympathy and prejudice of the +free States rendered the people of the North hardly less culpable. They +were working iniquity with the people of the South. This was the long, +sharp goad, which the young editor thrust in between the bars of the +Union and stirred the guilty sections to quick and savage outbursts of +temper against him and the bitter truths which he preached. Almost +directly the proofs came to him that he was HEARD at the South and at +the North alike. Angry growls reached his ears in the first month of the +publication of the _Liberator_ from some heartless New England editors +in denunciation of his "violent and intemperate attacks on +slaveholders." The _Journal_, published at Louisville, Kentucky, and +edited by George D. Prentice, declared that, "some of his opinions with +regard to slavery in the United States are no better than lunacy." The +_American Spectator_ published at the seat of the National Government, +had hoped that the good sense of the "late talented and persecuted +junior editor" of the _Genius_, "would erelong withdraw him even from +the side of the Abolitionists." And from farther South the growl which +the reformer heard was unmistakably ferocious. It was from the State of +South Carolina and the Camden _Journal_, which pronounced the +_Liberator_ "a scandalous and incendiary budget of sedition." These were +the beginning of the chorus of curses, which soon were to sing their +serpent songs about his head. Profane and abusive letters from irate +slaveholders and their Northern sympathisers began to pour into the +sanctum of the editor. Within a few months after the first issue of the +_Liberator_ the whole aspect of the world without had changed toward +him. "Foes are on my right hand, and on my left," he reported to some +friends. "The tongue of detraction is busy against me. I have no +communion with the world--the world none with me. The timid, the +lukewarm, the base, affect to believe that my brains are disordered, and +my words the ravings of a maniac. Even many of my friends--they who have +grown up with me from my childhood--are transformed into scoffers and +enemies." The apathy of the press, and the apathy of the people were +putting forth signs that the long winter of the land was passing away. + +To a colored man belongs the high honor of having been the _courier +avant_ of the slavery agitation. This man was David Walker, who lived in +Boston, and who published in 1829 a religio-political discussion of the +status of the negroes of the United States in four articles. The +wretchedness of the blacks in consequence of slavery he depicted in dark +and bitter language. Theodore Parker, many years afterward, said that +the negro was deficient in vengeance, the lowest form of justice. +"Walker's Appeal" evinced no deficiency in this respect in its author. +The pamphlet found its way South, and was the cause of no little +commotion among the master-class. It was looked upon as an instigation +to servile insurrection. The "Appeal" was proscribed, and a price put +upon the head of the author. Garrison deprecated the sanguinary +character of the book. For he himself was the very reverse of Walker. +Garrison was a full believer in the literal doctrine of non-resistance +as enunciated by Jesus. He abhorred all war, and physical collisions of +every description, as wicked and inhuman. He sang to the slave: + + "Not by the sword shall your deliverance be; + Not by the shedding of your master's blood, + Not by rebellion--or foul treachery, + Upspringing suddenly, like swelling flood; + Revenge and rapine ne'er did bring forth good. + God's _time is best_!--nor will it long delay; + Even now your barren cause begins to bud, + And glorious shall the fruit be!--watch and pray, + For lo! the kindling dawn that ushers in the day." + + +He considered "Walker's Appeal" "a most injudicious publication, yet +warranted by the creed of an independent people." He saw in our +Fourth-of-July demonstrations, in our glorification of force as an +instrument for achieving liberty, a constant incentive to the slaves to +go and do likewise. If it was right for the men of 1776 to rise in +rebellion against their mother-country, it surely could not be wrong +were the slaves to revolt against their oppressors, and strike for their +freedom. It certainly did not lie in the mouth of a people, who +apotheosized force, to condemn them. What was sauce for the white man's +goose was sauce for the black man's gander. + +The South could not distinguish between this sort of reasoning, and an +express and positive appeal to the slaves to cut the throats of their +masters. The contents of the _Liberator_ were quite as likely to produce +a slave insurrection as was "Walker's Appeal," if the paper was allowed +to circulate freely among the slave population. It was, in fact, more +dangerous to the lives and interests of slaveholders by virtue of the +pictorial representation of the barbarism and abomination of the +peculiar institution, introduced as a feature of the _Liberator_ in its +seventeenth number, in the shape of a slave auction, where the slaves +are chattels, and classed with "horses and other cattle," and where the +tortures of the whipping-post are in vigorous operation. Here was a +message, which every slave, however ignorant and illiterate could read. +His instinct would tell him, wherever he saw the pictured horror, that a +friend, not an enemy, had drawn it, but for what purpose? What was the +secret meaning, which he was to extract from a portrayal of his woes at +once so real and terrible. Was it to be a man, to seize the knife, the +torch, to slay and burn his way to the rights and estate of a man? +Garrison had put no such bloody import into the cut. It was designed not +to appeal to the passions of the slaves, but to the conscience of the +North. But the South did not so read it, was incapable, in fact, of so +reading it. What it saw was a shockingly realistic representation of the +wrongs of the slaves, the immediate and inevitable effect of which upon +the slaves would be to incite them to sedition, to acts of revenge. +Living as the slaveholders were over mines of powder and dynamite, it is +not to be marveled at that the first flash of danger filled them with +apprehension and terror. The awful memories of San Domingo flamed red +and dreadful against the dark background of every Southern plantation +and slave community. In the "belly" of the _Liberator's_ picture were +many San Domingos. Extreme fear is the beginning of madness; it is, +indeed, a kind of madness. The South was suddenly plunged into a state +of extreme fear toward which the _Liberator_ and "Walker's Appeal" were +hurrying it, by one of those strange accidents or coincidences of +history. + +This extraordinary circumstance was the slave insurrection in +Southampton, Virginia, in the month of August, 1831. The leader of the +uprising was the now famous Nat Turner. Brooding over the wrongs of his +race for several years, he conceived that he was the divinely appointed +agent to redress them. He was cast in the mould of those rude heroes, +who spring out of the sides of oppression as isolated trees will +sometimes grow out of clefts in a mountain. With his yearning to deliver +his people, there mingled not a little religious frenzy and +superstition. Getting his command from Heaven to arise against the +masters, he awaited the sign from this same source of the moment for +beginning the work of destruction. It came at last and on the night of +August 21st; he and his confederates made a beginning by massacring +first his own master, Mr. Joseph Travis, and his entire family. Turner's +policy was remorseless enough. It was to spare no member of the white +race, whether man, woman, or child, the very infant at the mother's +breast was doomed to the knife, until he was able to collect such an +assured force as would secure the success of the enterprise. This +purpose was executed with terrible severity and exactness. All that +night the work of extermination went on as the slave leader and his +followers passed like fate from house to house, and plantation to +plantation, leaving a wide swathe of death in their track. Terror filled +the night, terror filled the State, the most abject terror clutched the +bravest hearts. The panic was pitiable, horrible. James McDowell, one of +the leaders of the Old Dominion, gave voice to the awful memories and +sensations of that night, in the great anti-slavery debate, which broke +out in the Virginia Legislature, during the winter afterward. One of the +legislators, joined to his idol, and who now, that the peril had passed, +laughed at the uprising as a "petty affair." McDowell retorted--"Was +that a 'petty affair,' which erected a peaceful and confiding portion of +the State into a military camp, which outlawed from pity the unfortunate +beings whose brothers had offended; which barred every door, penetrated +every bosom with fear or suspicion, which so banished every sense of +security from every man's dwelling, that let but a hoof or horn break +upon the silence of the night, and an aching throb would be driven to +the heart? The husband would look to his weapon, and the mother would +shudder and weep upon her cradle. Was it the fear of Nat Turner and his +deluded, drunken handful of followers which produced such effects? Was +it this that induced distant counties, where the very name of +Southampton was strange, to arm and equip for a struggle? No, sir, it +was the _suspicion eternally attached to the slave himself,_--a +suspicion that a Nat Turner might be in every family, that the same +bloody deed might be acted over at any time and in any place, that the +materials for it were spread through the land, and were always ready for +a like explosion." + +Sixty one whites and more than a hundred blacks perished in this +catastrophe. The news produced a profound sensation in the Union. +Garrison himself, as he records, was horror-struck at the tidings. Eight +months before he had in a strain of prophecy penetrated the future and +caught a glimpse of just such an appalling tragedy: + + "Wo, if it come with storm, and blood, and fire, + When midnight darkness veils the earth and sky! + Wo to the innocent babe--the guilty sire-- + Mother and daughter--friends of kindred tie! + _Stranger and citizen alike shall die!_ + Red-handed slaughter his revenge shall feed, + And havoc yell his ominous death-cry, + And wild despair in vain for mercy plead-- + While hell itself shall shrink and sicken at the deed!" + + +After the Southampton insurrection the slavery agitation increased +apace, and the _Liberator_ and its editor became instantly objects of +dangerous notoriety in it. The eyes of the country were irresistibly +drawn to them. They were at the bottom of the uprising, they were +instigating the slaves to similar outbreaks. The savage growlings of a +storm came thrilling on every breeze from the South, and wrathful +mutterings against the agitator and his paper grew thenceforth more +distinct and threatening throughout the free States. October 15, 1831, +Garrison records in the _Liberator_ that he "is constantly receiving +from the slave States letters filled with the most diabolical threats +and indecent language." In the same month Georgetown, S.C., in a panic +made it unlawful for a free colored person to take the _Liberator_ from +the post-office. In the same month the Charleston _Mercury_ announced +that "gentlemen of the first respectability" at Columbia had offered a +reward of fifteen hundred dollars for the arrest and conviction of any +white person circulating the _Liberator_, Walker's pamphlet, "or any +other publication of seditious tendency." In Georgia the same symptoms +of fright were exhibited. In the same month the grand jury at Raleigh, +N.C., indicted William Lloyd Garrison and Isaac Knapp for circulating +the _Liberator_ in that county. It was even confidently expected that a +requisition would be made by the Executive of the State upon the +Governor of Massachusetts for their arrest, when they would be tried +under a law, which made their action felony. "Whipping and imprisonment +for the first offence, and death, without benefit of clergy, for the +second." Governor Floyd said in his message to the Virginia Legislature +in December that there was good cause to suspect that the plans of the +Southampton massacre were "designed and matured by unrestrained fanatics +in some of the neighboring States." Governor Hamilton sent to the South +Carolina Legislature in the same month an excited message on the +situation. He was in entire accord with the Virginia Executive as to the +primary and potent agencies which led to the slave uprising in Virginia. +They were "incendiary newspapers and other publications put forth in the +non-slave-holding States, and freely circulated within the limits of +Virginia." As specimens of "incendiary newspapers and other +publications, put forth in the non-slave-holding States," the South +Carolina official sent along with his message, copies of the _Liberator_ +and of Mr. Garrison's address to the "Free People of Color," for the +enlightenment of the members of the Legislature. But it remained for +Georgia to cap the climax of madness when her Legislature resolved: + + + "That the sum of five thousand dollars be, and the same is + hereby appropriated, to be paid to any person or persons who + shall arrest, bring to trial and prosecute to conviction, under + the laws of this State, the editor or publisher of a certain + paper called the _Liberator_, published in the town of Boston + and State of Massachusetts; or who shall arrest and bring to + trial and prosecute to conviction, under the laws of this State, + any other person or persons who shall utter, publish, or + circulate within the limits of this State said paper called the + _Liberator_, or any other paper, circular, pamphlet, letter, or + address of a seditious character." + + +This extraordinary resolve was signed Dec. 26, 1831, by "Wilson Lumpkin, +Governor." The whole South was in a state of terror. In its insane +fright it would have made short shrift of the editor of the _Liberator,_ +had he by accident, force, or fraud have fallen into the clutches of its +laws. The Georgia reward of five thousand dollars was as Mr. Garrison +put it, "a bribe to kidnappers." The Southern method of dealing with the +agitation within the slave States was violent and effective. There could +be no agitation after the agitators were abolished. And the Southern +method was to abolish the agitators. + +The suppression of Abolitionism within the slave States was no difficult +matter, but its suppression at the North was a problem of a wholly +different nature, as the South was not long in finding out. It would not +understand why its violent treatment of the disease within its +jurisdiction could not be prescribed as a remedy by the +non-slave-holding half of the Union within its borders. And so the South +began to call loudly and fiercely for the suppression of a movement +calculated to incite the slaves to insubordination and rebellion. This +demand of the South had its influence at the North. Such newspapers as +the _National Intelligencer,_ and the Boston _Courier_ suggested +amendments to the laws whereby the publication of incendiary writings in +the free States might be prohibited. The latter journal allowed that +under the criminal code of Massachusetts "every man has a right to +advocate Abolition, or conspiracy, or murder; for he may do all these +without breaking our laws, although in any Southern State public justice +and public safety would require his punishment." "But," the editor goes +on to remark, "if we have no laws upon the subject, it is because the +exigency was not anticipated.... Penal statutes against treasonable and +seditious publications are necessary in all communities. We have them +for our own protection; if they should include provisions for the +protection of our neighbors it would be no additional encroachment upon +the liberty of the press." The Governors of Virginia and Georgia +remonstrated with Harrison Gray Otis, who was Mayor of Boston in the +memorable year of 1831, "against an incendiary newspaper published in +Boston, and, as they alleged, thrown broadcast among their plantations, +inciting to insurrection and its horrid results." As a lawyer Mayor +Otis, however, "perceived the intrinsic, if not insuperable obstacles to +legislative enactments made to prevent crimes from being consummated +beyond the local jurisdiction." But the South was not seeking a legal +opinion as to what it could or could not do. It demanded, legal or +illegal, that Garrison and the _Liberator_ be suppressed. To the Boston +mayor the excitement over the editor and his paper seemed like much ado +about nothing. The cause appeared to his supercilious mind altogether +inadequate to the effect. And so he set to work to reduce the panic by +exposing the vulgarity and insignificance of the object, which produced +it. That he might give the Southern bugaboo its _quietus_, he directed +one of his deputies to inquire into a publication, of which "no member +of the city government, nor any person," of his honor's acquaintance, +"had ever heard." The result of this inquiry Mayor Otis reported to the +Southern functionaries. + +"Some time afterward," he wrote, "it was reported to me by the city +officers that they had ferreted out the paper and its editor; that his +office was an obscure hole, his only visible auxiliary a negro boy, and +his supporters a very few insignificant persons of all colors." + +With this bare bodkin Harrison Gray Otis thought to puncture the +Southern panic. But the slaveholders had correcter notions of the nature +and tendency of the Abolition enterprise than had the Boston mayor. They +had a strange, an obstinate presentiment of disaster from the first +instant that the _Liberator_ loomed upon their horizon. It was a battery +whose guns, unless silenced, would play havoc with Southern interests +and the slave system; _ergo_, the paper must be suppressed; _ergo_, its +editor must be silenced or destroyed. And so when Otis, from his serene +height, assured them of his "belief that the new fanaticism had not +made, nor was likely to make, proselytes among the respectable classes +of our people," they continued to listen to their fears, and to cry the +louder for the suppression of the "incendiary newspaper published in +Boston." + +The editor of that paper never flinched before the storm of malignity +which was gathering about his head. He pursued the even tenor of his +way, laboring at the case more than fourteen hours every day, except +Sundays, upon the paper, renewing, week after week, his assaults upon +the citadel of the great iniquity, giving no quarter to slave-holding +sinners, but carrying aloft the banner of IMMEDIATE AND UNCONDITIONAL +EMANCIPATION. Otis had looked to numbers and respectability as his +political barometer and cue; but when, after diligent search with +official microscopes, he failed to observe the presence of either in +connection with this "new fanaticism," wise man that he was, he turned +over and renewed his slumbers on the edge of a volcano whose ominous +rumbling the Southern heart had heard and interpreted aright. He was too +near to catch the true import of the detonations of those subterranean +forces which were sounding, week after week, in the columns of the +_Liberator_. They seemed trivial, harmless, contemptible, like the toy +artillery of children bombarding Fort Independence. Garrison's moral +earnestness and enthusiasm seemed to the Boston mayor like the impotent +rage of a man nursing memories of personal injuries suffered at the +South. + +If there was panic in the South, there was none in the office of the +_Liberator_. Unterrified by the commotion which his composing-stick was +producing near and far, he laughed to scorn the abuse and threats of his +enemies. When the news of the reward of the State of Georgia "for the +abduction of his person" reached him, he did not quail, great as was his +peril, but boldly replied: + +"Of one thing we are sure: all Southern threats and rewards will be +insufficient to deter us from pursuing the work of emancipation. As +citizens of the United States we know our rights and dare maintain them. +We have committed no crime, but are expending our health, comfort, and +means for the salvation of our country, and for the interests and +security of infatuated slaveholders, as well as for the relief of the +poor slaves." + +Archimedes with his lever had moved the world. Archimedes "in a small +chamber, unfurnitured and mean," had set a world of pro-slavery passions +and prejudices spinning away into space: + + "Such earnest natures are the fiery pith, + The compact nucleus, 'round which systems grow; + Mass after mass becomes inspired therewith, + And whirls impregnate with the central glow." + + + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + + + + + +MASTER STROKES. + + +"Help came but slowly" to the reformer. With a single instrument he had +stirred the nation, as no other man had done, on the slavery question. +He had thrown the South into widespread excitement, and thawed the +apathy of the North into widespread attention. He had won an almost +instant hearing for his cause. But he knew that this was not enough. +Effective as he had shown the weapon of the press to be, it alone was +unequal to the conduct of prolonged agitation. And prolonged agitation +Garrison clearly apprehended was to be the price of abolition. Back of +him and the _Liberator_ he needed an organized force, coadjutors like +Aaron and Hur to hold up his arms during the mighty conflict on which he +had now entered with the slave interests of the country. Those interests +were organized, and because they were organized they were powerful. The +sentiment of freedom he determined to organize and to render it thereby +invincible. To organized wrong he designed to oppose organized right, +confident that organized right would prevail in the end. He had +knowledge of the utility of temperance societies in advancing the cause +of sobriety among the people. He had learned from Lundy how much he had +relied upon the union of men as anti-slavery helps. Garrison determined +to summon to his side the powerful agency of an anti-slavery society +devoted to immediate and unconditional emancipation. He had already made +converts; he had already a small following. At Julien Hall, on the +occasion of his first lecture on the subject of slavery, he had secured +three remarkable men to the movement, viz., Rev. Samuel J. May, then a +young Unitarian minister, Samuel E. Sewall, a young member of the Bar, +and A. Bronson Alcott, a sage even in his early manhood. They had all +promised him aid and comfort in the great task which he had undertaken. +A little later two others, quite as remarkable as those first three were +drawn to the reformer's side, and abetted him in the treason to +iniquity, which he was prosecuting through the columns of the +_Liberator_ with unrivaled zeal and devotion. These disciples were Ellis +Grey Loring and David Lee Child. They were a goodly company, were these +five conspirators, men of intellect and conscience, of high family and +social connections, of brilliant attainments and splendid promises for +the future. To this number must be added a sixth, Oliver Johnson, who +was at the time editing _The Christian Soldier_, disciple of Garrison +then, and ever after his devoted friend. The early promises of this +noble half dozen friends of the slave were more than fulfilled in after +years. Often to the dingy room "under the eaves" in Merchants' Hall they +climbed to carry aid and comfort to "one poor, unlearned young man," and +to sit at his feet in this cradle-room of the new movement. It was there +in communion with the young master that suggestions looking to the +formation of an anti-slavery society, were doubtless first thrown out. + + "The place was dark, unfurnitured and mean; + Yet there the freedom of a race began." + + +It was not all clear sailing for the editor of the _Liberator_ even with +such choice spirits. They did not always carry aid and comfort to him, +but differences of opinions sometimes as well. He did not sugar-coat +enough the bitter truth which he was telling to the nation. Some of them +would have preferred _The Safety Lamp_ to the _Liberator_ as a title +less likely to offend the prejudices of many good people. Some again +objected to the pictorial heading of the paper as an altogether unwise +proceeding, and positively mischievous. He had the same experience when +the formation of an Abolition society was under consideration. He was +confronted with this benevolent aversion to giving offence by calling +things by their right names. But much as he desired to have his friends +and followers organized for associated action, where a principle was at +stake he was with them as with slavery itself absolutely inflexible and +uncompromising. He was for organizing on the principle of immediate +emancipation. A few deemed that ground too radical and revolutionary, +and were for ranging themselves under the banner of Gradualism, thinking +to draw to their ranks a class of people, who would be repelled by +Immediatism. But Garrison was unyielding, refused to budge an inch to +conciliate friend or foe--not even such stanch supporters as were Sewall +and Loring, who supplied him again and again with money needed to +continue the publication of the _Liberator_. No, he was right and they +were wrong, and they, not he, ought accordingly to yield. The contention +between the leader and his disciples was not what was expedient, but +what was right. It was on the part of the leader the assertion of a +vital principle, and on this ground he was pledged against retreat. The +mountain could not go to Mahomet, therefore Mahomet must needs go to the +mountain. Garrison could not abandon his position, wherefore in due time +Loring, Child, and Sewall surrendered theirs. Finely has Lowell +expressed this righteous stubbornness, and steadfastness to principle in +three stanzas of his poem entitled, "The Day of Small Things," and which +have such an obvious lesson for our own times that I shall venture to +quote them in this place: + + + "Who is it will not dare himself to trust? + Who is it hath not strength to stand alone? + Who is it thwarts and bilks the inward MUST? + He and his works, like sand from earth are blown. + + + "Men of a thousand shifts and wiles look here! + See one straightforward conscience put in pawn + To win a world! See the obedient sphere + By bravery's simple gravitation drawn! + + + "Shall we not heed the lesson taught of old, + And by the Present's lips repeated still, + In our own single manhood to be bold, + Fortressed in conscience and impregnable will?" + + +The history of the making of this first society is an interesting story. +There were four meetings in all before it was found possible to complete +the work of its organization. These meetings extended over a space of +nearly three months, so obstinate were a minority against committing the +proposed society to the principle of immediate emancipation. The very +name which was to be given to the association provoked debate and +disagreement. Some were for christening it "Philo-African," while +Garrison would no such milk-and-water title, but one which expressed +distinctly and graphically the real character of the organization, viz., +"New England Anti-Slavery Society." He would sail under no false or +neutral colors, but beneath the red flag of open and determined +hostility to slavery. It should be a sign which no one could possibly +mistake. The first meeting was held at the office of Samuel E. Sewall, +November 13, 1831. At the third meeting, convened New Year's evening of +1832, which was the first anniversary of the publication of the +_Liberator_, the work of organization was finished, with a single +important exception, viz., the adoption of the preamble to the +constitution. The character of the preamble would fix the character of +the society. Therefore that which was properly first was made to come +last. The fourth meeting took place on the night of January 6th in the +African Baptist Church on what was then Belknap but now known as Joy +street. The young leader and fourteen of his followers met that evening +in the school-room for colored children, situated under the auditorium +of the church. They could hardly have fallen upon a more obscure or +despised place for the consummation of their enterprise in the city of +Boston than was this selfsame negro church and school-room. The weather +added an ever memorable night to the opprobrium of the spot. A fierce +northeaster accompanied with "snow, rain, and hail in equal proportions" +was roaring and careering through the city's streets. To an eye-witness, +Oliver Johnson, "it almost seemed as if Nature was frowning upon the new +effort to abolish slavery; but," he added, "the spirits of the little +company rose superior to all external circumstances." + +If there was strife of the elements without, neither was there sweet +accord within among brethren. "The spirits of the little company" may +have risen superior to the weather, but they did not rise superior to +the preamble, with the principle of immediatism incorporated in it. +Eleven stood by the leader and made it the chief of the corner of the +new society, while three, Messrs. Loring, Sewall, and Child, refused to +sign the Constitution and parted sorrowfully from the small band of the +New England Anti-Slavery Society. But the separation was only temporary, +for each returned to the side of the reformer, and proved his loyalty +and valor in the trying years which followed. + +The preamble which was the bone of so much contention declared that: +"We, the undersigned, hold that every person, of full age and sane mind, +has a right to immediate freedom from personal bondage of whatsoever +kind, unless imposed by the sentence of the law for the commission of +some crime. We hold that man cannot, consistently with reason, religion, +and the eternal and immutable principles of justice, be the property of +man. We hold that whoever retains his fellow-man in bondage is guilty of +a grievous wrong. We hold that a mere difference of complexion is no +reason why any man should be deprived of any of his natural rights, or +subjected to any political disability. While we advance these opinions +as the principles on which we intend to act, we declare that we will not +operate on the existing relations of society by other than peaceful and +lawful means, and that we will give no countenance to violence or +insurrection." + +Twelve, the apostolic number, affixed to the preamble and constitution +their names, and thus formed the first Garrisonian Society for the +abolition of slavery in the United States. The names of these apostolic +men it is well to keep in mind. They are William Lloyd Garrison, Oliver +Johnson, Robert B. Hall, Arnold Buffum, William J. Snelling, John E. +Fuller, Moses Thatcher, Joshua Coffin, Stillman B. Newcomb, Benjamin C. +Bacon, Isaac Knapp, and Henry K. Stockton. The band of reformers, their +work done, had risen to pass out of the low, rude room into the dark +night. The storm was still raging. They themselves had perchance been +sobered by the experiences of the evening. They had gone in fifteen, +they were returning twelve. And, after all, what had they accomplished? +What could they a mere handful do to abolish slavery entrenched as it +was in Church and State? It is possible that some such dim +discouragement, some such vague misgiving of the futility of the +evening's labor, was in the hearts of those wearied men, and that their +leader divined as much, for the spirit of prophecy fell upon Garrison +just as they "were stepping out into the storm and darkness." "We have +met to-night," he said, "in this obscure school-house; our numbers are +few and our influence limited; but, mark my prediction, Faneuil Hall +shall erelong echo with the principles we have set forth. We shall shake +the nation by their mighty power." Then the little band dispersed "into +the storm and darkness," carrying with them these words charged with +hope and courage. + +The fruitful seed of organized agitation Garrison had securely planted +in soil fertile and ready for its reception. Its growth constitutes one +of the marvels of reforms. Within a few brief years it multiplied into +hundreds and thousands of societies throughout the free States. But its +beginnings were small and humble enough. "The objects of the society" +were according to the second article of the constitution, "to endeavor +by all means sanctioned by law, humanity, and religion, to effect the +abolition of slavery in the United States, to improve the character and +condition of the free people of color, to inform and correct public +opinion in relation to their situation and rights, and to obtain for +them equal civil and political rights and privileges with the whites." +The means which were immediately adopted by the society for the +accomplishment of these objects were mainly three, than which none +others could have been more effective. These were petitioning Congress +on the subject of slavery. The publication and circulation of +anti-slavery addresses and tracts, and the employment of anti-slavery +agents, "in obtaining or communicating intelligence, in the publication +and distribution of tracts, books, or papers, or in the execution of any +measure which may be adopted to promote the objects of the society." +Such was the simple but unequaled machinery which the New England +Anti-Slavery Society relied upon for success in the war, which it had +declared against American slavery. The executive power of the body, and +the operation of its machinery were lodged in a board of managers of +which Garrison's was the leading, originating mind. The society started +out bravely in the use of its means by memorializing Congress for the +abolition of slavery, "in the District of Columbia and in the +Territories of the United States under their jurisdiction," and by +preparing and distributing an address in maintenance of the doctrine of +immediate emancipation. The board of managers set the machinery in +motion as far and as fast as the extremely limited pecuniary ability of +the society would permit. The membership was not from the rich classes. +It was Oliver Johnson who wittily remarked that not more than one or two +of the original twelve, "could have put a hundred dollars into the +treasury without bankrupting themselves." The remark was true, and was +quite as applicable to any dozen of the new-comers as to the original +twelve. The society was never deficient in zeal, but it was certainly +sadly wanting in money. And money was even to such men and to such a +movement an important factor in revolutionizing public opinion. + +The _Liberator_ was made the official organ of the society, and in this +way was added to its other weapons that of the press. This was a capital +arrangement, for by it both the paper and the society were placed under +the direction of the same masterly guidance. There was still one arrow +left in the moral quiver of the organization to reach the conscience of +the people, and that was the appointment of an agent to spread the +doctrines of the new propaganda of freedom. In August the board of +managers, metaphorically speaking, shot this arrow by making Garrison +the agent of the society to lecture on the subject of slavery "for a +period not exceeding three months." This was the first drop from a cloud +then no bigger than a hand, but which was to grow and spread until, +covering the North, was, at the end of a few short years, to flood the +land with anti-slavery agents and lecturers. + +Our anti-slavery agent visited portions of Massachusetts, Maine, and +Rhode Island, preaching the Abolition gospel in divers places, and to +many people--notably at such centers of population as Worcester, +Providence, Bangor, and Portland, making at the latter city a signal +conversion to his cause in the person of General Samuel Fessenden, +distinguished then as a lawyer, and later as the father of William Pitt +Fessenden. The anti-slavery schoolmaster was abroad, and was beginning +to turn New England and the North into one resounding schoolhouse, where +he sat behind the desk and the nation occupied the forms. + +So effective was the agitation prosecuted by the society during the +first year of its existence that it was no empty declaration or boast of +the _Abolitionist_, the new monthly periodical of the society, that +"probably, through its instrumentality, more public addresses on the +subject of slavery, and appeals in behalf of the contemned free people +of color, have been made in New England, during the past year (1832) +than were elicited for forty years prior to its organization." + +The introduction of the principle of association into the slavery +agitation, and the conversion of it into an organized movement was an +achievement of the first importance. To Garrison, more than to any man, +or to all others put together, belongs the authorship of this immense +initiative. He it was, who, having "announced the principle, arranged +the method" of the Abolition movement. The marshaling of the +anti-slavery sentiment of New England under a common standard, in a +common cause, was a master stroke of moral generalship. This master +stroke the leader followed up promptly with a second stroke not less +masterly. That second stroke was his "Thoughts on African Colonization," +published in the summer succeeding the formation of the New England +Anti-Slavery Society. + +Garrison's championship of the cause of the slave had started with +strong faith in the efficacy and disinterestedness of the colonization +scheme as an instrument of emancipation. It commanded, therefore, his +early support. In his Park Street Church address he evinced himself in +earnest sympathy with the friends of colonization. But after his arrival +in Baltimore a change began to exhibit itself in this regard. He began +to qualify his confidence in its utility; began to discern in it +influences calculated to retard general emancipation. As these doubts +and misgivings arose within him he expressed them frankly in the +_Genius_. Lundy had been suspicious of the pro-slavery purposes or +interests of the enterprise for many years. He could not reconcile +himself to the significant or, at least, singular fact of so many +slaveholders being in the membership and the offices of the association. +Then, in addition to this lack of confidence on the part of Lundy in the +scheme, Garrison became acquainted, for the first time, with the objects +of the society's philanthropy--the class of free people of color. He +found that these people were not at all well affected to the society; +that they had no appreciation of its benevolent intentions in respect to +themselves. He found, on the contrary, that they were positively +embittered toward it and toward its designs for their removal from the +country as toward their worst enemy. This circumstance was undoubtedly a +poser to their young friend. How could he reconcile this deep-seated and +widespread disbelief in the purity of the motives of the Colonization +Society, with the simple integrity and humanity of the enterprise +itself? Later, his acquaintance with such representatives of the free +people of color in Philadelphia as James Forten and his son-in-law, +Robert Purvis, served but to confirm those first impressions which he +received in Baltimore from the Watkinses and the Greeners. It was the +same experience in New York and New Haven, in Boston and Providence. He +learned that from the very beginning, in the year 1817, that the free +people of color in Richmond and Philadelphia had, by an instinctive +knowledge of threatened wrong and danger, met and resolved against the +society and its sinister designs upon themselves. These people did not +wish to leave the country; they did not wish to be sent to Liberia; but +the society, bent on doing them good against their will, did want them +to leave the country, did want to send them to Liberia. + +And why did the society desire to remove the free people of color out of +the country? Was it from motives of real philanthropy? The colored +people were the first to detect its spurious humanity, the first to see +through the artful disguises employed to impose upon the conscience of +the republic. Their removal, they intuitively divined, was proposed not +to do their race a benefit, but rather to do a service to the owners of +slaves. These objects of the society's pseudo-philanthropy had the +sagacity to perceive that, practically, their expatriation tended to +strengthen the chains of their brethren then in slavery; for if the +South could get rid of its free colored population, its slave property +would thereby acquire additional security, and, of consequence, +increased market value. Like cause, like effect. If the operation of the +colonization scheme was decidedly in the interest of the masters, it was +the part of wisdom to conclude as the free colored people did actually +conclude that the underlying motive, the hidden purpose of the society +was also in the interest of the masters. + +Garrison did not reach his conclusions as to the pro-slavery character +and tendency of the society abruptly. The scales fell away gradually +from his eyes. He was not completely undeceived until he had examined +the reports of the society and found in them the most redundant evidence +of its insincerity and guilt. It was out of its own mouth that he +condemned it. When he saw the society in its true character, he saw what +he must do. It was a wolf in sheep's skin running at large among the +good shepherd's flock, and inflicting infinite hurt upon his poor sheep. +He no longer wondered at the horror which the colonization scheme +inspired among the free people of color. They were right. The society +was their dangerous and determined enemy; it was the bulwark of the +slave-holding classes. With the instinct of a great purpose he resolved +to carry this powerful bulwark of slavery by assault. To the attack he +returned week after week in the _Liberator_, during a year and a half. +Then he hurled himself upon it with all his guns, facts, arguments, +denunciations, blowing away and burning up every shred of false covering +from the doctrines, principles, and purposes of the society, revealing +it to mankind in its base and monstrous character. + +The society's one motive "to get rid of the free people of color," was +outrageous enough, but this was not its only sin. There was another +phase to the mischief it was working, which lifted it to the rank of a +great sinner. It was not only harmful in its principles and purposes. +"It imperatively and effectually seals up the lips," so Garrison accused +it, "of a vast number of influential and pious men, who, for fear of +giving offence to those slaveholders with whom they associate, and +thereby leading to a dissolution of the compact, dare not expose the +flagrant enormities of the system of slavery, nor denounce the crime of +holding human beings in bondage. They dare not lead to the onset against +the forces of tyranny; and if they shrink from the conflict, how shall +the victory be won? I do not mean to aver that in their sermons, or +addresses, or private conversations, they never allude to the subject of +slavery; for they do so frequently, or at least every Fourth of July. +But my complaint is that they content themselves with representing +slavery as an evil--a misfortune--a calamity which has been entailed +upon us by former generations,--_and not as an individual_ CRIME, +embracing in its folds, robbery, cruelty, oppression, and piracy. _They +do not identify the criminal_; they make no direct, pungent, earnest +appeal to the consciences of men-stealers." This was a damning bill, but +it was true in every particular; and the evidence which Garrison adduced +to establish his charges was overwhelming and irrefragable. + +Nearly fifty years afterward, Elizur Wright described the baleful +influence of the society upon the humanity and philanthropy of the +nation. "The humanity and philanthropy," he said, "which could not +otherwise be disposed of, was ingeniously seduced into an African +Colonization Society, whereby all slaves who had grown seditious and +troublesome to their masters could be transplanted on the pestiferous +African coast. That this wretched and seemingly transparent humbug could +have deluded anybody, must now seem past belief; but I must with shame +confess the fact that I for one was deluded by it. And that fact would +put me in doubt of my own sanity at the time if I did not know that high +statesmen, presidents of colleges, able editors, and that most undoubted +of firm philanthropists, Gerritt Smith, shared the same delusion. Bible +and missionary societies fellowshipped that mean and scurvy device of +the kidnapper, in their holy work. It was spoken of as the most glorious +of Christian enterprises, had a monthly magazine devoted to itself, and +taxed about every pulpit in the land for an annual sermon in its favor." + +Such was the Colonization Society, and its entrenched strength in the +piety and philanthropy of the country at the moment when Garrison +published his "Thoughts." It did not seem possible that a single arm +however powerful, was able to start its roots; but, directly upon the +launching of this bolt, the roots of the Bohun Upas, as Garrison +graphically designated the society, were seen to have started, and the +enterprise appeared blasted as by fire. The deluded intellect and +conscience of the free States saw in the fierce light, which the +pamphlet of the reformer threw upon the colonization scheme how +shamefully imposed upon they had been. They had believed the society +"the most glorious of Christian enterprises," and, lo! it stood revealed +to them a "scurvy device of the kidnapper." The effect was +extraordinary. The book was seized and its contents devoured by some of +the finest minds of the North. Here is an example of the interest which +it excited and the converts which it made: "Last Monday evening was our +Law Club meeting, and I had the great satisfaction of hearing Judge +Mellen, our Chief-Justice, say he had read your 'Thoughts,' was a +thorough convert to your views, and was ready to do all in his power to +promote them. Mr. Longfellow [father of Henry W. Longfellow] was present +also, and with equal warmth and clearness expressed himself also in +favor of your views. This is getting the two first men in the State for +talents and influence in benevolent effort. I have no doubt they will +head the list of those who will subscribe to form here an anti-slavery +society. Mr. Greenleaf [Simon] also, will cordially come in, and I need +not say he is one of the first [men] in the State, for his character is +known." This quotation is made from a letter of General Samuel +Fessenden, of Portland, Me., to Mr. Garrison, dated December 14, 1832. +Among the remarkable minds which the "Thoughts" disillusioned in respect +of the character and tendency of the Colonization Society were Theodore +D. Weld, Elizur Wright, and Beriah Green, N.P. Rogers, William Goodell, +Joshua Leavitt, Amos A. Phelps, Lewis Tappan, and James Miller McKim. + +Garrison's assertion that "the overthrow of the Colonization Society was +the overthrow of slavery itself," was, from the standpoint of a student +of history, an exaggerated one. We know now that the claim was not +founded on fact, that while they did stand together they did not fall +together. But the position was, nevertheless, the strongest possible one +for the anti-slavery movement to occupy at the time. In the disposition +of the pro-slavery forces on the field of the opening conflict in 1832, +the colonization scheme commanded the important approaches to the +citadel of the peculiar institution. It cut off the passes to public +opinion, and to the religious and benevolent influences of the land. To +reach these it was necessary in the first place to dislodge the society +from its coign of vantage, its strategical point in the agitation. And +this is precisely what "The Thoughts on African Colonization" did. It +dislodged the society from its powerful place in the moral sentiment of +the North. The capture of this position was like the capture of a +drawbridge, and the precipitation of the assaulting column directly upon +the walls of a besieged castle. Within the pamphlet was contained the +whole tremendous enginery of demolition. The anti-slavery agent and +lecturer thenceforth set it up wherever he spoke. + +To him it was not only the catapult; it furnished the missile-like facts +and arguments for breaching the walls of this pro-slavery stronghold as +well. + +The effect of the publication of "The Thoughts" in this country was +extraordinary, but the result of their circulation in England was hardly +less so. It produced there as here a revolution in public sentiment upon +the subject. The philanthropy and piety of Great Britain had generally +prior to the unmasking of the society, looked upon it as an instrument +of Emancipation, and had accordingly given it their powerful +countenance, and not a little material support. But from the moment that +the pamphlet reached England a decided change in this regard became +manifest. The society made fruitless attempts to break the force of the +blow dealt it by Garrison in the United States. But wherever its +emissaries traveled "The Thoughts" confronted and confounded them. So +that Mr. Garrison was warranted in saying that "all that sophistry or +misrepresentation could effect to overthrow its integrity has been +attempted in vain. The work, as a whole, stands irrefutable." The +attempts made to maintain its hold upon the British public were +characterized by duplicity and misrepresentation beyond anything +practiced in America. The work of deceiving the philanthropy of Great +Britain was conducted by the emissary of the society, Elliott Cresson, a +man perfectly fitted to perform his part with remarkable thoroughness +and industry. Three thousand miles away from America, and practically +secure from contradiction, he went about making outrageous statements as +to the anti-slavery character and purpose of the colonization +enterprise. As there was no one in England sufficiently acquainted with +the operations and designs of the society, he was enabled to falsify +facts, to conceal the real principles of the scheme with astonishing +audacity and activity. He approached Wilberforce, and duped Clarkson +into a belief in the anti-slavery aim of the society. + +Unmasked in America, the time had come when the interests of the +Abolition movement on this side of the Atlantic required that it should +be stripped of its disguises on the other side also. No better +instrument could be selected for this purpose than the man who had torn +the mask from its features in the United States. And so in March, 1833, +the Board of Managers of the New England Anti-Slavery Society notified +the public of the appointment of "William Lloyd Garrison as their agent, +and that he would proceed to England as soon as the necessary +arrangements can be made, for the purpose of procuring funds to aid in +the establishment of the proposed MANUAL LABOR SCHOOL FOR COLORED YOUTH, +and of disseminating in that country the truth in relation to American +slavery, and to its ally, the American Colonization Society." The +managers offered in justification of their step the fact that "Elliott +Cresson is now in England as an agent for the Colonization Society, and +that he has procured funds to a considerable amount by representing that +the object of the society is 'to assist in the emancipation of all the +slaves now in the United States.' It is important that the +philanthropists of that country should be undeceived, and that the real +principles and designs of the Colonization Society should be there made +known." + +In pursuance of this mission Garrison sailed from New York, May 2, 1833. +Twenty days later he landed in Liverpool. His arrival was opportune, for +all England was watching the closing scene in the drama of West India +Emancipation. He was an eye-witness of the crowning triumph of the +English Abolitionists, viz., the breaking by Act of Parliament of the +fetters of eight hundred thousand slaves. He was in time to greet his +great spiritual kinsman, William Wilberforce, and to undeceive him in +respect of the Colonization Society, before death claimed his body, and +to follow him to his last resting-place by the side of Pitt and Fox, in +Westminster Abbey. + +A highly interesting incident of this visit is best told in Mr. +Garrison's own words. He said: + +"On arriving in London I received a polite invitation by letter from Mr. +Buxton to take breakfast with him. Presenting myself at the appointed +time, when my name was announced, instead of coming forward promptly to +take me by the hand, he scrutinized me from head to foot, and then +inquired, 'Have I the pleasure of addressing Mr. Garrison, of Boston, in +the United States?' 'Yes, sir,' I replied, 'I am he; and I am here in +accordance with your invitation.' Lifting up his hands he exclaimed, +'Why, my dear sir, I thought you were a black man! And I have +consequently invited this company of ladies and gentlemen to be present +to welcome Mr. Garrison, the black advocate of emancipation, from the +United States of America.' I have often said that that is the only +compliment I have ever had paid to me that I care to remember or to tell +of! For Mr. Buxton had somehow or other supposed that no white American +could plead for those in bondage as I had done, and therefore I must be +black!" + +Garrison promptly threw down his challenge to Elliott Cresson, offering +to prove him an impostor and the Colonization Society "corrupt in its +principles, proscriptive in its measures, and the worst enemy of the +free colored and slave population of the United States." From the first +it was apparent that Cresson did not mean to encounter the author of the +"Thoughts" in public debate. Even a mouse when cornered will show fight, +but there was no manly fight in Cresson. Garrison sent him a letter +containing seven grave charges against his society, and dared him to a +refutation of them in a joint discussion. This challenge was presented +four times before the agent of colonization could be persuaded to accept +it. Garrison was bent on a joint public discussion between himself and +Mr. Cresson. But Mr. Cresson was bent on avoiding his opponent. He +skulked under one pretext or another from vindicating the colonization +scheme from the seven-headed indictment preferred against it by the +agent of the New England Anti-Slavery Society. As Cresson could not be +driven into a joint discussion with him there was nothing left to +Garrison but to go on without him. His arraignment and exposure of the +society in public and private was thorough and overwhelming. He was +indefatigable in the prosecution of this part of his mission. And his +labor was not in vain. For in less than three months after his reaching +England he had rendered the Colonization Society as odious there as his +"Thoughts" had made it in America. The great body of the anti-slavery +sentiment in Great Britain promptly condemned the spirit and object of +the American Colonization Society. Such leaders as Buxton and Cropper +"termed its objects _diabolical_;" while Zachary Macaulay, father of the +historian, did not doubt that "the unchristian prejudice of color (which +alone has given birth to the Colonization Society, though varnished over +with other more plausible pretences, and veiled under a profession of a +Christian regard for the temporal and spiritual interests of the negro +which is belied by the whole course of its reasonings and the spirit of +its measures) is so detestable in itself that I think it ought not to be +tolerated, but, on the contrary, ought to be denounced and opposed by +all humane, and especially by all pious persons in this country." + +The protest against the Colonization Society "signed by Wilberforce and +eleven of the most distinguished Abolitionists in Great Britain," +including Buxton, Macaulay, Cropper, and Daniel O'Connell, showed how +thoroughly Garrison had accomplished his mission. The protest declares, +thanks to the teachings of the agent of the New England Anti-Slavery +Society, that the colonization scheme "takes its roots from a cruel +prejudice and alienation in the whites of America against the colored +people, slave or free. This being its source the effects are what might +be expected; that it fosters and increases the spirit of caste, already +so unhappily predominant; that it widens the breach between the two +races--exposes the colored people to great practical persecution, in +order to _force_ them to emigrate; and, finally, is calculated to +swallow up and divert that feeling which America, as a Christian and +free country, cannot but entertain, that slavery is alike incompatible +with the law of God and with the well-being of man, whether the enslaver +or the enslaved." The solemn conclusion of the illustrious signers of +this mighty protest was that: "That society is, in our estimation, not +deserving of the countenance of the British public." This powerful +instrument fell, as Garrison wrote at the time, "like a thunderbolt upon +the society." The damage inflicted upon it was immense, irreparable. The +name of Thomas Clarkson was conspicuous by its absence from the protest. +He could not be induced to take positive ground against the society. +Garrison had visited him for this purpose. But the venerable +philanthropist, who was then blind, had taken position on _neutral +ground_, and could not, after an interview of four hours, be induced to +abandon it. But, fortunately, potent as the name of Clarkson would have +been in opposition to the society, it was not indispensable to its +overthrow in Great Britain. Garrison had won to his side "all the +staunch anti-slavery spirits," while Cresson was able to retain only "a +few titled, wealthy, high-pretending individuals." + +The success of the mission was signal, its service to the movement +against slavery in America manifold. Garrison writing from London to the +board of managers, summarized the results produced by it as follows: +"1st, awakening a general interest among the friends of emancipation in +this country, and securing their efficient coöperation with us in the +abolition of slavery in the United States; 2d, dispelling the mists with +which the agent of the American Colonization Society has blinded the +eyes of benevolent men in relation to the design and tendency of the +society; 3d, enlisting able and eloquent advocates to plead our cause; +4th, inducing editors of periodicals and able writers to give us the +weight of their influence; 5th, exciting a spirit of emulation in the +redemption of our slave population among the numerous female +anti-slavery societies; 6th, procuring a large collection of +anti-slavery documents, tracts, pamphlets, and volumes, which will +furnish us with an inexhaustible supply of ammunition." These were +indeed some of the grand results of laborious weeks. His mission was +ended. He was profoundly grateful to the good God for its success. The +great movement which he had started against oppression in his own +country was awaiting his aggressive leadership. He did not tarry abroad, +therefore, but set sail from London August 18, 1833, for New York, where +he landed six weeks later. + + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + + +COLORPHOBIA + + +Garrison's Abolitionism was of the most radical character. It went the +whole length of the humanity of the colored race, and all that that +implied. They were, the meanest members, whether bond or free, his +brothers and his sisters. From the first he regarded them as bone of his +bone and blood of his blood, as children with him of a common father. +Poor and enslaved and despised to be sure, wronged by all men, and +contemned by all men, but for that very reason they were deserving of +his most devoted love and labor. He never looked down upon them as +wanting in any essential respect the manhood which was his. They were +men and as such entitled to immediate emancipation. They were besides +entitled to equality of civil and political rights in the republic, +entitled to equality and fraternity in the church, equality and +fraternity at the North, equality and fraternity always and everywhere. +This is what he preached, this is what he practiced. In not a single +particular was he ever found separating himself from his brother in +black, saying to him "thus far but no farther." He never drew the line +in public or private between him and the people whose cause was his +cause--not even socially. He went into their homes and was in all things +one with them. He forgot that he was white, forgot that they were black, +forgot the pride of race, forgot the stigma of race too in the tie of +human kinship which bound him to them. If he had what they did not +possess, the rights of a man, the civil and political position of a man +in the State, the equality of a brother in the church, it could not make +him feel better than they, it filled him instead with a righteous sense +of wrong, a passionate sympathy, a supreme desire and determination to +make his own rights the measure of theirs. + +"I lose sight of your present situation," he said in his address before +Free People of Color, "and look at it only in futurity. I imagine myself +surrounded by educated men of color, the Websters, and Clays, and +Hamiltons, and Dwights, and Edwardses of the day. I listen to their +voice as judges and representatives, and rulers of the people--the whole +people." This glowing vision was not the handiwork of a rhetorician +writing with an eye to its effect upon his hearers. The ardent hope of +the reformer was rather the father of the golden dream. + +This practical recognition of the negro as a man and a brother was the +exact opposite of the treatment which was his terrible lot in the +country. Never in all history was there a race more shamefully oppressed +by a dominant race than were the blacks by the whites of America. Held +as slaves in the South, they were stamped as social outcasts at the +North. There was no one, however mean or vicious, who if he possessed a +white skin, was not treated more humanely than were they. In the most +enlightened of the free States they were discriminated against by public +laws and proscribed by public opinion. They were in a word pariahs of +the republic. They were shut out from all the common rights, and +privileges and opportunities enjoyed by the lowest of the favored race. +They were denied equality in the public school. The principle of popular +education had no application to a class which was not of the people, a +class which the common sentiment of a Christian nation had placed at the +zero point of political values, and meant to keep forever at that point. +Entrance to the trades were barred to the blacks. What did they want +with such things where there was no white trash so forgetful of his +superiority as to consent to work by their side. Nowhere were they +allowed the same traveling accommodations as white men, and they were +everywhere excluded from public inns. Neither wealth nor refinement was +able to procure them admission into other than "Jim Crow cars." If +heart-sick at the outrages by every one heaped upon them they turned for +consolation to the house of God, even there the spirit of proscription +and caste prejudice met them, and pointed to the "negro pew" where they +sat corraled from the congregation as if they had no equal share in the +salvation which the pulpit preached. Everywhere the white man had the +right of way, even on the highway to heaven! And in no place was the +negro made to feel the prejudice against his color more gallingly than +in churches arrogating the name of Christian. He had no rights on earth, +he had none in trying to get into the bosom of the founder of +Christianity, which the white sinners or saints were bound to respect. +Even the liberty-loving Quakers of Philadelphia were not above the use +of the "negro seat" in their meetings. Somehow they discerned that there +was a great gulf separating in this life at least the white from the +black believer. That God had made of one blood all nations of men, St. +Paul had taught, but the American church had with one accord in practice +drawn the line at the poor despised colored man. He was excluded from +ecclesiastical equality, for he was different from other men for whom +Christ died. The Bible declared that man was made but a little lower +than the angels; the American people in their State and Church +supplemented this sentiment by acts which plainly said that the negro +was made but a little above the brute creation. + +Here are instances of the length to which the prejudice against color +carried the churches in those early years of the anti-slavery movement: + +In 1830, a colored man, through a business transaction with a lessee of +one of the pews in Park Street Church, came into possession of it. +Thinking to make the best use of his opportunity to obtain religious +instruction for himself and family from this fountain of orthodoxy, the +black pew-holder betook him, one Sunday, to "Brimstone Corner." But he +was never permitted to repeat the visit. "Brimstone Corner" could not +stand him another Lord's day, and thereupon promptly expelled him and +his family out of its midst. The good deacons displayed their capacity +for shielding their flock from consorting with "niggers," by availing +themselves of a technicality to relet the pew to a member who was not +cursed with a dark skin. On another Lord's day, in another stronghold of +Boston Christianity, Oliver Johnson ran the battery of "indignant frowns +of a large number of the congregation" for daring to take a +fellow-Christian with a skin not colored like his own into his pew, to +listen to Dr. Beecher. The good people of the old Baptist meeting-house, +at Hartford, Conn., had evidently no intention of disturbing the +heavenly calm of their religious devotions by so much as a thought of +believers with black faces; for by boarding up the "negro pews" in front +and leaving only peep-holes for their occupants, they secured themselves +from a sight of the obnoxious creatures, while Jehovah, who is no +respecter of persons, was in His holy place. Incredible as it may seem, +a church in the town of Stoughton, Mass., to rid itself of even a +semblance of Christian fellowship and equality with a colored member, +did actually cut the floor from under the colored member's pew! + +These cruel and anti-Christian distinctions in the churches affected +Garrison in the most painful manner. He says: + +"I never can look up to these wretched retreats for my colored brethren +without feeling my soul overwhelmed with emotions of shame, indignation, +and sorrow." + +He had such an intimate acquaintance with members of this despised caste +in Boston and Philadelphia, and other cities, and appreciated so deeply +their intrinsic worth and excellence, as men and brethren, that he felt +their insults and injuries as if they were done to himself. He knew that +beneath many a dark skin he had found real ladies and gentlemen, and he +knew how sharper than a serpent's tooth to them was the American +prejudice against their color. In 1832, just after a visit to +Philadelphia, where he was the guest of Robert Purvis, and had seen much +of the Fortens, he wrote a friend: + +"I wish you had been with me in Philadelphia to see what I saw, to hear +what I heard, and to experience what I felt in associating with many +colored families. There are colored men and women, young men and young +ladies, in that city, who have few superiors in refinement, in moral +worth, and in all that makes the human character worthy of admiration +and praise." + +Strange to say, notwithstanding all their merits and advancement, the +free people of color received nothing but disparagement and contempt +from eminent divines like Dr. Leonard W. Bacon and the emissaries of the +Colonization Society. They were "the most abandoned wretches on the face +of the earth"; they were "all that is vile, loathsome, and dangerous"; +they were "more degraded and miserable than the slaves," and _ad +infinitum_ through the whole gamut of falsehood and traduction. It was +human for the American people to hate a class whom they had so deeply +wronged, and altogether human for them to justify their atrocious +treatment by blackening before the world the reputation of the said +class. That this was actually done is the best of all proofs of the +moral depravity of the nation which slavery had wrought. + +Garrison's vindication of the free people of color in Exeter Hall, +London, on July 13, 1833, from this sort of detraction and villification +is of historic value: + +"Sir," said he, addressing the chair, "it is not possible for the mind +to coin, or the tongue to utter baser libels against an injured people. +Their condition is as much superior to that of the slaves as the light +of heaven is more cheering than the darkness of the pit. Many of their +number are in the most affluent circumstances, and distinguished for +their refinement, enterprise, and talents. They have flourishing +churches, supplied by pastors of their own color, in various parts of +the land, embracing a large body of the truly excellent of the earth. +They have public and private libraries. They have their temperance +societies, their debating societies, their moral societies, their +literary societies, their benevolent societies, their saving societies, +and a multitude of kindred associations. They have their infant schools, +their primary and high schools, their sabbath schools, and their Bible +classes. They contribute to the support of foreign and domestic missions +to Bible and tract societies, etc. In the city of Philadelphia alone +they have more than fifty associations for moral and intellectual +improvement. In fact, they are rising up, even with mountains of +prejudice piled upon them, with more than Titanic strength, and +trampling beneath their feet the slanders of their enemies. A spirit of +virtuous emulation is pervading their ranks, from the young child to the +gray head. Among them is taken a large number of daily and weekly +newspapers, and of literary and scientific periodicals, from the popular +monthlies up to the grave and erudite _North American_ and _American +Quarterly Reviews_. I have at this moment, to my own paper, the +_Liberator_, one thousand subscribers among this people; and, from an +occupancy of the editorial chair for more than seven years, I can +testify that they are more punctual in their payments than any five +hundred white subscribers whose names I ever placed indiscriminately in +my subscription book." + +There was an earnest desire on the part of the free people of color to +raise the level of their class in the Union. At a convention held by +them in Philadelphia, in 1831, they resolved upon a measure calculated +to make up, to some extent, the deprivations which their children were +suffering by being excluded from the higher schools of learning in the +land. So they determined to establish a college on the manual-labor +system for the education of colored youth. They appealed for aid to +their benevolent friends, and fixed upon New Haven as the place to build +their institution. Arthur Tappan, with customary beneficence, "purchased +several acres of land, in the southerly part of the city, and made +arrangements for the erection of a suitable building, and furnishing it +with needful supplies, in a way to do honor to the city and country." + +The school, however, was never established owing to the violent +hostility of the citizens, who with the Mayor, Aldermen, and Common +Council resolved in public meeting to "_resist_ the establishment of the +proposed college in this place by every lawful means." + +The free people of color were derided because of their ignorance by +their persecutors, but when they and their friends proposed a plan to +reduce that ignorance, their persecutors bitterly opposed its execution. +New Haven piety and philanthropy, as embodied in the Colonization +Society, were not bent on the education of this class but on its +emigration to the coast of Africa solely. In such sorry contradictions +and cruelties did American prejudice against color involve American +Christianity and humanity. + +This outrage was perpetrated in 1831. Two years afterward Connecticut +enacted altogether the most shameful crime in her history. There lived +in the year 1833, in the town of Canterbury, in that State, an +accomplished young Quaker woman, named Prudence Crandall. Besides a +superior education, she possessed the highest character. And this was +well; for she was the principal of the Female Boarding School located in +that town. The institution was, in 1833, at the beginning of its third +year, and in a flourishing condition. While pursuing her vocation of a +teacher, Miss Crandall made the acquaintance of the _Liberator_ through +a "nice colored girl," who was at service in the school. Abhorring +slavery from childhood, it is no wonder that the earnestness of the +_Liberator_ exerted an immediate and lasting influence upon the +sympathies of the young principal. The more she read and the more she +thought upon the subject the more aroused she became to the wrongs of +which her race was guilty to the colored people. She, too, would lend +them a helping hand in their need. Presently there came to her a colored +girl who was thirsting for an education such as the Canterbury Boarding +School for young ladies was dispensing to white girls. This was Miss +Crandall's opportunity to do something for the colored people, and she +admitted the girl to her classes. But she had no sooner done so than +there were angry objections to the girl's remaining. + +"The wife of an Episcopal clergyman who lived in the village," Miss +Crandall records, "told me that if I continued that colored girl in my +school it would not be sustained." + +She heroically refused to turn the colored pupil out of the school, and +thereby caused a most extraordinary exhibition of Connecticut chivalry +and Christianity. + +Seeing how matters stood with her in these circumstances, Prudence +Crandall conceived the remarkable purpose of devoting her school to the +education of colored girls exclusively. She did not know whether her +idea was practicable, and so in her perplexity she turned for counsel to +the editor of the _Liberator_. She went to Boston for this purpose, and +there, at the old Marlboro' Hotel, on Washington street, on the evening +of January 29, 1833, she discussed this business with Mr. Garrison. This +visit and interview confirmed the brave soul in her desire to change her +school into one for the higher education of colored girls. It was +expected that a sufficient number of such pupils could be obtained from +well-to-do colored families in cities like Boston, Providence, and New +York to assure the financial success of the enterprise. When Miss +Crandall had fully matured her plans in the premises she announced them +to the Canterbury public. But if she had announced that she contemplated +opening a college for the spread of contagious diseases among her +townspeople, Canterbury could not possibly have been more agitated and +horrified. Every door in the village was slammed in her face. She was +denounced in town meetings, and there was not chivalry enough to cause a +single neighbor to speak in her defence. Samuel J. May had to come from +an adjoining town for this purpose. "But," says Mr. May, "they would not +hear me. They shut their ears and rushed upon me with threats of +personal violence." + +As there was nothing in the statutes of Connecticut which made the +holding of such a school as that of Miss Crandall's illegal, the good +Canterbury folk procured the passage of a hasty act through the +Legislature, which was then in session, "making it a penal offence, +punishable by fine and imprisonment, for any one in that State keeping a +school to take as his or her pupils the children of colored people of +other States." But the heart of the young Quaker woman was the heart of +a heroine. She dared to disregard the wicked law, was arrested, bound +over for trial, and sent to jail like a common malefactor. It was no +use, persecution could not cow the noble prisoner into submission to the +infamous statute. In her emergency truth raised up friends who rallied +about her in the unparalleled contest which raged around her person and +her school. There was no meanness or maliciousness to which her enemies +did not stoop to crush and ruin her and her cause. "The newspapers of +the county and of the adjoining counties teemed with the grossest +misrepresentations, and the vilest insinuations," says Mr. May, "against +Miss Crandall, her pupils, and her patrons; but for the most part, +peremptorily refused us any room in their columns to explain our +principles and purposes, or to refute the slanders they were +circulating." Four or five times within two years she was forced into +court to defend her acts against the determined malignity of men who +stood high in the Connecticut Church and State. The shops in the town +boycotted her, the churches closed their doors to her and her pupils. +Public conveyances refused to receive them, and physicians to prescribe +for them. It is said that the heroic soul was cut off from intercourse +with her own family, in the hope doubtless that she would the sooner +capitulate to the negro-hating sentiment of her neighbors. But firm in +her resolve the fair Castellan never thought of surrendering the citadel +of her conscience at the bidding of iniquitous power. Then, like +savages, her foes defiled with the excrement of cattle the well whence +the school drew its supply of water, attacked the house with rotten eggs +and stones, and daubed it with filth. This drama of diabolism was fitly +ended by the introduction of the fire fiend, and the burning of the +detestable building devoted to the higher education of "niggers." +Heathenism was, indeed, outdone by Canterbury Christianity. + +The circumstances of this outrage kindled Garrison's indignation to the +highest pitch. Words were inadequate to express his emotions and agony +of soul. In the temper of bold and clear-eyed leadership he wrote George +W. Benson, his future brother-in-law, "we may as well, first as last, +meet this proscriptive spirit, _and conquer it_. We--_i.e._, all the +friends of the cause--must make this a common concern. The New Haven +excitement has furnished a bad precedent--a second must not be given or +I know not what we can do to raise up the colored population in a manner +which their intellectual and moral necessities demand. In Boston we are +all excited at the Canterbury affair. Colonizationists are rejoicing and +Abolitionists looking sternly." Like a true general Garrison took in +from his _Liberator_ outlook the entire field of the struggle. No friend +of the slave, however distant, escaped his quick sympathy or ready +reinforcements. To him the free people of color turned for championship, +and to the _Liberator_ as a mouthpiece. The battle for their rights and +for the freedom of their brethren in the South advanced apace. +Everywhere the army of their friends and the army of their foes were in +motion, and the rising storm winds of justice and iniquity were +beginning "to bellow through the vast and boundless deep" of a nation's +soul. + + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + + +AGITATION AND REPRESSION. + + +William Lloyd Garrison's return from his English mission was signalized +by two closely related events, viz., the formation of the New York City +Anti-Slavery Society, and the appearance of the first of a succession of +anti-slavery mobs in the North. The news of his British successes had +preceded him, and prepared for him a warm reception on the part of his +pro-slavery countrymen. For had he not with malice prepense put down the +"most glorious of Christian enterprises," and rebuked his own country in +the house of strangers as recreant to freedom? And when O'Connell in +Exeter Hall pointed the finger of scorn at America and made her a +by-word and a hissing in the ears of Englishmen, was it not at a meeting +got up to further the designs of this "misguided young gentlemen who has +just returned from England whither he has recently been for the sole +purpose as it would seem [to the _Commercial Advertiser_] of traducing +the people and institutions of his own country." Had he not caught up +and echoed back the hissing thunder of the great Irish orator:--"_Shame +on the American Slaveholders_! Base wretches should we shout in +chorus--base wretches, how dare you profane the temple of national +freedom, the sacred fane of Republican rites, with the presence and the +sufferings of human beings in chains and slavery!" + +The noise of these treasons on a foreign shore, "deafening the sound of +the westerly wave, and riding against the blast as thunder goes," to +borrow O'Connell's graphic and grandiose phrases, had reached the +country in advance of Mr. Garrison. The national sensitiveness was +naturally enough stung to the quick. Here is a pestilent fellow who is +not content with disturbing the peace of the Union with his new +fanaticism, but must needs presume to make the dear Union odious before +the world as well. And his return, what is it to be but the signal for +increased agitation on the slavery question. The conquering hero comes +and his fanatical followers salute him forthwith with a new anti-slavery +society, which means a fresh instrument in his hands to stir up strife +between the North and the South. "Are we tamely to look on, and see this +most dangerous species of fanaticism extending itself through society?" +shrieked on the morning of Mr. Garrison's arrival in New York Harbor, +the malignant editor of the _Courier and Enquirer_. + +The pro-slavery and lawless elements of the city were not slow to take +the cue given by metropolitan papers, and to do the duty of patriots +upon their country's enemies. Arthur Tappen and his anti-slavery +associates outwitted these patriotic gentlemen, who attended in a body +at Clinton Hall on the evening of October 2, 1833, to perform the +aforesaid duty of patriots, while the objects of their attention were +convened at Chatham Street Chapel and organizing their new fanaticism. +The mob flew wide of its mark a second time, for when later in the +evening it began a serenade more expressive than musical before the +entrance to the little chapel on Chatham street the members of the +society "folded their tents like the Arabs and as silently stole away." +The Abolitionists accomplished their design and eluded their enemies at +the same time. But the significance of the riotous demonstration went +not unobserved by them and their newly arrived leader. It was plain from +that night that if the spirit of Abolitionism had risen, the spirit of +persecution had risen also. + +A somewhat similar reception saluted the reformer in Boston. An +inflammatory handbill announced to his townsmen his arrival. "The true +American has returned, _alias_ William Lloyd Garrison, the 'Negro +Champion,' from his disgraceful mission to the British metropolis," +etc., etc., and wound up its artful list of lies with the malignant +suggestion that "He is now in your power--do not let him escape you, but +go this evening, armed with plenty of _tar and feathers_ and administer +to him justice at his abode at No. 9 Merchant's Hall, Congress street." +In obedience to this summons, a reception committee in the shape of "a +dense mob, breathing threatenings which forboded a storm," did pay their +respects to the "true American" in front of his abode at the _Liberator_ +office. Fortunately the storm passed over without breaking that evening +on the devoted head of the "Negro Champion." But the meaning of the +riotous demonstration it was impossible to miss. Like the mob in New +York it clearly indicated that the country was on the outer edge of an +area of violent disturbances on the subject of slavery. + +The peril which Garrison had twice escaped was indeed grave, but neither +it nor the certainty of future persecution could flutter or depress his +spirits. "For myself," he wrote subsequently in the _Liberator_, "I am +ready to brave any danger even unto death. I feel no uneasiness either +in regard to my fate or to the success of the cause of Abolition. +Slavery must speedily be abolished; the blow that shall sever the chains +of the slaves may shake the nation to its center--may momentarily +disturb the pillars of the Union--but it shall redeem the character, +extend the influence, establish the security, and increase the +prosperity of our great republic." It was not the rage and malice of his +enemies which the brave soul minded, but the ever-present knowledge of +human beings in chains and slavery whom he must help. Nothing could +separate him from his duty to them, neither dangers present nor +persecutions to come. The uncertainty of life made him only the more +zealous in their behalf. The necessity of doing, doing, and yet ever +doing for the slave was plainly pressing deep like thorns into his +thoughts. "I am more and more impressed;" he wrote a friend a few weeks +later, "I am more and more impressed with the importance of 'working +whilst the day lasts.' If 'we all do fade as a leaf,' if we are 'as the +sparks that fly upward,' if the billows of time are swiftly removing the +sandy foundation of our life, what we intend to do for the captive, and +for our country, and for the subjugation of a hostile world, must be +done quickly. Happily 'our light afflictions are but for a moment.'" + +This yearning of the leader for increased activity in the cause of +immediate emancipation was shared by friends and disciples in different +portions of the country. Few and scattered as were the Abolitionists, +they so much the more needed to band together for the great conflict +with a powerful and organized evil. This evil was organized on a +national scale, the forces of righteousness which were rising against +it, if they were ever to overcome it and rid the land of it, had needs +to be organized on a national scale also. Garrison with the instinct of +a great reformer early perceived the immense utility of a national +anti-slavery organization for mobilizing the whole available Abolition +sentiment of the free States in a moral agitation of national and +tremendous proportions. + +He had not long to wait after his return from England before this desire +of his soul was satisfied. It was in fact just a month afterward that a +call for a convention for the formation of the American Anti-Slavery +Society went out from New York to the friends of immediate emancipation +throughout the North. As an evidence of the dangerously excited state of +the popular mind on the subject of slavery there stands in the summons +the significant request to delegates to regard the call as confidential. +The place fixed upon for holding the convention was Philadelphia, and +the time December 4, 1833. + +Garrison bestirred himself to obtain for the convention a full +representation of the friends of freedom. He sent the call to George W. +Benson, at Providence, urging him to spread the news among the +Abolitionists of his neighborhood and to secure the election of a goodly +number of delegates by the society in Rhode Island. He forthwith +bethought him of Whittier on his farm in Haverhill, and enjoined his old +friend to fail not to appear in Philadelphia. But while the young poet +longed to go to urge upon his Quaker brethren of that city "to make +their solemn testimony against slavery visible over the whole land--to +urge them, by the holy memories of Woolman and Benezet and Tyson to come +up as of old to the standard of Divine Truth, though even the fires of +another persecution should blaze around them," he feared that he would +not be able to do so. The spirit was surely willing but the purse was +empty, "as thee know," he quaintly adds, "our farming business does not +put much cash in our pockets." The cash he needed was generously +supplied by Samuel E. Sewall, and Whittier went as a delegate to the +convention after all. The disposition on the part of some of the poorer +delegates was so strong to be present at the convention that not even +the lack of money was sufficient to deter them from setting out on the +expedition. Two of them, David T. Kimball and Daniel E. Jewett, from +Andover, Mass., did actually supplement the deficiencies of their +pocket-books by walking to New Haven, the aforesaid pocket-books being +equal to the rest of the journey from that point. + +About sixty delegates found their way to Philadelphia and organized on +the morning of December 4th, in Adelphi Hall, the now famous convention. +It was a notable gathering of apostolic spirits--"mainly composed of +comparatively young men, some in middle age, and a few beyond that +period." They had come together from ten of the twelve free States, +which fact goes to show the rapid, the almost epidemic-like spread of +Garrisonian Abolitionism through the North. The _Liberator_ was then +scarcely three years old, and its editor had not until the second day of +the convention attained the great age of twenty-eight! The convention of +1787 did not comprise more genuine patriotism and wisdom than did this +memorable assembly of American Abolitionists. It was from beginning to +end an example of love to God and love to men, of fearless scorn of +injustice and fearless devotion to liberty. Not one of those three score +souls who made up the convention, who did not take his life in his hand +by reason of the act. It was not the love of fame surely which brought +them over so many hundreds of miles, which made so many of them endure +real physical privation, which drew all by a common, an irresistible +impulse to congregate for an unpopular purpose within reach of the teeth +and the claws of an enraged public opinion. + +The convention, as one man might have said with the single-minded Lundy, +"My heart was deeply grieved at the gross abomination; I heard the wail +of the captive; I felt his pang of distress; and the iron entered my +soul." The iron of slavery had indeed entered the soul of every member +of the convention. It was the divine pang and pity of it which collected +from the East and from the West this remarkable body of reformers. + +The story of how they had to find a president illustrates the +contemporary distrust and antagonism, which the anti-slavery movement +aroused among the men of standing and influence. Knowing in what bad +odor they were held by the community, and anxious only to serve their +cause in the most effective manner, the members of the convention hit +upon the plan of asking some individual eminent for his respectability +to preside over their deliberations, and thereby disarm the public +suspicions and quiet the general apprehensions felt in respect of the +incendiary character of their intention. So in pursuance of this plan +six of their number were dispatched on the evening of December 3d to +seek such a man. But the quest of the committee like that of Diogenes +proved a failure. After two attempts and two repulses the committee were +not disposed to invite the humiliation of a third refusal and must have +listened with no little relief, to this blunt summary of the situation +by Beriah Green, who was one of the six. "If there is not timber amongst +ourselves," quoth Green, "big enough to make a president of, let us get +along without one, or go home and stay there until we have grown up to +be men." The next day Green was chosen, and established in a manner +never to be forgotten by his associates that the convention did possess +"timber big enough to make a president of." + +Narrow as were the circumstances of many of the members, the convention +was by no means destitute of men of wealth and business prominence. Such +were the Winslows, Isaac and Nathan, of Maine, Arnold Buffum, of +Massachusetts, and John Rankin and Lewis Tappan, of New York. +Scholarship, talents, and eloquence abounded among the delegates. Here +there was no lack, no poverty, but extraordinary sufficiency, almost to +redundancy. The presence of the gentler sex was not wanting to lend +grace and picturesqueness to the occasion. The beautiful and benignant +countenance of Lucretia Mott shed over the proceedings the soft radiance +of a pure and regnant womanhood; while the handful of colored delegates +with the elegant figure of Robert Purvis at their head, added pathos and +picturesqueness to the _personnel_ of the convention. Neither was the +element of danger wanting to complete the historic scene. Its presence +was grimly manifest in the official intimation that evening meetings of +the convention could not be protected, by the demonstrations of popular +ill-will which the delegates encountered on the streets, by the +detachment of constabulary guarding the entrance to Adelphi Hall, and by +the thrillingly significant precaution observed by the delegates of +sitting with locked doors. Over the assembly it impended cruel and +menacing like fate. Once securely locked within the hall, the +Abolitionists discreetly abstained from leaving it at noon for dinner, +well knowing how small a spark it takes to kindle a great fire. It was +foolhardy to show themselves unnecessarily to the excited crowds in the +streets, and so mindful that true courage consisteth not in +recklessness, they despatched one of their number for crackers and +cheese, which they washed down with copious draughts of cold water. But +they had that to eat and drink besides, whereof the spirits of mischief +without could not conceive. + +The grand achievement of the convention was, of course, the formation of +the American Anti-Slavery Society, but the crown of the whole was +unquestionably the Declaration of Sentiments. The composition of this +instrument has an interesting history. It seems that the delegates +considered that the remarkable character of the movement which they were +launching upon the wide sea of national attention demanded of them an +expression altogether worthy of so momentous an undertaking. The +adoption of a constitution for this purpose was felt to be inadequate. A +constitution was indispensable, but some other expression was necessary +to give to their work its proper proportion and importance. Such a +manifestation it was deemed meet to make in the form of a declaration of +sentiments. A committee was accordingly appointed to draft the +declaration. This committee named three of its number, consisting of +Garrison, Whittier, and Samuel J. May to draw up the document. The +sub-committee in turn deputed Garrison to do the business. + +Mr. May has told in his _Recollections of the Anti-Slavery Conflict_, +how he and Whittier left their friend at ten o'clock in the evening, +agreeing to call at eight the following morning and how on their return +at the appointed hour they found Garrison with shutters closed and lamps +burning, penning the last paragraph of the admirable document. He has +told how they three read it over together two or three times, making +some slight alterations in it, and how at nine o'clock the draft was +laid by them before the whole committee. The author of the recollections +has left a graphic account of its effect upon the convention. "Never in +my life," he says, "have I seen a deeper impression made by words than +was made by that admirable document upon all who were present. After the +voice of the reader had ceased there was silence for several minutes. +Our hearts were in perfect unison. There was but one thought with us +all. Either of the members could have told what the whole convention +felt. We felt that the word had just been uttered which would be mighty, +through God, to the pulling down of the strongholds of slavery." Such +was the scene at the first reading of the Declaration of Sentiments, Dr. +Atlee, the reader. The effect at its final reading was, if possible, +even more dramatic and eloquent. Whittier has depicted this closing and +thrilling scene. He has described how Samuel J. May read the declaration +for the last time. "His sweet, persuasive voice faltered with the +intensity of his emotions as he repeated the solemn pledges of the +concluding paragraphs. After a season of silence, David Thurston of +Maine, rose as his name was called by one of the secretaries and affixed +his name to the document. One after another passed up to the platform, +signed, and retired in silence. All felt the deep responsibility of the +occasion--the shadow and forecast of a life-long struggle rested upon +every countenance." + +The effects, so electrical and impressive, which followed the reading of +the declaration were not disproportioned to its merits, for it was an +instrument of singular power, wisdom, and eloquence. Indeed, to this +day, more than half a century after it was written it still has virtue +to quicken the breath and stir the pulses of a sympathetic reader out of +their normal time. A great passion for freedom and righteousness +irradiates like a central light the whole memorable document. It begins +by a happy reference to an earlier convention, held some fifty-seven +years before in the same place, and which adopted a declaration holding +"that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator +with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, LIBERTY, and +the pursuit of happiness;" and how at the trumpet-call of its authors +three millions of people rushed to arms "deeming it more glorious to die +instantly as free men, than desirable to live one hour as slaves"; and +how, though few in number and poor in resources those same people were +rendered invincible by the conviction that truth, justice, and right +were on their side. But the freedom won by the men of 1776 was +incomplete without the freedom for which the men of 1833 were striving. +The authors of the new declaration would not be inferior to the authors +of the old "in purity of motive, in earnestness of zeal, in decision of +purpose, intrepidity of action, in steadfastness of faith, in sincerity +of spirit." Unlike the older actors, the younger had eschewed the sword, +the spilling of human blood in defence of their principles. Theirs was a +moral warfare, the grappling of truth with error, of the power of love +with the inhumanities of the nation. Then it glances at the wrongs which +the fathers suffered, and at the enormities which the slaves were +enduring. The "fathers were never slaves, never bought and sold like +cattle, never shut out from the light of knowledge and religion, never +subjected to the lash of brutal taskmasters," but all these woes and +more, an unimaginable mountain of agony and misery, was the appalling +lot of the slaves in the Southern States. The guilt of this nation, +which partners such a crime against human nature, "is unequaled by any +other on earth," and therefore it is bound to instant repentance, and to +the immediate restitution of justice to the oppressed. + +The Declaration of Sentiments denies the right of man to hold property +in a brother man, affirms the identity in principle between the African +slave trade and American slavery, the imprescriptibility of the rights +of the slaves to liberty, the nullity of all laws which run counter to +human rights, and the grand doctrine of civil and political equality in +the Republic, regardless of race and complexional differences. It boldly +rejects the principle of compensated emancipation, because it involves a +surrender of the position that man cannot hold property in man; because +slavery is a crime, and the master is not wronged by emancipation but +the slaves righted, restored to themselves; because immediate and +general emancipation would only destroy nominal, not real, property, the +labor of the slaves would still remain to the masters and doubled by the +new motives which freedom infuses into the breasts of her children; and, +finally because, if compensation is to be given at all it ought to be +given to those who have been plundered of their rights. It spurns in one +compact paragraph the pretensions of the colonization humbug as +"delusive, cruel, and dangerous." + +But lofty and uncompromising as were the moral principles and positions +of the declaration, it nevertheless recognized with perspicuity of +vision the Constitutional limitations of the Federal Government in +relation to slavery. It frankly conceded that Congress had no right to +meddle with the evil in any of the States. But wherever the national +jurisdiction reached the general government was bound to interfere and +suppress the traffic in human flesh. It was the duty of Congress, +inasmuch as it possessed the power, to abolish slavery in the District +of Columbia, the National Territories, along the coast and between the +States. The free States are the _particeps criminis_ of the slave +States. They are living under a pledge of their tremendous physical +force to rivet the manacles of chattel slavery upon millions in the +South; they are liable at any instant to be called on under the +Constitution to suppress a general insurrection of the slaves. This +relationship is criminal, "is full of danger, IT MUST BE BROKEN UP." + +So much for the views and principles of the declaration, now for the +designs and measures as enumerated therein: "We shall organize +anti-slavery societies, if possible, in every city, town and village in +our land. + +"We shall send forth agents to lift up the voice of remonstrance, of +warning, of entreaty, and of rebuke. + +"We shall circulate, unsparingly and extensively, anti-slavery tracts +and periodicals. + +"We shall enlist the pulpit and the press in the cause of the suffering +and the dumb. + +"We shall aim at a purification of the churches from all participation +in the guilt of slavery. + +"We shall encourage the labor of freemen rather than that of slaves, by +giving a preference to their productions; and + +"We shall spare no exertions nor means to bring the whole nation to +speedy repentance." + +The instrument closes by pledging the utmost of its signers to the +overthrow of slavery--"come what may to our persons, our interests, or +our reputations--whether we live to witness the triumph of Liberty, +Justice, and Humanity, or perish untimely as martyrs in this great, +benevolent, and holy cause." Twin pledge it was to that ancestral, +historic one made in 1776: "And for the support of this declaration, +with a firm reliance on the protection of DIVINE PROVIDENCE, we mutually +pledge to each other, our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor." + +Whittier has predicted for the Declaration of Sentiments an enduring +fame: "It will live," he declares, "as long as our national history." +Samuel J. May was equally confident that this "Declaration of the Rights +of Man," as he proudly cherished it, would "live a perpetual, impressive +protest against every form of oppression, until it shall have given +place to that brotherly kindness which all the children of the common +Father owe to one another." As a particular act and parchment-roll of +high thoughts and resolves, highly expressed, it will not, I think, +attain to the immortality predicted for it. For as such it has in less +than two generations passed almost entirely out of the knowledge and +recollection of Americans. But in another sense it is destined to +realize all that has been foreshadowed for it by its friends. Like +elemental fire its influence will glow and flame at the center of our +national life long after as a separate and sovereign entity it shall +have been forgotten by the descendants of its illustrious author and +signers. + +The convention was in session three days, and its proceedings were +filled with good resolutions and effective work. Arthur Tappan was +elected President of the national organization, and William Green, Jr., +Treasurer. Elizur Wright, Jr., was chosen Secretary of Domestic +Correspondence, William Lloyd Garrison Secretary of Foreign +Correspondence, and Abraham L. Cox Recording Secretary. Besides these +officers there were a Board of Management and a number of +Vice-Presidents selected. For three days the hearts of the delegates +burned within them toward white-browed Duty and the master, Justice, who +stood in their midst and talked with divine accents to their spirits of +how men were enslaved and cruelly oppressed by men, their own brothers, +and how the cry of these bondmen came up to them for help. And with one +accord there fell upon the delegates a pang and pity, an uplifting, +impelling sense of 'woe unto us' if we withhold from our brethren in +bonds the help required of us. This rising tide of emotion and +enthusiasm gathering mass at each sitting of the convention, culminated +during the several readings of the Declaration of Sentiments. And when +on the third day Beriah Green brought the congress to a close in a +valedictory address of apostolic power and grandeur, and with a prayer +so sweet, so fervent, and strong as to melt all hearts, the pent-up +waters of the reform was ready to hurl themselves into an agitation the +like of which had never before, nor has since, been seen or felt in the +Union. Thenceforth freedom's little ones were not without great allies, +who were "exultations, agonies, and love, and man's unconquerable mind." + +Everywhere the flood of Abolitionism burst upon the land, everywhere the +moral deluge spread through the free States. Anti-slavery societies rose +as it were, out of the ground, so rapid, so astonishing were their +growth during the year following the formation of the national society. +In nearly every free State they had appeared doubling and quadrupling in +number, until new societies reached in that first year to upwards of +forty. Anti-slavery agents and lecturers kept pace with the anti-slavery +societies. They began to preach, to remonstrate, to warn, entreat, and +rebuke until their voices sounded like the roar of many waters in the +ears of the people. Wherever there was a school-house, a hall, or a +church, there they were, ubiquitous, irrepressible, a cry in the +wilderness of a nation's iniquity. Anti-slavery tracts and periodicals +multiplied and started from New York and Boston in swarms, and clouds, +the thunder of their wings were as the thunder of falling avalanches to +the guilty conscience of the country. There was no State, city, town, or +village in the Republic where their voice was not heard. + +The Rev. Amos A Phelp's "Lectures on Slavery and Its Remedy;" "the Rev. +J.D. Paxton's 'Letters on Slavery'; the Rev. S.J. May's letters to +Andrew T. Judson, 'The Rights of Colored People to Education +Vindicated'; Prof. Elizur Wright, Jr.'s, 'Sin of Slavery and Its +Remedy'; Whittier's 'Justice and Expediency'; and, above all, Mrs. Lydia +Maria Child's startling 'Appeal in favor of that class of Americans +called Africans' were the more potent of the new crop of writings +betokening the vigor of Mr. Garrison's Propagandism," says that +storehouse of anti-slavery facts the "Life of Garrison" by his children. +Swift poured the flood, widespread the inundation of anti-slavery +publications. Money, although not commensurate with the vast wants of +the crusade, came in copious and generous streams. A marvelous +munificence characterized the charity of wealthy Abolitionists. The poor +gave freely of their mite, and the rich as freely of their thousands. +Something of the state of simplicity and community of goods which marked +the early disciples of Christianity seemed to have revived in the hearts +of this band of American reformers. A spirit of renunciation, of +self-sacrifice, of brotherly kindness, of passionate love of +righteousness, of passionate hatred of wrong, of self-consecration to +truth and of martyrdom lifted the reform to as high a moral level as had +risen any movement for the betterment of mankind in any age of the +world. + +The resolutions of the signers of the Declaration of Sentiment, to +enlist the pulpit in the cause of the suffering and dumb, and to attempt +the purification of the churches from all participation in the guilt of +slavery, encountered determined opposition from the pulpits and the +churches themselves. The Abolitionists were grieved and indignant at the +pro-slavery spirit which pulpits and churches displayed. But what +happened was as we now look back at those proceedings, an inevitable +occurrence, a foregone conclusion. The pulpits were only representative +of the religion of the pews, and the pews were occupied by the same sort +of humanity that toil and spin and haggle over dollars and cents six out +of every seven days. They have their selfish and invested interests, +fixed social notions, relationships, and prejudices, which an episode +like Sunday, churches, and sermons do not seriously affect. Indeed, +Sunday, churches, and sermons constitute an institution of modern +civilization highly conservative of invested interests, fixed social +notions, relationships, and prejudices. Who advances a new idea, a +reformatory movement, disturbs the _status quo_, stirs up the human bees +in that great hive called society, and that lesser one called the +church, and he must needs expect to have the swarm about his head. + +This was precisely what happened in the case of the anti-slavery +movement. It threatened the then _status quo_ of property rights, it +attacked the fixed social notions, relationships, and prejudices of the +South and of the North alike. The revolution which this new idea +involved in the slave States, was of the most radical character, going +down to a complete reconstruction of their entire social system. At once +the human hornets were aroused, and in these circumstances, the innocent +and the guilty were furiously beset. Because the new idea which +disturbed the South had originated in the North, the wrath of the South +rose hot against not the authors of the new idea alone but against the +people of that section as well. But this sectional unpleasantness +endangered the stability of the Union, and menaced with obstructions and +diversions the golden stream of Northern traffic, dollars, and +dividends. This was intolerable, and forthwith the Apiarian brotherhood +of the free States put together their heads with those of the slave +States to attack, sting, and utterly abolish the new idea, and the new +idea's supporters. The Northern churches were, of course, in the +Northern brotherhood. And when the new fanaticism threatened the +financial stability of the pews, the pulpits instead of exerting +themselves in behalf of the suffering and dumb slaves, exerted +themselves to preserve the prosperity of the pews by frowning down the +friends of the slaves. They were among the first to stone the new idea +and its fiery prophets. "Away with them!" shouted in chorus pulpit and +pews. Sad? yes, but alas! natural, too. These men were not better nor +worse than the average man. They were the average men of their +generation, selfish, narrow, material, encrusted in their prejudices +like snails in their shells, struggling upward at a snail's pace to the +larger life, with its added sweetness and humanities, but experiencing +many a discomfiture by the way from those foul and triple fiends, the +World, the Flesh, and the Devil. + +Nowhere in the churches was their opposition to the Abolition movement +more persistent and illiberal than in the theological seminaries, whence +the pulpits drew their supplies of preachers. Like master, like servant, +these institutions were indentured to the public, and reflected as in a +mirror the body and pressure of its life and sentiment. That a stream +cannot rise higher than its source, although a theological stream, found +remarkable demonstration in the case of Lane Seminary. Here after the +publication of the "Thoughts on Colonization," and the formation of the +National Society, an earnest spirit of inquiry broke out among the +students on the subject of slavery. It was at first encouraged by the +President, Lyman Beecher, who offered to go in and discuss the question +with his "boys." That eminent man did not long remain in this mind. The +discussions which he so lightly allowed swept through the institution +with the force of a great moral awakening. They were continued during +nine evenings and turned the seminary at their close, so far as the +students went, into an anti-slavery society. This is not the place to go +at length into the history of that anti-slavery debate, which, in its +consequences, proved one of the events of the anti-slavery conflict. Its +leader was Theodore D. Weld, who was until Wendell Phillips appeared +upon the scene, the great orator of the agitation. + +Dr. Beecher had no notion of raising such a ghost when he said, "Go +ahead, boys, I'll go in and discuss with you." It was such an apparition +of independence and righteousness as neither the power of the trustees +nor the authority of the faculty was ever able to dismiss. The virtue of +a gag rule was tried to suppress Abolition among the students, but +instead of suppressing Abolition, it well-nigh suppressed the seminary; +for, rather than wear a gag on the obnoxious subject, the students--to +between seventy and eighty, comprising nearly the whole muster-roll of +the school--withdrew from an institution where the exercise of the right +of free inquiry and free speech on a great moral question was denied and +repressed. The same spirit of repression arose later in the Theological +School at Andover, Mass. There the gag was effectively applied by the +faculty, and all inquiry and discussion relating to slavery disappeared +among the students. But the attempt to impose silence upon the students +of Phillips's Academy near-by was followed by the secession of forty or +fifty of the students. + +Ah! the Abolitionists had undertaken to achieve the impossible, when +they undertook to enlist the pulpit in the cause of the slaves, and to +purify the churches from all participation in the guilt of slavery. For +the average man, whether within or without the church, is not controlled +in his conduct toward his brother man by the principles and precepts of +Jesus, but by the laws of social and individual selfishness. These +selfish forces may at epochal moments align themselves with justice and +liberty, and they not infrequently do, otherwise human progress must be +at an end. In advancing themselves, they perforce advance justice and +liberty. Thus do men love their neighbors as themselves, and move +forward to fraternity and equality in kingdoms and commonwealths. The +special province of moral reformers, like Garrison and the +Abolitionists, seems to be to set these egoistic and altruistic elements +of human society at war, the one against the other, thereby compelling +its members and classes, willy nilly, to choose between the +belligerents. Some will enlist on one side, some on the other, but in +the furnace heat of the passions which ensues, an ancient evil, or a bad +custom or institution, gets the vitality burned out of it, which in due +time falls as slag out of the new order that arises at the close of the +conflict. + + + + + +CHAPTER X. + + + +BETWEEN THE ACTS. + + +Mr. Garrison, in a private letter to a friend under date of September +12, 1834, summarises the doings of the preceding twelve months of his +life, and makes mention of a fact which lends peculiar interest to that +time: "It has been the most eventful year," he remarks, "in my history. +I have been the occasion of many uproars, and a continual disturber of +the public peace. As soon as I landed I turned the city of New York +upside down. Five thousand people turned out to see me tarred and +feathered, but were disappointed. There was also a small hubbub in +Boston on my arrival. The excitement passed away, but invective and +calumny still followed me. By dint of some industry and much persuasion, +I succeeded in inducing the Abolitionists in New York to join our little +band in Boston, in calling a national convention at Philadelphia. We +met, and such a body of men, for zeal, firmness, integrity, benevolence, +and moral greatness, the world has rarely seen in a single assembly. +Inscribed upon a declaration which it was my exalted privilege to write, +their names can perish only with the knowledge of the history of our +times. A National Anti-Slavery Society was formed, which astonished the +country by its novelty, and awed it by its boldness. In five months its +first annual meeting was held in the identical city in which, only seven +antecedent months, Abolitionists were in peril of their lives. In +ability, interest, and solemnity it took precedence of all the great +religious celebrations which took place at the same time. During the +same month, a New England anti-slavery convention was held in Boston, +and so judicious were its measures, so eloquent its appeals, so +unequivocal its resolutions, that it at once gave shape and character to +the anti-slavery cause in this section of the Union. In the midst of all +these mighty movements, I have wooed "a fair ladye," and won her, have +thrown aside celibacy, and jumped body and soul into matrimony, have +sunk the character of bachelor in that of husband, have settled down +into domestic quietude, and repudiated all my roving desires, and have +found that which I have long been yearning to find, a home, a wife, and +a beautiful retreat from a turbulent city." + +Garrison does not exaggerate the importance of the initiatives and +achievements of the year, or the part played by him in its history. His +activity was indeed phenomenal, and the service rendered by him to the +reform, was unrivaled. He was in incessant motion, originating, +directing, inspiring the agitation in all portions of the North. What +strikes one strongly in studying the pioneer is his sleeplessness, his +indefatigableness, his persistency in pursuit of his object. Others may +rest after a labor, may have done one, two, or three distinct tasks, but +between Garrison's acts there is no hiatus, each follows each, and is +joined to all like links in a chain. He never closed his eyes, nor +folded his arms, but went forward from work to work with the +consecutiveness of a law of nature. + +But amid labors so strenuous and uninterrupted the leader found +opportunity to woo and win "a fair ladye." She was a daughter of a +veteran Abolitionist, George Benson, of Brooklyn, Conn., who with his +sons George W. and Henry E. Benson, were among the stanchest of the +reformer's followers and supporters. The young wife, before her +marriage, was not less devoted to the cause than they. She was in +closest sympathy with her husband's anti-slavery interests and purposes. +Never had husband found wife better fitted to his needs, and the needs +of his life work. So that it might be truly said that Garrison even when +he went a-wooing forgot not his cause and that when he took a wife, he +made at the same time a grand contribution to its ultimate triumph. + +How did Helen Eliza Garrison serve the great cause? One who knew shall +tell. He has told it in his own unequaled way. "That home," he says, +"was a great help. Her husband's word and pen scattered his purpose far +and wide; but the comrades that his ideas brought to his side her +welcome melted into friends. No matter how various and discordant they +were in many things--no matter how much there was to bear and +overlook--her patience and her thanks for their sympathy in the great +idea were always sufficient for the work also.... In that group of +remarkable men and women which the anti-slavery movement drew together, +she had her own niche--which no one else could have filled so perfectly +or unconsciously as she did.... She forgot, omitted nothing. How much we +all owe her!" These were words spoken by a friend, whose name will +appear later on in this story; words spoken by him at the close of her +beautiful life, as she lay dead in her coffin. + +And here is another account of her written by the husband on the first +anniversary of their marriage: "I did not marry her," he confides to her +brother George, "expecting that she would assume a prominent station in +the anti-slavery cause, but for domestic quietude and happiness. So +completely absorbed am I in that cause, that it was undoubtedly wise in +me to select as a partner one who, while her benevolent feelings were in +union with mine, was less immediately and entirely connected with it. I +knew she was naturally diffident, and distrustful of her own ability to +do all that her heart might prompt. She is one of those who prefer to +toil unseen--to give by stealth--and to sacrifice in seclusion. By her +unwearied attention to my wants, her sympathetic regards, her perfect +equanimity of mind, and her sweet and endearing manners; she is no +trifling support to Abolitionism, inasmuch as she lightens my labors, +and enables me to find exquisite delight in the family circle, as an +offset to public adversity." + +And here is a lovely bit of self-revelation made to her betrothed +several months before they were wedded. "I am aware of the +responsibility that will devolve upon me," she writes, "and how much my +example will be copied among that class you have so long labored to +elevate and enlighten. I have been considering how the colored people +think of dress, and how much of their profits are expended for useless +ornaments that foolishly tend to make a show and parade. As much stress +will, of course, be laid on Garrison's _wife_ by that class, it behooves +me to be very circumspect in all things, when called upon to fill so +important a station." + +The marriage occurred September 4, 1834, and the next day the pair set +up housekeeping in "Freedom's Cottage," on Bower street, Roxbury. The +young housekeepers were rich in every good thing except money; and of +that commodity there was precious little that found its way into the +family till. And money was indispensable even to a philanthropist, who +cared as little for it as did Garrison. He had never in his twenty-eight +years experienced the sensation which a bank account, however small, +gives its possessor. He had been toiling during the last three years in +a state of chronic self-forgetfulness, and of consequence in a state of +chronic inpecuniosity. He had never been careful of what he got--was +careful only of what he gave. For himself he was ready to subsist on +bread and water and to labor more than fourteen hours at the case to +make the issue of the _Liberator_ possible. But surely he could not put +"a fair ladye" on such limited commons even for the sake of his cause. +The laborer is worthy of his hire, and an unworldly minded reformer +ought to be supplied with the wherewithal needful to feed, clothe, and +house himself and those dependent upon him. Some such thought shaped +itself in Garrison's mind as his circumstances grew more and more +straitened, and his future as the head of a family looked more and more +ominous. Anxiety for the morrow pressed heavily upon him as his +responsibilities as a breadwinner hugged closer and closer his everyday +life. Poverty ceased to be the ordinary enemy of former years, whom he +from the lookouts of the unconquerable mind used to laugh to scorn; it +had become instead a cruel foe who worried as by fire the peace of his +soul. + +There was the _Liberator_? The _Liberator_ as a moral engine was a +marvelous success; but the _Liberator_ as a money-maker was a most +dismal failure. If its owners had possessed only common aptitude for +business the failure need not have been so complete, indeed the +enterprise might have been crowned with a moderate degree of success. +But never were two men more entirely lacking in the methods, which +should enter into ventures of that character, than were Garrison and +Knapp. Garrison was unfortunate in this respect but it seems that Knapp +was more so. Neither took to book-keeping, and neither overcame his +serious deficiency in this regard. The consequence was that the books +kept themselves, and confusion grew upon confusion until the partners +were quite confounded. Garrison naïvely confesses this fault of the firm +to his brother-in-law thus: "Brother Knapp, you know, resembles me very +closely in his habits of procrastination. Indeed I think he is rather +worse than I am in this respect!" + +The paper was issued originally without a single subscriber. At the end +of the first volume the subscription list numbered five hundred names. +In the course of the next two volumes this number was more than doubled, +almost tripled, in fact. The subscription price was two dollars. The +property would have begun from this point to make returns to its owners +had they possessed the business training and instinct requisite to its +successful management. But they were reformers, not money-getters, and +instead of enjoying the profits they proceeded to use them up +incontinently in their first enlargement of the paper. But while they +had added to the cost of publication, they took no thought to augment +the cost of subscription. The publishers gave more and the subscribers +received more for the sum of two dollars. The pecuniary embarrassments +of the _Liberator_ increased, and so the partners' "bondage to penury" +increased also. This growing pressure was finally relieved by "several +generous donations," made for the support of the paper. At the beginning +of the fourth volume, the publishers wisely or other-wisely, again +enlarged their darling, and again neglected to raise the subscription +rates at the same time. + +Misfortunes never come without company, but alight in flocks, and a +whole flock of misfortunes it was to the _Liberator_ when Joshua Coffin, +"that huge personification of good humor," was appointed canvassing +agent for the paper. He was as wanting in business methods as his +employers were. Confusion now gathered upon confusion around the devoted +heads of the partners, was accelerated and became daily more and more +portentous and inextricable. The delinquencies of subscribers grew more +and more grave. On the three first volumes they were two thousand +dollars in arrears to the paper. This was a large, a disastrous loss, +but traceable, to no inconsiderable extent, doubtless, to the loose +business methods of the reformer and his partner. The _Liberator_ at the +beginning of its fourth year was struggling in a deep hole of financial +helplessness and chaos. Would it ever get out alive, or "SHALL THE +_LIBERATOR_ DIE?" burst in a cry of anguish, almost despair, from its +editor, so weak in thought of self, so supreme in thought of others. + +This carelessness of what appertained to the things which concerned +self, and devotion to the things which concerned his cause, finds apt +and pathetic illustration in this letter to Samuel J. May in the summer +of 1834, when his pecuniary embarrassments and burdens were never harder +to carry: + +"In reply to your favor of the 24th [July], my partner joins with me in +consenting to print an edition of Miss Crandall's [defence] as large as +the one proposed by you, at our own risk. As to the profits that may +arise from the sale of the pamphlet, we do not expect to make any; on +the contrary, we shall probably suffer some loss, in consequence of the +difficulty of disposing of any publication, however interesting or +valuable in itself. But a trial so important as Miss C.'s, involving +such momentous consequences to a large portion of our countrymen, +implicating so deeply the character of this great nation, ought not to +go unpublished, and _shall_ not while we have the necessary materials +for printing it." + +It is interesting to note that the weekly circulation of the +_Liberator_, in the spring of 1834, was twenty-three hundred copies, and +that this number was distributed in Philadelphia, four hundred; in New +York, three hundred: in Boston, two hundred; in other parts of the free +States eleven hundred; and that of the remaining three hundred, one-half +was sent as exchange with other papers, and eighty of the other half +were divided equally between England and Hayti, leaving seventy copies +for gratuitous distribution. The colored subscribers to the paper were +to the whites as three to one. + +There were several suggestions by sundry friends looking to the release +of the _Liberator_ from its embarrassments, and, to the relief of its +unselfish publishers, from the grinding poverty which its issue imposed +upon them. The most hopeful and feasible of them was the scheme of which +Garrison wrote his betrothed April 14, 1834: "I am happy to say," he +pours into her ears, "that it is probable the managers of the New +England Anti-Slavery Society will determine, to-morrow afternoon, to +take all the pecuniary liabilities of the _Liberator_ hereafter, and +give me a regular salary for editing it, and friend Knapp a fair price +for printing it. My salary will not be less than $800 per annum, and +perhaps it will be fixed at a $1,000.... The new arrangement will go +into effect on the 1st of July." But alas; the managers took no such +action on the morrow, nor went the "new arrangement" into effect at the +time anticipated. The editor was married in September, and two months +later the eagerly expected relief was still delayed. This hope deferred +must have caused the young husband meanwhile no little anxiety and heart +sickness. + +Love in a cottage is very pretty and romantic in novels, but love in a +cottage actually thriving on "bread and water," was a sweet reality in +the home of the young couple in Roxbury. "All the world loves a lover," +says Emerson, but alas! there are exceptions to all rules, and all the +world loved not Garrison in his newly found felicity as shall presently +appear. + +The pledge made by the reformer in the initial number of the _Liberator_ +to be "as harsh as truth," had been kept to the letter. To some minds +there is nothing more difficult to understand and tolerate than is the +use of harsh language toward individual wrongdoers. They appear to be +much more solicitous to turn away the wrath of the wicked than to do +away with their wickedness. Multitudes of such minds were offended at +the tremendous severities of Garrison's speech. They were for peace at +any cost, while Garrison was for truth at any cost. These pro-slavery +critics were not necessarily wanting in good feelings to the slaves, or +lacking in a sense of the justice of their cause. But the feelings and +the sense were transitive to an abstract object, intransitive to that +terrible reality, the American slave. The indignation of such people +exceeded all bounds when contemplating wrongs in the abstract, iniquity +in the abstract, while the genuine article in flesh and blood and +habited in broadcloth and respectability provoked no indignation, +provoked instead unbounded charity for the willing victims of ancestral +transgressions. Upon the Southern slaveholder, as a creature of +circumstances, these people expended all their sympathy while upon the +Southern slave, who were to their view _the circumstances_, they looked +with increasing disapprobation. Garrison's harsh language greatly +shocked this class--excited their unbounded indignation against the +reformer. + +Besides this class there was another, composed of friends, whom +Garrison's denunciatory style offended. To Charles Pollen and Charles +Stuart, and Lewis Tappan, this characteristic of the writings of the +great agitator was a sore trial. To them and to others, too, his +language seemed grossly intemperate and vituperative, and was deemed +productive of harm to the movement. But Garrison defended his harsh +language by pointing to the state of the country on the subject of +slavery before he began to use it, and to the state of the country +afterward. How utterly and morally dead the nation was before, how +keenly and marvelously alive it became afterward. The blast which he had +blown had jarred upon the senses of his slumbering countrymen he +admitted, but he should not be blamed for that. What to his critics +sounded harsh and abusive, was to him the trump of God. For, at the +thunder-peal which the Almighty blew from the mouth of his servant, how, +as by a miracle, the dead soul of the nation awoke to righteousness. He +does not arrogate to himself infallibility, indeed he is sure that his +language is not always happily chosen. Such errors, however, appear to +him trivial, in view of indisputable and extraordinary results produced +by the _Liberator_. He believes in marrying masculine truths to +masculine words. He protests against his condemnation by comparison. +"Every writer's style is his own--it may be smooth or rough, plain or +obscure, simple or grand, feeble or strong," he contends, "but +_principles_ are immutable." By his principles, therefore he would, be +judged. "Whittier, for instance," he continues, "is highly poetical, +exuberant, and beautiful. Stuart is solemn, pungent, and severe. Wright +is a thorough logician, dextrous, transparent, straightforward. Beriah +Green is manly, eloquent, vigorous, devotional. May is persuasive, +zealous, overflowing with the milk of human kindness. Cox is diffusive, +sanguine, magnificent, grand. Bourne thunders and lightens. Phelps is +one great, clear, infallible argument--demonstration itself. Jocelyn is +full of heavenly-mindedness, and feels and speaks and acts with a zeal +according to knowledge. Follen is chaste, profound, and elaborately +polished. Goodell is perceptive, analytical, expert, and solid. Child +(David L.) is generously indignant, courageous, and demonstrative; his +lady combines strength with beauty, argumentation with persuasiveness, +greatness with humility. Birney is collected, courteous, +dispassionate--his fearlessness excites admiration, his +conscientiousness commands respect." Of these writers, which is +acceptable to slaveholders or their apologists? Some have been cruelly +treated and all been calumniated as "fanatics, disorganizers, and +madmen." And why? "Certainly not for the _phraseology_ which they use, +but for the _principles_ which they adopt." + +From another quarter came presently notes of discord, aroused by +Garrison's _hard language_. Sundry of the Unitarian clergy, under the +lead of Rev. Henry Ware, Jr., took it into their heads that the editor +of the _Liberator_ and some others were outrageously abusing the +Abolition cause, "mismanaging it by their unreasonable violence" of +language. Wherefore those gentlemen interposed to rescue the great cause +from harm by a brilliant scheme designed to secure moderation in this +regard. This brilliant scheme was nothing less absurd than the +establishment of a censorship over the _Liberator_. But as these +solicitous souls had reckoned without their host, their amiable plan +came to naught; but not, however, before adding a new element to the +universal discord then fast swelling to a roar. To the storm of censure +gathering about his head the reformer bowed not--neither swerved he to +the right hand nor to the left--all the while deeming it, "with the +apostle, a small thing to be judged by man's judgment." "I solicit no +man's praise," he sternly replies to his critics, "I fear no men's +censure." + +There was still another cause of offence given by Garrison to his +countrymen. It was not his _hard language_, but a circumstance less +tolerable, if that was possible, than even that rock of offence. It +seems that when the editor of the _Liberator_ was in England, and dining +with Thomas Powell Buxton, he was asked by the latter in what way the +English Abolitionists could best assist the anti-slavery movement in +America, and he had replied, "_By giving us George Thompson_." This +unexpected answer of the American appeared without doubt to the +Englishman at the time somewhat extraordinary. He had his misgivings as +to the wisdom, to say nothing of the propriety, of an international act +of such importance and delicacy as the sending of George Thompson to +America. He questioned whether the national self-love of the American +people would not resent the arrival of an Englishman on such a mission +among them and refuse him a fair hearing in consequence. But Garrison +was confident that while Thompson's advent would stir up the pro-slavery +bile of the North and all that, he would not be put to much if any +greater disadvantage as a foreigner in speaking in New England on the +subject of slavery, than were those Abolitionists who were to the manner +born. As to his friend's personal safety in the East, Garrison was +extremely optimistic, had not apparently the slightest apprehensions for +him in this regard. + +Well, after due deliberation, George Thompson consented to undertake the +mission to America, and the English reformers to send him, though not +all of them. For some there were like James Cropper, who were indisposed +to promoting such a mission, or "paying agents to travel in the United +States." It was natural enough for Mr. Garrison to prefer such a request +after hearing George Thompson speak. For he was one of those electric +speakers, who do with popular audiences what they will. In figure and +voice and action, he was a born orator. His eloquence was graphic, +picturesque, thrilling, and over English audiences it was irresistible. +Garrison fancied that such eloquence would prove equally attractive to +and irresistible over American audiences as well. But in this he was +somewhat mistaken, for Thompson had to deal with an element in American +audiences of which he had had no experience in England. What that +element was he had occasion to surmise directly he arrived upon these +shores. He reached New York just sixteen days after the marriage of his +friend, the editor of the _Liberator_ to be immediately threatened with +mob violence by the metropolitan press in case he ventured to "lecture +in favor of immediate Abolition," and to be warned that: "If our people +will not suffer our own citizens to tamper with the question of slavery, +it is not to be supposed that they will tolerate the officious +intermeddling of a foreign fanatic." Then as if by way of giving him a +taste of the beak and talons of the American _amour propre_, he and his +family were put out of the Atlantic Hotel in deference to the wish of an +irate Southerner. Thus introduced the English orator advanced speedily +thereafter into closer acquaintance with the American public. He +lectured in many parts of New England where that new element of rowdyism +and virulence of which his English audiences had given him no previous +experience, manifested its presence first in one way and then in others, +putting him again and again in jeopardy of life and limb. At Augusta, +Maine, his windows were broken, and he was warned out of the town. At +Concord, New Hampshire, his speech was punctuated with missiles. At +Lowell, Massachusetts, he narrowly escaped being struck on the head and +killed by a brickbat. Indeed it was grimly apparent that the master of +Freedom's Cottage would be obliged to revise his views as to the hazard, +which his friend ran in speaking upon the subject of slavery in New +England. To do so was weekly becoming for that friend an enterprise of +great personal peril. But it added also to the fierce hatred with which +the public now regarded Garrison. He was the author of all the mischief, +the slavery agitation, the foreign emissary. He had even dared to inject +the poison of Abolitionism into the politics of Boston and +Massachusetts. This attempt on the part of the _Liberator_ to establish +an anti-slavery test of office was only another proof of the dangerous +character of the new fanaticism and the Jacobinical designs of the +Garrisonian fanatics, ergo, the importance of suppressing the +incendiaries. Down with Thompson! Garrison must be destroyed! The +Union--it must and shall be preserved! All these the public excitement, +which had risen everywhere to a tempest, had come more and more to mean. +A tremendous crisis had come in the life of Garrison, and a great peril, +eagle-like, with the stirred-up hate of a nation, was swooping upon him. + + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + + + +MISCHIEF LET LOOSE. + + +A wild-cat-like creature was abroad. To it the Abolitionists were to be +thrown. It was to destroy Garrison, make an end of Thompson, and +suppress between its enormous jaws the grandest moral movement of the +century. Besides doing up this modest little programme, the beast, O +wonderful to say, was also to crown its performances by "saving" the +Union. Rejoicing in the possession of such a conservative institution, +the politicians, the press, and public opinion uncaged the monster, +while from secure seats they watched the frightful scenes of fury and +destruction enacted by it in the national arena. + +These scenes began in the summer of 1834, and in the city of New York. +They were ushered in by the breaking up of an anti-slavery celebration +on the Fourth of July by the clack and roar of several hundred young +rowdies, gathered for the purpose. Their success but whetted the +appetite of the spirit of mischief for other ventures against the +Abolitionists. As a consequence New York was in a more or less disturbed +state from the fourth to the ninth of the month. The press of the city, +with but a single exception (_The Evening Post_) meanwhile goaded the +populace on by false and inflammatory representations touching the +negroes and their friends, to the rioting which began in earnest on the +evening of the ninth. That night a mob attacked Lewis Tappan's house on +Rose street, breaking in the door, smashing blinds and windows, and +playing havoc generally with the furniture. On the following evening the +rioters assailed the store of Arthur Tappan, on Pearl street, +demolishing almost every pane of glass in the front of the building. On +the same evening the mob paid its respects to Rev. Dr. Cox, by breaking +windows both at his house and at his church. The negro quarters in the +neighborhood of Five Points, and their houses in other parts of the +city, were raided on the night of the 11th, and much damage done by the +lawless hordes which for nearly a week wreaked their wrath upon the +property of the negroes and their anti-slavery friends. + +After this brave beginning, the wild-cat-like spirit continued, these +ferocious demonstrations in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, +Connecticut, Maine, and New Hampshire. The slavery agitation had +increased apace. It had broken out in Congress on the presentation of +anti-slavery petitions. The fire thus kindled spread through the +country. Southern excitement became intense, amounted almost to panic. +The activity of the anti-slavery press, the stream of anti-slavery +publications, which had, indeed, increased with singular rapidity, was +exaggerated by the Southern imagination, struck it with a sort of +terror. There were meetings held in many parts of the South, tremendous +scenes enacted there. In Charleston, South Carolina, the post-office was +broken open by an aristocratic mob, under the lead of the famous Robert +Y. Hayne, and a bonfire made of the Abolition mail-matter which it +contained. As this Southern excitement advanced, a passionate fear for +the stability of the Union arose in the heart of the North. Abolition +and the Abolitionists had produced these sectional disturbances. +Abolition and the Abolitionists were, therefore, enemies of the +"glorious Union." Northern excitement kept pace with Southern excitement +until, in the summer of 1835, a reign of terror was widely established +over both sections. To Garrison, from his _Liberator_ outlook, all +seemed "Consternation and perplexity, for perilous times have come." +They had, indeed, come in New York, as witness this from the pen of +Lydia Maria Child, who was at the time (August 15) in Brooklyn. Says +she: + + + "I have not ventured into the city, nor does one of us dare to + go to church to-day, so great is the excitement here. You can + form no conception of it. 'Tis like the time of the French + Revolution, when no man dared trust his neighbor. Private + assassins from New Orleans are lurking at the corners of the + streets to stab Arthur Tappan, and very large sums are offered + for any one who will convey Mr. Thompson into the slave + States.... There are several thousand Southerners now in the + city, and I am afraid there are not seven hundred among them who + have the slightest fear of God before their eyes. Mr. Wright + [Elizur] was yesterday barricading his doors and windows with + strong bars and planks an inch thick. Violence in some form + seems to be generally expected." + + +Great meetings to put the Abolitionists down afforded vents during this +memorable year to the pent-up excitement of the free States. New York +had had its great meeting, and had put the Abolitionists down with +pro-slavery resolutions and torrents of pro-slavery eloquence. Boston, +too, had to have her great meeting and her cataracts of pro-slavery +oratory to reassure the South of the sympathy and support of "the great +body of the people of the Northern States." The toils seemed everywhere +closing around the Abolitionists. The huge head of the asp of public +opinion, the press of the land was everywhere busy, day and night, +smearing with a thick and virulent saliva of lies the brave little band +and its leader. Anti-slavery publications, calculated to inflame the +minds of the slaves against their masters, and intended to instigate the +slaves to servile insurrections, had been distributed broadcast through +the South by the emissaries of anti-slavery societies. The Abolitionists +advocated the emancipation of the slaves in the South by Congress, +intermarriages between the two races, the dissolution of the Union, etc. +All of which outrageous misrepresentations were designed to render the +movement utterly odious to the public, and the public so much the more +furious for its suppression. + +It was in the midst of such intense and widespread excitement that +Boston called its meeting to abolish the Abolitionists. It was the month +of August, and the heat of men's passions was as great as the heat of +the August sun. The moral atmosphere of the city was so charged with +inflammable gases that the slightest spark would have sufficed to +produce an explosion. The Abolitionists felt this and carried themselves +the while with unusual circumspection. They deemed it prudent to publish +an address to neutralize the falsehoods with which they were assailed by +their enemies. The address drawn up by Garrison for the purpose was +thought "too fiery for the present time," by his more cautious followers +and was rejected. The _Liberator_ office had already been threatened in +consequence of a fiery article by the editor, denouncing the use of +Faneuil Hall for the approaching pro-slavery meeting. It seemed to the +unawed and indignant champion of liberty that it were "better that the +winds should scatter it in fragments over the whole earth--better that +an earthquake should engulf it--than that it should be used for so +unhallowed and detestable a purpose!" The anti-abolition feeling of the +town had become so bitter and intense that Henry E. Benson, then clerk +in the anti-slavery office, writing on the 19th of the month, believed +that there were persons in Boston, who would assassinate George Thompson +in broad daylight, and doubted whether Garrison or Samuel J. May would +be safe in Faneuil Hall on the day of the meeting, and what seemed still +more significant of the inflamed state of the public mind, was the +confidence with which he predicted that a mob would follow the meeting. +The wild-cat-like spirit was in the air--in the seething heart of the +populace. + +The meeting was held August 21st, in the old cradle of liberty. To its +call alone fifteen hundred names were appended. It was a Boston audience +both as to character and numbers, an altogether imposing affair, over +whom the mayor of the city presided and before whom two of the most +consummate orators of the commonwealth fulmined against the +Abolitionists. One of their hearers, a young attorney of twenty-four, +who listened to Peleg Sprague and Harrison Gray Otis that day, described +sixteen years afterward the latter and the effects produced by him on +that audience. Our young attorney vividly recalled how "'Abolitionist' +was linked with contempt, in the silver tones of Otis, and all the +charms that a divine eloquence and most felicitous diction could throw +around a bad cause were given it; the excited multitude seemed actually +ready to leap up beneath the magic of his speech. It would be something, +if one must die, to die by such a hand--a hand somewhat worthy and able +to stifle anti-slavery, if it could be stifled. The orator was worthy of +the gigantic task attempted; and thousands crowded before him, every one +of their hearts melted by that eloquence, beneath which Massachusetts +had bowed, not unworthily, for more than thirty years." + +Here is a specimen of the sort of goading which the wild-cat-like spirit +of the city got from the orators. It is taken from the speech of Peleg +Sprague. The orator is paying his respects to George Thompson, "an +avowed _emissary_" "_a professed agitator_," who "comes here from the +dark and corrupt institutions of Europe to enlighten _us_ upon the +rights of man and the moral duties of our own condition. Received by our +hospitality, he stands here upon our soil, protected by our laws, and +hurls firebrands, arrows, and death into the habitations of our +neighbors and friends, and brothers; and when he shall have kindled a +conflagration which is sweeping in desolation over our land, he has only +to embark for his own country, and there look serenely back with +indifference or exultation upon the widespread ruin by which _our_ +cities are wrapt in flames, and _our_ garments rolled in blood." + +The great meeting was soon a thing of the past but not so its effects. +The echoes of Otis and Sprague did not cease at its close. They thrilled +in the air, they thrilled long afterward in the blood of the people. +When the multitude dispersed Mischief went out into the streets of the +city with them. Wherever afterward they gathered Mischief made one in +their midst. Mischief was let loose, Mischief was afoot in the town. The +old town was no place for the foreign emissary, neither was it a safe +place for the arch-agitator. On the day after the meeting, Garrison and +his young wife accordingly retreated to her father's home at Brooklyn, +Conn., where the husband needed not to be jostling elbows with Mistress +Mischief, and her _pals_. + +Garrison's answer to the speeches of Otis and Sprague was in his +sternest vein. He is sure after reading them that, "there is more guilt +attaching to the people of the free States from the continuance of +slavery, than those in the slave States." At least he is ready to affirm +upon the authority of Orator Sprague, "that New England is as really a +slave-holding section of the republic as Georgia or South Carolina." +Sprague, he finds, "in amicable companionship and popular repute with +thieves and adulterers; with slaveholders, slavedealers, and +slave-destroyers; ... with the disturbers of the public peace; with the +robbers of the public mail; with ruffians who insult, pollute, and +lacerate helpless women; and with conspirators against the lives and +liberties of New England citizens." + +To Otis who was then nearly seventy years of age Garrison addressed his +rebuke in tones of singular solemnity. It seemed to him that the aged +statesman had transgressed against liberty "under circumstances of +peculiar criminality." "Yet at this solemn period," the reprobation of +the prophet ran, "you have not scrupled, nay, you have been ambitious, +to lead and address an excited multitude, in vindication of all +imaginable wickedness, embodied in one great system of crime and +blood--to pander to the lusts and desires of the robbers of God and his +poor--to consign over to the tender mercies of cruel taskmasters, +multitudes of guiltless men, women, and children--and to denounce as an +'unlawful and dangerous association' a society whose only object is to +bring this nation to repentance, through the truth as it is in Jesus." + +These audacious and iconoclastic performances of the reformer were not +exactly adapted to turn from him the wrath of the idol worshipers. They +more likely added fuel to the hot anger burning in Boston against him. +Three weeks passed after his departure from the city, and his friends +did not deem it safe for him to return. Toward the end of the fourth +week of his enforced absence, against which he was chafing not a little, +an incident happened in Boston which warned him to let patience have its +perfect work. It was on the night of September 17th that the +dispositions of the city toward him found grim expression in a gallows +erected in front of his house at 23 Brighton street. This ghastly +reminder that the fellow-citizens of the editor of the _Liberator_ +continued to take a lively interest in him, "was made in real +workmanship style, of _maple joist_ five inches through, eight or nine +feet high, for the accommodation of two persons." Garrison and Thompson +were the two persons for whom these brave accommodations were prepared. +But as neither they nor their friends were in a mood to have trial made +of them, the intended occupants consented to give Boston a wide berth, +and to be somewhat particular that they did not turn in with her while +the homicidal fit lasted. + +This editing his paper at long range, and this thought of life and +safety Garrison did not at all relish. They grew more and more irksome +to his fearless and earnest spirit. For his was a "pine-and-fagot" +Abolitionism that knew not the fear of men or their wrath. But now he +must needs have a care for the peace of mind of his young wife, who was, +within a few months, to give birth to a child. And her anxiety for him +was very great. Neither was the anxiety of devoted friends and followers +to be lightly disregarded. All of which detained the leader in Brooklyn +until the 25th of the month, when the danger signals seemed to have +disappeared. Whereupon he set out immediately for his post in Boston to +be at the head of his forces. He found the city in one of those strange +pauses of popular excitement, which might signify the ebb of the tide or +only the retreat of the billows. He was not inclined to let the +anti-Abolition agitation subside so soon, before it had carried on its +flood Abolition principles to wider fields and more abundant harvests in +the republic. Anxious lest the cat-like temper of the populace was +falling into indifference and apathy, he and his disciples took occasion +to prod it into renewed wakefulness and activity. The instruments used +for this purpose were anti-slavery meetings and the sharp goad of his +_Liberator_ editorials. The city was possessed with the demon of +slavery, and its foaming at the mouth was the best of all signs that the +Abolition exorcism was working effectively. So, in between the +glittering teeth and the terrible paws was thrust the maddening goad, +and up sprang the mighty beast horrible to behold. + +One of these meetings was the anniversary of the formation of the Boston +Female Anti-Slavery Society which fell on October 14th. The ladies +issued their notice, engaged a hall, and invited George Thompson to +address them. Now the foreign emissary was particularly exasperating to +Boston sensibility on the subject of slavery. He was the veritable red +rag to the pro-slavery bull. The public announcement, therefore, that he +was to speak in the city threw the public mind into violent agitation. +The _Gazette_ and the _Courier_ augmented the excitement by the +recklessness with which they denounced the proposed meeting, the former +promising to Thompson a lynching, while the latter endeavored to involve +his associates who were to the "manner born" in the popular outbreak, +which was confidently predicted in case the "foreign vagrant" wagged his +tongue at the time appointed. + +Notwithstanding the rage of press and people the meeting was postponed +through no willingness on the part of the ladies, but because of the +panic of the owners of the hall lest their property should be damaged or +destroyed in case of a riot. The ladies, thereupon, appointed three +o'clock in the afternoon of October 21st as the time, and the hall +adjoining the Anti-Slavery Office, at 46 Washington street, as the place +where they would hold their adjourned meeting. This time they made no +mention of Mr. Thompson's addressing them, merely announcing several +addresses. In fact, an address from Mr. Thompson, in view of the squally +outlook, was not deemed expedient. To provide against accidents and +disasters, he left the city on the day before the meeting. But this his +enemies did not know. They confidently expected that he was to be one of +the speakers. An inflammatory handbill distributed on the streets at +noon of the 21st seemed to leave no doubt of this circumstance in the +pro-slavery portion of the city. + +The handbill referred to ran as follows: + + + THOMPSON, + + THE ABOLITIONIST! + + That infamous foreign scoundrel, THOMPSON, will hold forth _this + afternoon_ at the _Liberator_ office. No. 48 Washington street. + The present is a fair opportunity for the friends of the Union + to _snake Thompson out_! It will be a contest between the + Abolitionists and the friends of the Union. A purse of $100 has + been raised by a number of patriotic citizens to reward the + individual who shall first lay violent hands on Thompson, so + that he may be brought to the tar-kettle before dark. Friends of + the Union, be vigilant! + + _Boston, Wednesday, 12 o'clock._ + + +That Wednesday forenoon Garrison spent at the anti-slavery office, +little dreaming of the peril which was to overtake him in that very spot +in the afternoon. He went home to an early dinner, since his wife was a +member of the society, and he himself was set down for an address. As he +wended his way homeward, Mischief and her gang were afoot distributing +the aforesaid handbills "in the insurance offices, the reading-rooms, +all along State street, in the hotels, bar-rooms, etc.," and scattering +it "among mechanics at the North End, who were mightily taken with it." +Garrison returned about a half hour before the time appointed for the +meeting. He found a small crowd of about a hundred individuals collected +in front of the building where the hall was situated, and on ascending +to the hall more of the same sort, mostly young men, choking the access +to it. They were noisy, and Garrison pushed his way through them with +difficulty. As he entered the place of meeting and took his seat among +the ladies, twenty had already arrived, the gang of young rowdies +recognized him and evinced this by the exclamation: "That's Garrison!" +The full significance of the crowd just without the hall did not seem to +have occurred to the man whom they had identified. He did not know that +they were the foam blown from the mouth of a great mob at the moment +filling the streets in the neighborhood of the building where he sat +with such serenity of spirit. His wife who had followed him from their +home saw what Garrison did not see. The crowd of a hundred had swelled +to thousands. It lay in a huge irregular cross, jammed in between the +buildings on Washington street, the head lowering in front of the +anti-slavery office, the foot reaching to the site where stood Joy +building, now occupied by the Rogers, the right arm stretching along +Court street to the Court House, and the left encircling the old State +House, City Hall and Post-office then, in a gigantic embrace. All hope +of urging her way through that dense mass was abandoned by Mrs. +Garrison, and a friend, Mr. John E. Fuller, escorted her to his home, +where she passed the night. + +Meantime the atmosphere upstairs at the hall began to betoken a fast +approaching storm. The noises ominously increased on the landing just +outside. The door of the hall was swung wide open and the entrance +filled with rioters. Garrison, all unconscious of danger, walked over to +these persons and remonstrated in his grave way with them in regard to +the disturbance which they were producing, winding up with a +characteristic bit of pleasantry: "Gentlemen," said he, "perhaps you are +not aware that this is a meeting of the Boston _Female_ Anti-Slavery +Society, called and intended exclusively for _ladies_, and those only +who have been invited to address them. Understanding this fact you will +not be so rude and indecorous as to thrust your presence upon this +meeting." But he added, "If, _gentlemen_, any of you are _ladies_ in +disguise--why only apprise me of the fact, give me your names, and I +will introduce you to the rest of your sex, and you can take seats among +them accordingly." The power of benignity over malignity lasted a few +moments after this little speech, when the situation changed rapidly +from bad to worse. "The tumult continually increased," says an +eye-witness, "with horrible execrations, howling, stamping, and finally +shrieking with rage. They seemed not to dare to enter, notwithstanding +their fury, but mounted on each other's shoulders, so that a row of +hostile heads appeared over the slight partition, of half the height of +the wall which divides the society's rooms from the landing place. We +requested them to allow the door to be shut; but they could not decide +as to whether the request should be granted, and the door was opened and +shut with violence, till it hung useless from its hinges." + +Garrison thinking that his absence might quiet these perturbed spirits +and so enable the ladies to hold their meeting without further +molestation volunteered at this juncture to the president of the society +to retire from the hall unless she desired him to remain. She did not +wish him to stay but urged him to go at once not only for the peace of +the meeting but for his own safety. Garrison thereupon left the hall +meaning at the time to leave the building as well, but egress by the way +of the landing and the stairs, he directly perceived was impossible, and +did what seemed the next best thing, entered the anti-slavery office, +separated from the hall by a board partition. Charles C. Burleigh +accompanied him within this retreat. The door between the hall and the +office was securely locked, and Garrison with that marvelous serenity of +mind, which was a part of him, busied himself immediately with writing +to a friend an account of the scenes which were enacting in the next +room. + +The tempest had begun in the streets also. The mob from its five +thousand throats were howling "Thompson! Thompson!" The mayor of the +city, Theodore Lyman, appeared upon the scene, and announced to the +gentlemen of property and standing, who were thus exercising their vocal +organs, that Mr. Thompson was not at the meeting, was not in the city. +But the mayor was a modern Canute before the sea of human passion, which +was rushing in over law and authority. He besought the rioters to +disperse, but he might as well have besought the waves breaking on +Nastasket Beach to disperse. Higher, higher rose the voices; fiercer, +fiercer waxed the multitude; more and more frightful became the uproar. +The long-pent-up excitement of the city and its hatred of Abolitionists +had broken loose at last and the deluge had come. The mayor tossed upon +the human inundation as a twig on a mountain stream, and with him for +the nonce struggled helplessly the police power of the town also. + +Upstairs in the hall the society and its president are quite as +powerless as the mayor and the police below. Miss Mary S. Parker, the +president, is struggling with the customary opening exercises. She has +called the meeting to order, read to the ladies some passages from the +Bible, and has lifted up her voice in prayer to the All Wise and +Merciful One "for direction and succor, and the forgiveness of enemies +and revilers." It is a wonderful scene, a marvelous example of Christian +heroism, for in the midst of the hisses and threats and curses of the +rioters, the prayer of the brave woman rose clear and untremulous. But +now the rioters have thrown themselves against the partition between the +landing-place and the hall. They are trying to break it down; now, they +have partially succeeded. In another moment they have thrown themselves +against the door of the office where Garrison is locked. The lower panel +is dashed in. Through the opening they have caught sight of their +object, Garrison, serenely writing at his desk. "There he is! That's +Garrison! Out with the scoundrel!" and other such words of recognition +and execration, burst from one and another of the mob. The shattering of +the partition, the noise of splitting and ripping boards, the sharp +crash caused by the shivering of the office door, the loud and angry +outcries of the rioters warn the serene occupant of the office that his +position has become one of extreme peril. But he does not become +excited. His composure does not forsake him. Instead of attempting to +escape, he simply turns to his friend, Burleigh, with the words, "You +may as well open the door, and let them come in and do their worst." But +fortunately, Burleigh was in no such extremely non-resistant mood. + +The advent of the mayor and the constables upon the scene at this point +rescued Garrison from immediately falling into the hands of the mob, who +were cleared out of the hall and from the stairway. Now the voice of the +mayor was heard urging the ladies to go home as it was dangerous to +remain; and now the voice of Maria Weston Chapman, replying: "If this is +the last bulwark of freedom, we may as well die here as anywhere." The +ladies finally decided to retire, and their exit diverted, while the +operation lasted, the attention of the huge, cat-like creature from +their object in the anti-slavery office. When the passing of the ladies +had ceased, the old fury of the mob against Garrison returned. "Out with +him!" "Lynch him!" rose in wild uproar from thousands in the streets. +But again the attention of the huge, cat-like creature was diverted from +its object in the second story of the building before which it was +lashing itself into frenzy. This time it was the anti-slavery sign which +hung from the rooms of the society over the sidewalk. The mob had caught +sight of it, and directly set up a yell for it. The sensation of utter +helplessness in the presence of the multitude seemed at this juncture to +return to the chief magistrate of the city. It was impossible to control +the cataract-like passions of the rioters. He heard their awful roar for +the sign. The din had risen to terrific proportions. The thought of what +might happen next appalled him. The mob might begin to bombard the sign +with brickbats, and from the sign pass to the building, and from the +building to the constables, and then--but the mayor glanced not beyond, +for he had determined to appease the fury of the mob by throwing down to +it the hateful sign. A constable detached it, and hurled it down to the +rioters in the street. But by the act the mayor had signified that the +rule of law had collapsed, and the rule of the mob had really begun. +When the rioters had wreaked their wrath upon the emblem of freedom, +they were in the mood for more violence. The appetite for destruction, +it was seen, had not been glutted; only whetted. Garrison's situation +was now extremely critical. He could no longer remain where he was, for +the mob would invade the building and hunt him like hounds from cellar +to garret. He must leave the building without delay. To escape from the +front was out of the question. A way of escape must, therefore, be found +in the rear. All of these considerations the mayor and Garrison's +friends urged upon him. The good man fell in with this counsel, and, +with a faithful friend, proceeded to the rear of the building, where +from a window he dropped to a shed, but in doing so was very nearly +precipitated to the ground. After picking himself up he passed into a +carpenter's shop, meaning to let himself down into Wilson's Lane, now +Devonshire street, but the myriad-eyed mob, which was searching every +portion of the building for their game, espied him at this point, and +with that set up a great shout. The workmen came to the aid of the +fugitive by closing the door of the carpenter's shop in the face of his +pursuers. The situation seemed desperate. Retreat from the front was cut +off; escape from the rear anticipated and foiled. Garrison perceived the +futility of any further attempts to elude the mob, and proposed in his +calm way to deliver himself up to them. But his faithful Achates, John +Reid Campbell, advised him that it was his duty to avoid the mob as long +as it was possible to do so. Garrison thereupon made a final effort to +get away. He retreated up stairs, where his friend and a lad got him +into a corner of the room and tried to conceal his whereabouts by piling +some boards in front of him. But, by that time, the rioters had entered +the building, and within a few moments had broken into the room where +Garrison was in hiding. They found Mr. Reid, and demanded of him where +Garrison was. But Reid firmly refused to tell. They then led him to a +window, and exhibited him to the mob in the Lane, advising them that it +was not Garrison, but Garrison's and Thompson's friend, who knows where +Garrison is, but refuses to tell. A shout of fierce exultation from +below greeted this announcement. Almost immediately afterward, Garrison +was discovered and dragged furiously to the window, with the intention +of hurling him thence to the pavement. Some of the rioters were for +doing this, while others were for milder measures. "Don't let us kill +him outright!" they begged. So his persecutors relented, coiled a rope +around his body instead, and bade him descend to the street. The great +man was never greater than at that moment. With extraordinary meekness +and benignity he saluted his enemies in the street. From the window he +bowed to the multitude who were thirsting for his destruction, +requesting them to wait patiently, for he was coming to them. Then he +stepped intrepidly down the ladder raised for the purpose, and into the +seething sea of human passion. + +Garrison must now have been speedily torn to pieces had he not been +quickly seized by two or three powerful men, who were determined to save +him from falling into the hands of the mob. They were men of great +muscular strength, but the muscular strength of two or three giants +would have proven utterly unequal to the rescue, and this Mr. Garrison's +deliverers evidently appreciated. For while they employed their powerful +arms, they also employed stratagem as well to effect their purpose. They +shouted anon as they fought their way through the excited throng, "He is +an American! He shan't be hurt!" and other such words which divided the +mind of the mob, arousing among some sympathy for the good man. By this +means he was with difficulty got out of Wilson's lane into State street, +in the rear of the old State House. The champion was now on historic +ground, ground consecrated by the blood of Crispus Attucks and his +fellow-martyrs sixty-five years before. His hat was lost, much of his +clothing was stripped from his body, he was without his customary +glasses, and was therefore practically blind. He could hear the awful +clamor, the mighty uproar of the mob, but he could not distinguish them +one from another, friend from foe. Nevertheless he "walked with head +erect, calm countenance flashing eyes like a martyr going to the stake, +full of faith and manly hope" according to the testimony of an +eye-witness. Garrison himself has thrown light on the state of his mind +during the ordeal. "The promises of God," he afterward remembered, +sustained his soul, "so that it was not only divested of fear, but ready +to sing aloud for joy." + +The news now reached the ears of the mayor that Garrison was in the +hands of the mob. Thereupon the feeble but kindly magistrate began to +act afresh the role of the twig in the mountain stream. He and his +constables struggled helplessly in the human current rushing and raging +around City Hall, the head and seat of municipal law and authority. +Without the aid of private citizens Garrison must inevitably have +perished in the commotions which presently reached their climax in +violence and terror. He was in the rear of City Hall when the mayor +caught up to him and his would-be rescuers. The mayor perceived the +extremity of the situation, and said to the Faneuil Hall giants who had +hold of Garrison, "Take him into my office," which was altogether more +easily said than done. For the rioters have raised the cry "to the Frog +Pond with him!" Which order will be carried out, that of the magistrate +or that of the mob? + +These were horrible moments while the two hung trembling in the balance. +But other private citizens coming to the assistance of the mayor struck +the scales for the moment in his favor, and Garrison was finally +hustled, and thrust by main force into the south door of the City Hall +and carried up to the mayor's room. But the mob had immediately effected +an entrance into the building through the north door and filled the +lower hall. The mayor now addressed the pack, strove manfully in his +feeble way to prevail upon the human wolves to observe order, to sustain +the law and the honor of the city, he even intimated to them that he was +ready to lay down his life on the spot to maintain the law and preserve +order. Then he got out on the ledge over the south door and spoke in a +similar strain to the mob on the street. But alas! he knew not the +secret for reversing the Circean spell by which gentlemen of property +and standing in the community had been suddenly transformed into a +wolfish rabble. + +The increasing tumult without soon warned the authorities that what +advantage the mayor may have obtained in the contest with the mob was +only temporary and that their position was momentarily becoming more +perilous and less tenable. It was impossible to say to what extreme of +violence a multitude so infuriated would not go to get their prey. It +seemed to the now thoroughly alarmed mayor that the mob might in their +frenzy attack the City Hall to effect their purpose. There was one +building in the city, which the guardians of the law evidently agreed +could resist the rage of the populace, and that building was the jail. +To this last stronghold of Puritan civilization the authorities and the +powers that were, fell back as a dernier resort to save Garrison's life. +But even in this utmost pitch and extremity, when law was trampled in +the streets, when authority was a reed shaken in a storm, when anarchy +had drowned order in the bosom of the town, the Anglo-Saxon passion for +legal forms asserted itself. The good man, hunted for his life, must +forsooth be got into the only refuge which promised him security from +his pursuers by a regular judicial commitment as a disturber of the +peace. Is there anything at once so pathetic and farcical in the +Universal history of mobs? + +Pathetic and farcical to be sure, but it was also well meant, and +therefore we will not stop to quarrel with men who were equal to the +perpetration of a legal fiction so full of the comedy and tragedy of +civilized society. But enough--the municipal wiseacres having put their +heads together and evolved the brilliant plan of committing the prophet +as a disturber of the peace, immediately set about its execution, which +developed in the sequence into a bird of altogether another color. For a +more perilous and desperate device to preserve Garrison's life could not +well have been hit upon. How was he ever to be got out of the building +and through that sea of ferocious faces surging and foaming around it. +First then by disguising his identity by sundry changes in his apparel. +He obtained a pair of trousers from one kindly soul, another gave him a +coat, a third lent him a stock, a fourth furnished him a cap. A hack was +summoned and stationed at the south door, a posse of constables drew up +and made an open way from the door to it. Another hack was placed in +readiness at the north door. The hack at the south door was only a ruse +to throw the mob off the scent of their prey, while he was got out of +the north door and smuggled into the other hack. Up to this point, the +plan worked well, but the instant after Garrison had been smuggled into +the hack he was identified by the mob, and then ensued a scene which +defies description; no writer however skillful, may hope to reproduce +it. The rioters rushed madly upon the vehicle with the cry: "Cut the +traces! Cut the reins!" They flung themselves upon the horses, hung upon +the wheels, dashed open the doors, the driver the while belaboring their +heads right and left with a powerful whip, which he also laid vigorously +on the backs of his horses. For a moment it looked as if a catastrophe +was unavoidable, but the next saw the startled horses plunging at +break-neck speed with the hack up Court street and the mob pursuing it +with yells of baffled rage. Then began a thrilling, a tremendous race +for life and Leverett street jail. The vehicle flew along Court street +to Bodoin square, but the rioters, with fell purpose flew hardly less +swiftly in its track. Indeed the pursuit of the pack was so close that +the hackman did not dare to drive directly to the jail but reached it by +a detour through Cambridge and Blossom streets. Even then the mob +pressed upon the heels of the horses as they drew up before the portals +of the old prison, which shut not an instant too soon upon the editor of +the _Liberator_, who was saved from a frightful fate to use a Biblical +phrase but by the skin of his teeth. + +Here the reformer safe from the wrath of his foes, was locked in a cell; +and here, during the evening, with no abatement of his customary +cheerfulness and serenity of spirit, he received several of his anxious +friends, Whittier among them, whom through the grated bars he playfully +accosted thus: "You see my accommodations are so limited, that I cannot +ask you to spend the night with me." That night in his prison cell, and +on his rude prison bed, he slept the sleep of the just man, sweet and +long: + + "When peace within the bosom reigns, + And conscience gives th' approving voice; + Though bound the human form in chains. + Yet can the soul aloud rejoice. + + + "'Tis true, my footsteps are confined-- + I cannot range beyond this cell-- + But what can circumscribe my mind, + To chain the winds attempt as well!" + + +The above stanzas he wrote the next morning on the walls of his cell. +Besides this one he made two other inscriptions there, to stand as +memorabilia of the black drama enacted in Boston on the afternoon of +October 21, 1835. + +After being put through the solemn farce of an examination in a court, +extemporized in the jail, Garrison was discharged from arrest as a +disturber of the peace! But the authorities, dreading a repetition of +the scenes of the day before, prayed him to leave the city for a few +days, which he did, a deputy sheriff driving him to Canton, where he +boarded the train from Boston to Providence, containing his wife, and +together they went thence to her father's at Brooklyn, Conn. The +apprehensions of the authorities in respect of the danger of a fresh +attack upon him were unquestionably well founded, inasmuch as diligent +search was made for him in all of the outgoing stages and cars from the +city that morning. + +In this wise did pro-slavery, patriotic Boston translate into _works_ +her sympathy for the South. + + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + + + +FLOTSAM AND JETSAM. + + +The results of the storm became immediately manifest in several ways. +Such a commotion did not leave things in precisely the state in which +they were on the morning of the memorable day on which it struck the +city. The moral landscape and geography of the community had sensibly +changed at its close. The full extent of the alteration wrought could +not at once be seen, nor was it at once felt. But that there were deep +and abiding changes made by it in the court of public opinion in Boston +and Massachusetts on the subject of slavery there is little doubt. It +disgusted and alarmed many individuals who had hitherto acted in unison +with the social, business, and political elements, which were at the +bottom of the riot. Francis Jackson, for instance, had been one of the +fifteen hundred signers of the call for the great Faneuil Hall meeting +of the 21st of August. But on the afternoon of the 21st of October he +threw his house open to the Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society, after +its meeting had been broken up by the mob. It seemed to him then that it +was no longer a mere struggle for the freedom of the slave, but for the +right of free speech and free discussion as well. Dr. Henry I. Bowditch, +a young man, in 1835, eminent professor and physician subsequently, +dates from that afternoon of mob violence his conversion to +Abolitionism. In that selfsame hour seeds of resistance to slavery were +sown in two minds of the first order in the city and State. Wendell +Phillips was a spectator in the streets that day, and the father of +Charles Sumner, the sheriff at the time, fought bravely to save Garrison +from falling into the hands of the mob. The great riot gave those young +men their first summons to enter the service of freedom. It was not long +afterward probably that they both began to read the _Liberator_. From +that event many intelligent and conservative people associated slavery +with lynch law and outrage upon the rights of free speech and popular +assembly. + +This anti-slavery reaction of the community received practical +demonstration in the immediate increase of subscribers to the +_Liberator_. Twelve new names were added to the subscription list in one +day. It received significant illustration also in Garrison's nomination +to the legislature. In this way did between seventy and eighty citizens +testify their sympathy for him and their reprobation of mob rule. In yet +another way was its influence felt, and this was in the renewed zeal and +activity which it instantly produced on the part of the Abolitionists +themselves. It operated upon the movement as a powerful stimulus to +fresh sacrifices and unwearied exertions. George W. Benson, Garrison's +brother-in-law, led off bravely in this respect, as the following +extract from a letter written by him in Boston, two days after the riot, +to Garrison, at Brooklyn, well illustrates. He had come up to the city +from Providence the night before, in quest of his sister and her +husband. Not finding them, he turned to the cause which had been so +ruthlessly attacked, and this is the sort of care which he bestowed upon +it. He got Burleigh to write a general relation of the mob for +publication in the _Liberator_, and Whittier to indite another, with an +appeal to the public, the same to be published immediately, and of which +he ordered three thousand copies for himself. + +"I further ordered," he writes, "one thousand copies of A. Grimké's +letter, with your introductory remarks, and your address published in +the _Liberator_ several weeks since, with your name appended, and +Whittier's poetry on the times, in a pamphlet form. I urged all our +friends to redouble their exertions. They seemed well disposed to accept +the advice, as nothing will now avail but thorough measures. _Liberty or +Death_!" + +This is a fair specimen of the indomitable, indefatigable spirit which +was born of the attempt to put Abolitionism down by lawlessness and +violence. Indeed, the "Broad-Cloth Mob," viewed in the light of the +important consequences which followed it, was equal to a hundred +anti-slavery meetings, or a dozen issues of the _Liberator_. + +It is a curious and remarkable circumstance that, on the very day of the +Boston mob, there occurred one in Utica, N.Y., which was followed by +somewhat similar results. An anti-slavery convention was attacked and +broken up by a mob of "gentlemen of property and standing in the +community," under the active leadership of a member of Congress. Here +there was an apparent defeat for the Abolitionists, but the consequences +which followed the outrage proved it a blessing in disguise. For the +cause made many gains thereby, and conspicuously among them was Gerritt +Smith, ever afterward one of its most eloquent and munificent +supporters. If anti-slavery meetings made converts by tens, anti-slavery +mobs made them by hundreds. The enemies of freedom builded better than +they knew or intended, and Garrison had the weightiest of reasons for +feeling thankful to them for the involuntary, yet vast aid and comfort +which their pro-slavery virulence and violence were bringing him and the +anti-slavery movement throughout the free States. Example: in 1835-36, +the great mob year, as many as three hundred and twenty-eight societies +were organized in the North for the immediate abolition of slavery. + +The mob did likewise help towards a satisfactory solution of the riddle +propounded by Garrison: "Shall the _Liberator_ die?" The fresh access of +anti-slavery strength, both in respect of zeal and numbers, begotten by +it, exerted no slight influence on the longevity of the _Liberator_. +Poor the paper continued, and embarrassed the editor for many a month +thereafter, but as an anti-slavery instrument its survival may be said +from that proceeding to have become a necessity. To allow the +_Liberator_ to die at this juncture would have been such a confession of +having been put down, such an ignominious surrender to the mobocrats as +the Abolitionists of Boston would have scorned to make. "I trust," wrote +Samuel E. Sewall, "there will not be even one week's interruption in the +publication of the _Liberator._" _Ex uno disce omnes_. He but voiced the +sentiment of the editor's disciples and associates in the city, in the +State, and in New England as well. + +Besides these larger consequences there were others of a more personal +and less welcome character. The individual suffers but the cause goes +forward. Property-holders in Boston after the riot were not at all +disposed to incur the risk of renting property to such disturbers of the +peace as Garrison and the _Liberator_. The owner of his home on Brighton +street was thrown into such alarm for the safety of his property, if +Garrison continued to occupy it, that he requested the cancellation of +the lease and the vacation of the premises. Garrison and his friends, +all things considered, decided that it was the part of wisdom to accede +to the request--although this breaking up of his home was a sore trial +to the young husband in more ways than one. + +The landlord of the building where was located the _Liberator_ office +promptly notified the publishers to remove the paper not many mornings +after the mob. This was particularly hard luck, inasmuch as the most +dilligent quest for another local habitation for the paper, failed of +success. No one was willing to imperil his property by letting a part of +it to such a popularly odious enterprise. So that not only had the +household furniture of the editor to be stored, but the office effects +of the paper as well. The inextinguishable pluck and zeal of Garrison +and his Boston coadjutors never showed to better advantage than when +without a place to print the _Liberator_, the paper was "set up in +driblets" in other offices at extraordinary expense, and sent out week +after week to tell the tale of the mob, and to preach with undiminished +power the gospel of universal emancipation. + +But more afflictive to the feelings of the reformer than the loss of his +home, or that of the office of the _Liberator_, was the loss of his +friend, George Thompson. It seemed to him when the English orator +departed that "the paragon of modern eloquence," and "the benefactor of +two nations," had left these shores. Garrison's grief was as poignant as +his humiliation was painful. George Thompson had come hither only as a +friend of America, and America had pursued him with the most relentless +malice. The greatest precautions were taken after the "Broadcloth Mob" +to ensure his safety. The place of his concealment was kept a secret and +committed only to a few tried friends. There is no doubt that had these +precautions not been observed and his hiding place been discovered by +the ruffians of the city, his life would have been attempted. Indeed it +is almost as certain that had he ventured to show himself in public he +would have been murdered in broad daylight in any of the large towns and +cities of Massachusetts. His mission was clearly at an end unless he was +determined to invite martyrdom. In these circumstances there was nothing +to do but to smuggle him out of the country at the first opportunity. On +Sunday, November 8, the anxiously looked-for moment came when George +Thompson was put upon a packet, in which he sailed for St. Johns, New +Brunswick, whence he subsequently took passage for England. Garrison was +inconsolable. "Who now shall go forth to argue our cause in public," he +sadly asked, "with subtle sophists and insolent scoffers?" little +dreaming that there was then approaching him out of the all-hail +hereafter a greater in these identical respects than George Thompson, +indisputably great as he was. + +It was a blessed refuge to Garrison, the Benson homestead of Brooklyn, +termed Friendship's Valley. Hunted as a partridge by his enemies here he +found the quiet, and sympathy, and the right royal welcome and affection +for which his heart panted amidst the dust, and din, and dangers of the +crusade against slavery. But grateful as were the domestic sweets of +Friendship's Valley, his was altogether too militant and masterful a +spirit to yield himself without a struggle to the repose which it +offered. He did not at all relish the idea of being a forced exile from +Boston, of being obliged to edit the _Liberator_ at such long range. But +his friends urged him to submit to the one, and do the other, both on +grounds of economy and common prudence. He was almost super-anxious lest +it be said that the fear of the mob drove him out of Boston, and that +the fear of it kept him out. This super-anxiety in that regard his +friends to a certain degree shared with him. It was a phase of Abolition +grit. Danger attracted this new species of reformers as a magnet draws +iron. Instead of running away from it, they were, with one accord, +forever rushing into it. And the leader in Brooklyn was for rushing back +to Boston, where, if one chanced to sow the wind in the morning, he +might be morally certain of reaping the whirlwind in the afternoon. + +Two weeks after he had been secretly conveyed to Canton by Deputy +Sheriff Parkman, being the day of his discharge from Leverett street +jail, he was back again in Boston. The popular excitement had subsided. +He showed himself freely in the streets and was nowhere molested. One +day, however, while at the anti-slavery office on Washington street, he +witnessed what was perhaps a final manifestation of the cat-like spirit +of the great mob. A procession passed by with band and music, bearing +aloft a large board on which were represented George Thompson and a +black woman with this significant allusion to the riot, made as if +addressed to himself by his dusky companion in disgrace: "When are we +going to have another meeting, Brother Thompson?" The cat-like creature +had lapsed into a playful mood, but its playfulness would have quickly +given place to an altogether different fit did it but know that Garrison +was watching it from the window of the very room where a few weeks +before he had nearly fallen into its clutches. + +Garrison remained in Boston two weeks, going about the city, wherever +and whenever business or duty called him in a perfectly fearless way. He +left on the afternoon of November 18th. On that same afternoon the +Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society held a memorable meeting at the house +of Francis Jackson. It was then that Harriet Martineau, another foreign +emissary, avowed her entire agreement with the principles of the +Abolitionists, which subjected her to social ostracism, and to unlimited +abuse from the pro-slavery press of the city. + +The new hatred of slavery which the mob had aroused in Boston found +heroic expression in a letter of Francis Jackson's replying to a vote of +thanks of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society to him for his +hospitality to the ladies after their meeting was broken up by the mob. +Mr. Jackson in his answer points with emphasis to the fact that his +hospitality had a double aim, one was the accommodation of the ladies, +the other the preservation of the right of free discussion. In his +regard a foundation principle of free institutions had been assailed. +"Happily," he shrewdly observed, "one point seems already to be gaining +universal assent, that slavery cannot long survive free discussion. +Hence the efforts of the friends, and apologists of slavery to break +down this right. And hence the immense stake which the enemies of +slavery hold, in behalf of freedom and mankind, in its preservation. The +contest is, therefore, substantially between liberty and slavery. + +"As slavery cannot exist with free discussion, so neither can liberty +breathe without it. Losing this, we, too, shall be no longer free men +indeed, but little, if at all, superior to the millions we now seek to +emancipate." This apprehension and spirit of resistance, voiced by +Francis Jackson, was Garrison's new ally, which, phoenix-like, was born +out of the ashes of that terrific attempt of his enemies to effect his +destruction, known as the "Broad-Cloth Mob." + + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + + + +THE BAROMETER CONTINUES TO FALL. + + +Having made trial of the strong arm of the mob as an instrument for +putting down the Abolitionists, and been quite confounded by its +unexpected energy and unmanageableness, Boston was well disposed to lay +the weapon aside as much too dangerous for use. For the wild-cat-like +creature might take it into its head, when once it had got a taste of +blood, to suppress some other isms in the community besides +Abolitionism. No, no, the gentlemen of property and standing in the +community had too much at stake to expose their property and their +persons to the perils of any further experiments in that direction, even +for the sake of expressing their sympathy for their dear brethren in the +South, or of saving the dear Union into the bargain. Another method more +in accord with the genius of their high state of civilization, they +opined, might be invented to put the agitation and the agitators of the +slavery question down. The politicians thereupon proceeded to make this +perfectly wonderful invention. Not the strong arm of the mob, quoth +these wiseacres, but the strong arm of the law it shall be. And the +strong arm of the law they forthwith determined to make it. + +Massachusetts was hearkening with a sort of fascination to the song of +the slave syren. And no wonder. For the song of the slave syren was +swelling and clashing the while with passionate and imperious energy. +South Carolina had led off in this kind of music. In December following +the Boston mob Governor McDuffie, pitched the key of the Southern +concert in his message to the legislature descriptive of anti-slavery +publications, and denunciatory of the anti-slavery agitation. The +Abolitionists were, to his mind, "enemies of the human race," and the +movement for immediate emancipation ought to be made a felony punishable +"by death without benefit of clergy." He boldly denied that slavery was +a political evil, and vaunted it instead as "_the corner stone of our +republican edifice_." The legislature upon the receipt of this +extraordinary message proceeded to demand of the free States the +suppression, by effective legislation, of anti-slavery societies and +their incendiary publications. The burden of this demand was directly +caught up by North Carolina, Alabama, Virginia, and Georgia. But there +were some things which even a pro-slavery North could not do to oblige +the South. Neither party, much as both desired it, dared to undertake +the violation by law of the great right of free speech and of the +freedom of the press. Not so, however, was it with sundry party leaders, +notably the governors of New York and Massachusetts, who were for trying +the strong arm of the law as an instrument for suppressing Abolitionism. +Edward Everett was so affected by the increasing Southern excitement and +his fears for the safety of the dear Union that he must needs deliver +himself in his annual message upon the Abolition agitation. He was of +the opinion that the Abolitionists were guilty of an offence against +Massachusetts which might be "prosecuted as a misdemeanor at common +law." He evidently did not consider that in the then present state of +political parties and of public opinion any repressive legislation upon +the subject could be got through the legislature, and hence the immense +utility of the old machinery of the common law, as an instrument for +putting down the agitation. But in order to get this machinery into +operation, careful preparation was necessary. Proof must not be wanting +as to the dangerous and unpatriotic character and tendency of the +movement to be repressed. There should be the most authoritative +utterance upon this point to warrant the effective intervention of the +Courts and Grand Juries of the commonwealth in the prosecution of the +Abolitionists, as disturbers of the peace. Ergo the Governor's +deliverance in his annual message against them. Now, if the legislature +could be brought to deliver itself in tones not less certain, the third +coördinate branch of the State government might catch its cue and act +with energy in suppressing the disturbers of the peace of the +commonwealth and of the dear Union as well. This was the scheme, the +conspiracy which was in a state of incubation in Massachusetts in the +year 1836. The pro-slavery portion of Governor Everett's message, +together with the Southern demands for repressive legislation against +the Abolitionists were referred to a joint legislative committee for +consideration and report. The chairman of the committee was George Lunt, +of Newburyport, a bitter pro-slavery politician, who saw no sign, +received no light which did not come out of the South. + +The Abolitionists perceived the gravity of the new danger which +threatened them, and rallied promptly to avert it. They shrewdly guessed +that the object of the committee would not be the enactment of any new +law against themselves but the adoption of condemnatory resolutions +instead. This course they rightly dreaded more than the other, and to +defeat it the managers of the Massachusetts Anti-slavery Society +requested a public hearing of the committee, which was granted. On March +4th Garrison and many of the anti-slavery leaders appeared before the +committee, with a carefully planned programme of procedure. To each of +the selected speakers was assigned a distinct phase of the great subject +of discussion before the committee. Samuel J. May was appointed to open +with an exposition of the anti-slavery movement and of the object and +motives of its founders; Garrison to follow with an exhibition of the +pacific character of the agitation as contained in official publications +whereby forgiveness, submission, and non-resistance were steadily +inculcated; Ellis Gray Loring was next to demonstrate the perfectly +constitutional character of the agitation. The Abolitionists had in no +wise contravened the National or the State Constitution, either in +letter or spirit, and so on through the programme. It was thus that the +Abolitionists dexterously killed two birds with one stone; for at the +same time that they made their defence before the committee, they +managed to present their cause to the attention of the public as well. +Appearing before the committee to prevent hostile action on the part of +the legislature against their movement, they skillfully turned the +occasion into the most notable meeting for agitating the subject of +slavery in the State during the year. + +The pro-slavery malignity of the chairman helped not a little to bring +this result to pass. He again and again interrupted the speakers with +the greatest insolence of behavior. Garrison, for a wonder, was allowed +to finish his remarks without interruption. Here is a specimen of the +way in which Paul addressed himself to King Agrippa's master--public +opinion: + +"Sir," spoke he to the committee, "we loudly boast of our free country, +and of the union of these States, yet I have no country! As a New +Englander and as an Abolitionist I am excluded by a bloody proscription +from one-half of the national territory, and so is every man who is +known to regard slavery with abhorrence. Where is our Union? ... The +right of free and safe locomotion from one part of the land to the other +is denied to us, except on peril of our lives.... Therefore it is, I +assert, that the Union is now virtually dissolved.... Look at McDuffie's +sanguinary message! Read Calhoun's Report to the U.S. Senate, +authorizing every postmaster in the South to plunder the mail of such +Northern letters or newspapers as he may choose to think incendiary! +Sir, the alternative presented to the people of New England is this: +they must either submit to be gagged and fettered by Southern +taskmasters, or labor unceasingly for the removal of slavery from our +country." + +This was a capital stroke, a bold and brilliant adaptation of the +history of the times to the advancement of the anti-slavery movement in +New England. Missing Garrison, the anger of the chairman fell upon +Goodell and Prof. Follen, like a tiger's whelp. Follen was remarking +upon the Faneuil Hall meeting, how it had rendered the Abolitionists +odious in Boston, and how, in consequence, the mob had followed the +meeting. + +"Now, gentlemen," the great scholar continued, "may we most reasonably +anticipate that similar consequences would follow the expression by the +legislature of a similar condemnation? Would not the mob again undertake +to execute the informal sentence of the General Court? Would it not let +loose again its bloodhounds upon us?" + +At this point Mr. Lunt peremptorily stopped the speaker, exclaiming: + +"Stop, sir! You may not pursue this course of remark. It is insulting to +this committee and the legislature which they represent." + +The Abolitionists, after this insult, determined to withdraw from the +hearing, and appeal to the legislature to be heard, not as a favor but +of right. A new hearing was, therefore, ordered, and the reformers +appeared a second time before the committee. But the scenes of the first +were repeated at the second hearing. The chairman was intolerably +insolent to the speakers. His violent behavior to William Goodell, who +was paying his respects to the Southern documents lying on the table of +the committee, terminated the second hearing. These documents Mr. +Goodell described as fetters for Northern freemen, and boldly +interrogated the chairman in respect of them thus: + +"Mr. Chairman, are you prepared to attempt putting them on?" But the +chairman was in no mood to listen to the question. His insolence reached +a climax as he exclaimed passionately to Mr. Goodell, "Stop, sir! Sit +down, sir! The committee will hear no more of this." But the temper of +the Abolitionists had risen also, as had also risen the temper of the +great audience of citizens who were present at the hearing which was had +in the hall of the House of Representatives. "Freemen we came," retorted +Goodell, "and as freemen we shall go away." Scarcely had these words +died upon the ears when there rose sharply from the auditory, the stern +protest "Let us go quickly, lest we be made slaves." + +The attempt to suppress the Abolitionists was a failure. It but +stimulated the agitation and deepened the popular interest in the +subject. Strong allies within and without the legislature were enlisted +on the side of freedom. The turning of the tide of public sentiment in +the grand old State had come. Slowly did it rise for awhile, but from +that event it never ceased to flow in and with increasing volume. The +condemnatory report of the insolent chairman proved as innocuous as the +baying of dogs at the moon. The legislature refused to indorse it and +the pro-slavery resolutions attached to it. They were both ignominiously +laid upon the table, and what is more to the purpose as a straw to show +the drift of popular opinion on the slavery question in Massachusetts, +their author failed of a renomination as Senator at the hands of his +dissatisfied constituents. + +The conflict was raging not alone in Massachusetts but all through the +free States. In Congress the battle was assuming an intensely bitter +character. Here the South was the agitator. Here she kept the political +waters in a state of violent ebullition. As the discord grew, +sectionalism threw darkening and portentous shadows over the face of the +Union. The South was insisting in all stages of passion that the tide of +Abolition be checked in the North, that the flood of incendiary +publications be suppressed at their sources in the free States. The +Southern slave-holding President had suggested the suppression of these +by Congress. He would "prohibit, under severe penalties, the circulation +in the Southern States, through the mail, of incendiary publications +intended to instigate the slaves to insurrection." But when Webster and +a few Northern leaders objected to such a proceeding as unconstitutional +and in derogation of the freedom of the press, the South treated the +objection as inimical to Southern interest and security. Thereupon the +Southern excitement increased all the faster. The slave-power was not +disposed to accept anything short of complete submission on the part of +the North. And this the North could not well yield. While the +slave-holding States were clamoring for the suppression of Abolitionism +in the free States, Abolitionism was giving evidences of extraordinary +expansion, and activity. It had risen well above the zero point in +politics. It was gaining numbers and it was gaining votes. A new element +had appeared at the polls and both of the old parties began to exhibit a +certain degree of impressibility to the latest attraction. The +slave-power with quick instinct recognized in the new comer a dangerous +rival, and schemed for its destruction. Southern jealousy took on the +character of insanity. Neither Northern Whigs nor Northern Democrats +were permitted to show any regard for the rival. They were to snub and +utterly abolish her, otherwise they should be snubbed and utterly +abolished by the slave-power. They could not with impunity give to +Abolitionism the scantiest attention or courtesy. Not even a gallant +like John Quincy Adams, who was able to see nothing attractive in the +little band of reformers. They seemed to him, in fact, "a small, +shallow, and enthusiastic party preaching the abolition of slavery upon +the principles of extreme democracy." If Mr. Adams had little love for +the South, he had none whatever for the Abolitionists. By no stretch of +the imagination could he have been suspected of any sentimental +attachment to the Abolition movement. For his unvarying attitude towards +it was one of grim contempt. But if the old Roman had no love for the +Abolitionists, he did have a deep-seated attachment and reverence for +certain ancient rights appertaining to free institutions, which nothing +was able to shake. Among these was the great right of petition, viewed +by the ex-President as a right of human nature. For a dozen years he +stood in Congress its sleepless sentinel. And herein did he perform for +freedom most valiant service. It made no difference to the dauntless old +man whether he approved of the prayer of a petition or not, if it was +sent to him he presented it to the House all the same. He presented +petitions for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, and +one, at least, against it, petitions from black and white, bond and +free, with superb fidelity to the precious right which he championed. + +This characteristic of the aged statesman kept the Southern members in a +state of chronic apprehension and excitement. They bullied him, they +raged like so many wild animals against him, they attempted to crush him +with votes of censure and expulsion all to no purpose. Then they applied +the gag: "That all petitions, memorials, and papers touching the +abolition of slavery, or the buying, selling, or transferring slaves, in +any State, or district, or territory of the United States, be laid on +the table without being debated, printed, read, or referred, and that no +action be taken thereon." Mr. Adam's denunciation of this action as a +violation of the Constitution, of the right of the people to petition, +and of the right to freedom of speech in Congress, found wide echo +through the North. The violence, intolerence, and tyranny of the South +were disgusting many of the most intelligent and influential minds in +the non-slave-holding States, and driving them into more or less close +affiliation with the anti-slavery movement. + +And so it was wherever one turned there were conflict and uproar. +Everywhere contrary ideas, interests, institutions, tendencies, were +colliding with inextinguishable rage. All the opposites and +irreconcilables in a people's life had risen and clashed together in a +death struggle for mastery. Freedom and slavery, civilization and +barbarism had found an Armageddon in the moral consciousness of the +Republic. Now the combatants rallied and the battle thickened at one +point, now around another. At Washington the tide rolls in with +resounding fury about the right of petition and the freedom of debate, +then through the free States it surges and beats around the right of +free speech and the freedom of the press. Storm clouds are flying from +the East and from the West, flying out of the North and out of the +South. Everywhere the chaos of the winds has burst, and the anarchy of +the "live thunder." + +Benton with his customary optimism from a Southern standpoint, rejoiced +in the year 1836 that the people of the Northern States had "chased off +the foreign emissaries, silenced the gabbling tongues of female dupes, +and dispersed the assemblies, whether fanatical, visionary, or +incendiary, of all that congregated to preach against evils that +afflicted others, not them, and to propose remedies to aggravate the +disease which they pretended to cure." Calhoun's pessimism was clearer +eyed. The great nullifier perceived at once the insuppressible nature of +the Abolition movement and early predicted that the spirit then abroad +in the North would not "die away of itself without a shock or +convulsion." Yes, it was as he had prophesied, the anti-slavery reform +was, at the very moment of Benton's groundless jubilation, rising and +spreading with astonishing progress through the free States. It was +gaining footholds in the pulpit, the school, and the press. It was a +stalwart sower, scattering broadcast as he walked over the fields of the +then coming generation truths and antipathies of social principles, +which were to make peace impossible between the slave-holding and the +non-slave-holding halves of the Union. + +In the year 1836 the anti-slavery leaven or residuum for instance, was +sufficiently potent to preserve the statutes of the free States, free +from repressive laws directed against the Abolitionists. This was much +but there was undoubtedly another phase of the agitation, a phase which +struck the shallow eye of Benton, and led him into false conclusions. It +was not clear sailing for the reform. It was truly a period of stress +and storm. Sometimes the reform was in a trough of the sea of public +opinion, sometimes on the crest of a billow, and then again on the bosom +of a giant ground swell. In Boston in this selfsame year which witnessed +Benton's exultation over the fall of Abolitionism, the Massachusetts +Anti-Slavery Society was not able to obtain the use of hall or church +for its annual meeting, and was in consequence forced into insufficient +accommodations at its rooms on Washington street. The succeeding year +the society was obliged, from inability to obtain the use of either hall +or church in the city, to occupy for its annual meeting the loft over +the stable connected with the Marlborough Hotel. It is a long way from +this rude meeting-house to the hall of the House of Representatives, but +in this storm and stress period the distance was traversed in a few +brief hours. The society applied in its exigency for the use of the hall +for an evening meeting, and the application was granted by the members. +It was a _jeu d'esprit_ of Henry B. Stanton, "That when Boston votes we +go into a stable, but when the State votes we go into the State House." +It was even so, for the incident served to reveal what was true +everywhere through the free States that the anti-slavery reform was +making fastest progress among people away from the great centres of +population. It found ready access to the simple American folk in +villages, in the smaller towns, and in the rural districts of New +England and the North. And already from these independent and +uncorrupted sons and daughters of freedom had started the deep ground +swell which was to lift the level of Northern public opinion on the +question of slavery. + +This Walpurgis period of the movement culminated on November 7, 1837, in +a terrible tragedy. The place was a little Illinois town, Alton, just +over the Mississippi River from St. Louis, and the victim was Elijah P. +Lovejoy. He was a minister of the Presbyterian Church, and the editor of +a weekly religious newspaper, first published in St. Louis and removed +by him later to Alton. His sin was that he did not hold his peace on the +subject of slavery in the columns of his paper. He was warned "to pass +over in silence everything connected" with that question. But he had no +choice, he had to cry aloud against iniquities, which, as a Christian +minister and a Christian editor, he dared not ignore. His troubles with +the people of St. Louis took in the spring of 1836 a sanguinary turn, +when he denounced the lynching of a negro by a St. Louis mob, +perpetrated under circumstances of peculiar atrocity. In consequence of +his outspoken condemnation of the horror, his office was broken into and +destroyed by a mob. Lovejoy thereupon removed his paper to Alton, but +the wild-cat-like spirit pursued him across the river and destroyed his +press. He replaced his broken press with a new one, only to have his +property a second time destroyed. He replaced the second with a third +press, but a third time the mob destroyed his property. Then he bought a +fourth press, and resolved to defend it with his life. Pierced by +bullets he fell, resisting the attack of a mob bent on the destruction +of his rights. Lovejoy died a martyr to free speech and the freedom of +the press. + +The tidings of this tragedy stirred the free States to unwonted depths. +The murder of an able and singularly noble man by a mob was indeed +horrible enough, but the blow which took his life was aimed at the right +of free speech and the freedom of the press. He was struck down in the +exercise of his liberties as a citizen of the town where he met death, +and of the State and country to which he belonged. What brave man and +good in the North who might not meet a similar fate for daring to +denounce evils approved by the community in which his lot was cast? Who +was safe? Whose turn would it be next to pay with his life for attempts +to vindicate the birthright of his citizenship? What had Lovejoy done, +what had he written, that thousands of people who did not agree with +Garrison would not have done and have written under like circumstances? +He was not a disciple of Garrison, he did not accept the doctrine of +immediate emancipation, and yet a pro-slavery mob had murdered him. Yes, +who was safe? Who was to be the next? A great horror transfixed the +North, and bitter uncertainty, and tremendous dread of approaching +perils to its liberties. + +Ah! had not Garrison spoken much plain truth at the public hearing of +the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society before the insolent chairman and +his committee when he said: "The liberties of the people of the free +States are identified with those of the slave population. If it were not +so, there would be no hope, in my breast, of peaceful deliverance of the +latter class from their bondage. Our liberties are bound together by a +ligament as vital as that which unites the Siamese twins. The blow which +cuts them asunder, will inevitably destroy them both. Let the freedom of +speech and of the press be abridged or destroyed, and the nation itself +will be in bondage; let it remain untrammeled, and Southern slavery must +speedily come to an end." The tragedy at Alton afforded startling +illustration of the soundness of this remark. Classes like individuals +gain wisdom only by experience; and the murder of Lovejoy was one of +those terrific experiences which furrow themselves in the soul of a +people in frightful memories and apprehensions which do not disappear +but remain after long lapse of years. + +Twelve days after the murder--it was before the development of the +telegraph and rapid postal facilities--the news reached Boston. It +produced the most profound sensation. Many of the leading citizens felt +straightway that if the rights assailed in the person of Lovejoy were to +be preserved to themselves and their section, immediate action was +required. A great meeting was proposed, and Faneuil Hall applied for. +The application was denied by the municipal authorities on the plea that +its use for such a purpose might provoke a mob. The city was, however, +dealing now not with the despised Abolitionists, but with men of +property and standing in the community and was soon brought to its +senses by the indignant eloquence of Dr. Channing, appealing to the +better self of Boston in this strain: "Has it come to this? Has Boston +fallen so low? May not its citizens be trusted to come together to +express the great principles of liberty for which their forefathers +died? Are our fellow-citizens to be murdered in the act of defending +their property and of assuming the right of free discussion? And is it +unsafe in this metropolis to express abhorrence of the deed?" + +A second application for the hall was granted, and a meeting, which is +an historical event in the annals of the old town, was held December 8, +1837--a meeting memorable as an uprising, not of the Abolitionists, but +of the conservatism and respectability of the city in behalf of the +outraged liberties of white men. Ever memorable, too, for that marvelous +speech of Wendell Phillips, which placed him instantly in the front rank +of minds with a genius for eloquence, lifted him at once as an +anti-slavery instrument and leader close beside William Lloyd Garrison. +The wild-cat-like spirit which had hunted Thompson out of the country +and Lovejoy to death, had more than made good the immense deficit of +services thus created through the introduction upon the national stage +of the reform of this consummate and incomparable orator. + +The assassination of Lovejoy was an imposing object lesson to the North, +but it was not the last. Other and terrible illustrations of the triumph +of mobs followed it, notably the burning of Pennsylvania Hall in +Philadelphia on the evening of May 17, 1838. As the murder of Lovejoy +formed the culmination of outrages directed against the rights of +person, the burning of Pennsylvania Hall furnished the climax of +outrages committed against the rights of property. The friends of the +slave and of free discussion in Philadelphia feeling the need of a place +where they might assemble for the exercise of the right of free speech +in a city which denied to them the use of its halls and meeting-houses, +determined to erect for themselves such a place. At a cost of forty +thousand dollars they built Pennsylvania Hall and devoted it to "Free +Discussion, Virtue, Liberty, and Independence." + +Two days after the dedicatory exercises were had the hall was occupied +by the annual convention of American Anti-Slavery Women. On the evening +of May 16th, Garrison, Maria Weston Chapman, Angelina Grimké Weld and +others addressed the convention in the new temple of freedom. The scenes +of that evening have been graphically described by the first speaker as +follows: "The floor of the hall was densely crowded with women, some of +the noblest specimens of our race, a large proportion of whom were +Quakers. The side aisles and spacious galleries were as thickly filled +with men. Nearly three thousand people were in the hall. There seemed to +be no visible symptoms of a riot. When I rose to speak I was greeted +with applause by the immense assembly, and also several times in the +course of my remarks. As soon, however, as I had concluded my address, a +furious mob broke into the hall, yelling and shouting as if the very +fiends of the pit had suddenly broken loose. The audience rose in some +confusion, and would undoubtedly have been broken up, had it not been +for the admirable self-possession of some individuals, particularly the +women. The mobocrats finding that they could not succeed in their +purpose, retreated into the streets, and, surrounding the building, +began to dash in the windows with stones and brick-bats. It was under +these appalling circumstances that Mrs. Chapman rose for the first time +in her life, to address a promiscuous assembly of men and women--and she +acquitted herself nobly. She spoke about ten minutes, and was succeeded +by A.E.G. Weld, who occupied nearly an hour. As the tumult from without +increased, and the brick-bats fell thick and fast (no one, however, +being injured) her eloquence kindled, her eye flashed, and her cheeks +glowed, as she devoutly thanked the Lord that the stupid repose of that +city had at length been disturbed by the force of truth. When she sat +down, Esther Moore (a Friend) made a few remarks, then Lucretia Mott, +and finally Abby Kelley, a noble young woman from Lynn. + +"The meeting broke up about 10 o'clock, and we all got safely home. The +next day the street was thronged with profane ruffians and curious +spectators--the women, however, holding their meetings in the hall all +day, till towards evening. It was given out by the mob that the hall +would be burnt to the ground that night. We were to have a meeting in +the evening, but it was impossible to execute our purpose. The mayor +induced the manager to give the keys of the building into his hands. He +then locked the doors, and made a brief speech to the mob, assuring them +that he had the keys, and that there would be no meeting, and requesting +them to retire. He then went home, but the mob were bent on the +destruction of the hall. They had now increased to several thousands, +and soon got into the hall by dashing open the doors with their axes. +They then set fire to this huge building, and in the course of an hour +it was a solid mass of flame. The bells of the city were rung, and +several engines rallied; but no water was permitted to be thrown upon +the building. The light of the fire must have been seen a great +distance." + +At midnight Garrison was spirited out of the city, and conveyed in a +covered carriage by a friend to Bristol, about twenty miles, where in +the morning he took the steamboat for Boston. The light of that fire was +visible a great distance in more senses than one. The burning of +Pennsylvania Hall proved a public enlightener. After that occurrence the +gentlemen of property scattered through the free States devoted +themselves less to the violent suppression of Abolitionism and more to +the forcible suppression, upon occasion, of the alarming manifestations +of popular lawlessness, which found significant demonstration just a +week later in the city of Boston. + +Mr. Garrison has preserved for us an instructive account of this affair, +too, and here is the story as told by him to his brother-in-law, George +W. Benson, in a letter dated May 25th: "The spirit of mobocracy, like +the pestilence, is contagious; and Boston is once more ready to reënact +the riotous scenes of 1835. The Marlboro' Chapel, having just been +completed, and standing in relation to our cause just as did +Pennsylvania Hall, is an object of pro-slavery malevolence. Ever since +my return, threats have been given out that the chapel should share the +fate of the hall. Last evening was the time for its dedication; and, so +threatening was the aspect of things, four companies of light infantry +were ordered to be in readiness, each being provided with 100 _ball_ +cartridges, to rush to the scene of riot on the tolling of the bells. +The Lancers, a powerful body of horsemen, were also in readiness. During +the day placards were posted at the corners of the streets, denouncing +the Abolitionists, and calling upon the citizens to rally at the chapel +in the evening, in order to put them down. An immense concourse of +people assembled, a large proportion doubtless from motives of +curiosity, and not a few of them with evil designs; but owing to the +strong military preparations, the multitude refrained entirely from any +overt acts of violence. They did not disperse till after 10 o'clock, and +during the evening shouted and yelled like a troop of wild savages. Some +ten or twelve were seized and carried to the watch-house, and this +morning fined for their disorderly conduct." + +The frightful excesses of the Walpurgis period of the agitation reacted +through the free States to an extraordinary extent in favor of +Abolition. The greater the horror committed by the wild-cat-like spirit, +the greater the help which the reform derived therefrom. The destruction +of property, and the destruction of life instead of putting down the +hated Abolitionists aroused in the public mind apprehensions and +antagonisms in respect of mobs, which proved, immediately and +ultimately, of immense advantage to freedom. This revulsion on the part +of the North from lawless attempts to abolish Abolitionism, affected +almost unavoidably, and in the beginning of it almost unconsciously, the +friendly dispositions of that section toward slavery, the root and +mainspring of these attempts. Blows aimed at the agent were sure, +regardless of the actor's intention, to glance and strike the principal. +In spite of mobs then, and to a remarkable degree because of mobs, +Abolitionism had become a powerful motor in revolutionizing public +opinion in the free States on the subject of slavery. + + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + + + +BROTHERLY LOVE FAILS, AND IDEAS ABOUND. + + +During those strenuous, unresting years, included between 1829 and 1836, +Garrison had leaned on his health as upon a strong staff. It sustained +him without a break through that period, great as was the strain to +which it was subjected. But early in the latter year the prop gave way, +and the pioneer was prostrated by a severe fit of sickness. It lasted +off and on for quite two years. His activity the first year was +seriously crippled, though at no time, owing to his indomitable will, +could he be said to have been rendered completely _hors de combat_. +Almost the whole of 1836 he spent with his wife's family in Brooklyn, +where his first child was born. This new mouth brought with it fresh +cares of a domestic character. He experienced losses also. Death removed +his aged father-in-law in the last month of 1836, and four weeks later +Henry E. Benson, his brother-in-law. Their taking off was a sad blow to +the reformer and to the reform. That of the younger man cast a gloom +over anti-slavery circles in New England; for at the time of his death +he was the secretary and general agent of the Massachusetts Society, and +although not twenty-three, had displayed uncommon capacity for affairs. +The business ability which he brought into his office was of the +greatest value where there was such a distinct deficiency in that +respect among his coadjutors, and the loss of it seemed irreparable. + +Afflicted as he was, the leader was nevertheless cheered by the +extraordinary progress of the movement started by him. The growth and +activity of Abolitionism were indeed altogether phenomenal. In February, +1837, Ellis Gray Loring estimated that there were then eight hundred +anti-slavery societies in the United States, that an anti-slavery +society had been formed in the North every day for the last two years, +and that in the single State of Ohio there were three hundred societies, +one of which had a membership of four thousand names. The moral +agitation was at its height. The National Society had hit upon a capital +device for increasing the effectiveness of its agents and lecturers. +This was to bring them together in New York for a few weeks' study of +the slavery question under the direction of such masters as Theodore D. +Weld, Beriah Green, Charles Stuart, and others. All possible phases of +the great subject, such as, What is slavery? What is immediate +emancipation? The consequences of emancipation to the South, etc., etc., +pro-slavery objections and arguments were stated and answered. The +agents and lecturers went forth from the convention bristling with +facts, and glowing with enthusiasm to renew the crusade against slavery. +Garrison, broken in health as he was, went on from Boston to attend this +school of his disciples. He spoke briefly but repeatedly to them upon +the all-absorbing topic which had brought them together. "It was a happy +circumstance, too," he wrote, "that I was present with them, and that +they had an opportunity to become _personally_ acquainted with me; for, +as I am a great stumbling-block in the way of the people, or, rather, of +some people, it would be somewhat disastrous to our cause if any of our +agents, through the influence of popular sentiment, should be led to +cherish prejudices against me." + +In February, 1837, the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society came to the +rescue of the _Liberator_ from its financial embarrassments and +hand-to-mouth existence by assuming the responsibility of its +publication. The arrangement did not in any respect compromise Mr. +Garrison's editorial independence, but lifted from him and his friend +Knapp in his own language, "a heavy burden, which has long crushed us to +the earth." The arrangement, nevertheless, continued but a year when it +was voluntarily set aside by Mr. Garrison for causes of which we must +now give an account. + +In the letter from which we have quoted above, touching his visit to the +Convention of Anti-Slavery Agents, Garrison alludes to one of these +causes. He says: "I was most kindly received by all, and treated as a +brother, notwithstanding the wide difference of opinion between us on +some religious points, _especially the Sabbath question_." The italics +are our own. Until within a few years he had been one of the strictest +of Sabbath observers. Although never formally connected with any church, +he had been a narrow and even an intolerant believer in the creed and +observances of New England orthodoxy. Words failed him in 1828 to +express his abhorrence of a meeting of professed infidels: "It is +impossible," he exclaimed with the ardor of a bigot, "to estimate the +depravity and wickedness of those who, at the present day, reject the +Gospel of Jesus Christ," etc. A year and a half later while editing the +_Genius_ in Baltimore, he held uncompromisingly to the stern Sabbatical +notions of the Puritans. A fête given to Lafayette in France on Sunday +seemed to him an act of sheer religious desecration. The carrying of +passengers and the mails on the Sabbath provoked his energetic +reprobation. He was in all points of New England Puritanism, orthodox of +the orthodox. + +Subsequently he began to see things in a different light. As the area of +his experience extended it came to him that living was more than +believing, that it was not every one who professed faith in Jesus had +love for him in the heart; and that there were many whom his own +illiberalism had rated as depraved and wicked on mere points of +doctrine, who, nevertheless, shamed by the blamelessness and nobility of +their conduct multitudes of ardent Christians of the lip-service sort. +Indeed this contradiction between creed and conduct struck him with +considerable force in the midst of his harsh judgments against unbelief +and unbelievers. "There are, in fact," he had remarked a year or two +after he had attained his majority, "few _reasoning_ Christians; the +majority of them are swayed more by the usages of the world than by any +definite perception of what constitutes duty--so far, we mean, as +relates to the subjugation of vices which are incorporated, as it were, +into the existence of society; else why is it that intemperance, and +slavery, and war, have not ere this in a measure been driven from our +land?" + +As the months of his earnest young life passed him by, they showed him +as they went how horrible a thing was faith without works. "By their +fruits ye shall know them," the Master had said, and more and more as he +saw how many and great were the social evils to be reformed, and in what +dire need stood his country of righteous action, did he come to put +increasing emphasis on conduct, as the one thing needful to rid the land +of the triple curse of slavery, intemperance, and war. As he mused upon +these giant evils, and the desolation which they were singly and +together causing in the world, and upon the universal apathy of the +churches in respect of them, it seemed to him that the current religion +was an offence and an abomination. And in his prophetic rage he +denounced it as "a religion which quadrates with the natural depravity +of the heart, giving license to sin, restraining no lust, mortifying not +the body, engendering selfishness, and cruelty!--a religion which walks +in silver slippers, on a carpeted floor, having thrown off the burden of +the cross and changed the garments of humiliation for the splendid +vestments of pride! a religion which has no courage, no faithfulness, no +self-denial, deeming it better to give heed unto men than unto God!" +This was in the autumn of 1829, but though he was thus violently +denunciatory of contemporary religion, the severity of his judgment +against the skepticism of the times had not been materially modified. He +still regarded the unbeliever with narrow distrust and dislike. When, +after his discharge from Baltimore jail, he was engaged in delivering +his message on the subject of slavery, and was seeking an opportunity to +make what he knew known to the people of Boston, he was forced, after +vainly advertising for a hall or meeting-house in which to give his +three lectures, to accept the offer of Abner Kneeland's Society of +Infidels of the use of their hall for that purpose. The spirit of these +people, branded by the community as blasphemers, and by himself, too, in +all probability, Garrison saw to be as admirable as the spirit displayed +by the churches of the city toward him and his cause was unworthy and +sinful. But, grateful as he was for the hospitality of the infidels, he, +nevertheless, rather bluntly informed them that he had no sympathy with +their religious notions, and that he looked for the abolition of slavery +to evangelicism, and to it alone. + +A few years in the university of experience, where he learned that +conduct is better than creeds, and living more than believing, served to +emancipate him from illiberal prejudices and narrow sectarianism. He +came to see, "that in Christ Jesus all stated observances are so many +self-imposed and unnecessary yokes; and that prayer and worship are all +embodied in that pure, meek, child-like state of heart which +affectionately and reverently breathes but one petition--'Thy will be +done on earth as it is in heaven.' Religion ... is nothing but +love--perfect love toward God and toward man--without formality, without +hypocrisy, without partiality--depending upon no outward form to +preserve its vitality or prove its existence." + +This important change in Mr. Garrison's religious convictions became +widely known in the summer of 1836 through certain editorial strictures +of his upon a speech of Dr. Lyman Beecher, at Pittsburgh, on the subject +of the Sabbath. The good doctor was cold enough on the question of +slavery, which involved not only the desecration of the Sabbath, but of +the souls and bodies of millions of human beings. If Christianity was +truly of divine origin, and Garrison devoutly believed that it was, it +would approve its divinity by its manner of dealing with the vices and +evils which were dragging and chaining the feet of men to the gates of +hell. If it parleyed with iniquity, if it passed its victims by on the +other side, if it did not war incessantly and energetically to put down +sin, to destroy wickedness, it was of the earth, earthy, and its +expounders were dumb dogs where they should bark the loudest and bite +the hardest; and Dr. Beecher appeared to him one of these dumb dogs, +who, when he opened his mouth at all, was almost sure to open it at the +men who were trying through evil report and good to express in their +lives the spirit of Him who so loved the world that He gave His Son to +die to redeem it. He bayed loud enough at the Abolitionists but not at +the abomination which they were attacking. He was content to leave it to +the tender mercies of two hundred years. No such liberal disposition of +the question of the Sabbath was he willing to allow. He waxed eloquent +in its behalf. His enthusiasm took to itself wings and made a great +display of ecclesiastical zeal beautiful to behold. "The Sabbath," quoth +the teacher who endeavored to muzzle the students of Lane Seminary on +the subject of slavery, whose ultimate extinction his prophetic soul +quiescently committed to the operation of two centuries; "the Sabbath," +quoth he, "is the _great sun of the moral world_." Out upon you, said +Garrison, the LORD GOD is the _great sun of the moral world_, not the +Sabbath. It is not one, but every day of the week which is His, and +which men should be taught to observe as holy days. It is not regard for +the forms of religion but for the spirit, which is essential to +righteousness. What is the command, 'Remember the Sabbath day to keep it +holy,' but one of ten commandments? Is the violation of the fourth any +worse than the violation of the third or fifth, or sixth? Nowhere is it +so taught in the Bible. Yet, what is slavery but a breaking and treading +down of the whole ten, what but a vast system of adultery, robbery, and +murder, the daily and yearly infraction on an appalling scale not alone +of the spirit but of the letter of the decalogue? + +Mr. Garrison then passed to criticisms of a more special character +touching the observance of the day thus: "These remarks are made not to +encourage men to do wrong at any time, but to controvert a pernicious +and superstitious notion, and one that is very prevalent, that +extraordinary and supernatural visitations of divine indignation upon +certain transgressors (of the Sabbath particularly and almost +exclusively) are poured out now as in the days of Moses and the +prophets. Whatever claim the Sabbath may have to a strict religious +observance, we are confident it cannot be strengthened, but must +necessarily be weakened, by all such attempts to enforce or prove its +sanctity." This pious but rational handling of the Sabbath question gave +instant offence to the orthodox readers of the _Liberator_. For it was +enough in those days to convict the editor of rank heresy. From one and +another of his subscribers remonstrances came pouring in upon him. A +young theological student at Yale ordered his paper stopped in +consequence of the anti-Sabbatarian views of the editor. A Unitarian +minister at Harvard, Mass., was greatly cut up by reason thereof, and +suddenly saw what before he did not suspect. "I had supposed you," he +wrote in his new estate, "a very pious person, and that a large +proportion of the Abolitionists were religious persons.... I have +thought of you as another Wilberforce--but would Wilberforce have spoken +thus of the day on which the Son of God rose from the dead?" Garrison's +query in reply--"Would Wilberforce have denied the identity of Christ +with the Father?"--was a palpable hit. But as he himself justly +remarked, "Such questions are not arguments, but fallacies unworthy of a +liberal mind." Nevertheless, so long as men are attached to the leading +strings of sentiment rather than to those of reason, such questions will +possess tremendous destructive force, as Mr. Garrison, in his own case, +presently perceived. He understood the importance of not arousing +against him "denominational feelings or peculiarities," and so had +steered the _Liberator_ clear of the rocks of sectarianism. But when he +took up in its columns the Sabbath question he ran his paper directly +among the breakers of a religious controversy. He saw how it was with +him at once, saw that he had stirred up against him all that religious +feeling which was crystallized around the first day of the week, and +that he could not hope to escape without serious losses in one way or +another. "It is pretty certain," he writes Samuel J. May in September, +1836, "that the _Liberator_ will sustain a serious loss in its +subscriptions at the close of the present volume; and all appeals for +aid in its behalf will be less likely to prevail than formerly. I am +conscious that a mighty sectarian conspiracy is forming to crush me, and +it will probably succeed to some extent." + +This controversy over the Sabbath proved the thin edge of differences +and dissensions, which, as they went deeper and deeper, were finally to +rend asunder the erstwhile united Abolition movement. The period was +remarkable for the variety and force of new ideas, which were coming +into being, or passing into general circulation. And to all of them it +seems that Garrison was peculiarly receptive. He took them all in and +planted them in soil of extraordinary fertility. It was immediately +observed that it was not only one unpopular notion which he had adopted, +but a whole headful of them. And every one of these new ideas was a sort +of rebel-reformer, a genuine man of war. They had come as a protest +against the then existing beliefs and order of things, come as their +enemies and destroyers. Each one of them was in a sense a stirrer-up of +sedition against old and regnant relations and facts, political, moral, +and religious. Whoever espoused them as his own, espoused as his own +also the antagonisms, political, moral, and religious which they would +excite in the public mind. All of which was directly illustrated in the +experience of the editor of the _Liberator_. Each of these new notions +presently appeared in the paper along with Abolitionism. What was his +intention timid people began to inquire? Did he design to carry them +along with the Abolition movement? Suspicious minds fancied they saw "in +Mr. Garrison, a decided wish, nay, a firm resolve, in laboring to +overthrow slavery, to overthrow the Christian Sabbath and the Christian +ministry. His doctrine is that every day is a Sabbath, and every man his +own minister. There are no Christian ordinances, there is no visible +church." His no-government and non-resistant ideas excited yet further +the apprehensions of some of his associates for the safety of that +portion of the present order to which they clung. As developed by +Garrison they seemed to deny the right of the people "to frame a +government of laws to protect themselves against those who would injure +them, and that man can apply physical force to man rightfully under no +circumstances, and not even the parent can apply the rod to the child, +and not be, in the sight of God, a trespasser and a tyrant." + +Garrison embraced besides Perfectionism, a sort of political, moral, and +religious Come-outerism, and faith in "universal emancipation from sin." +His description of himself about this time as "an Ishmaelitish editor" +is not bad, nor his quotation of "Woe is me my mother! for I was born a +man of strife" as applicable to the growing belligerency of his +relations with the anti-slavery brethren in consequence of the new ideas +and isms, which were taking possession of his mind and occupying the +columns of the _Liberator_. + +Among the strife-producers during this period of the anti-slavery +agitation, the woman's question played a principal part. Upon this as +upon the Sabbath question, Garrison's early position was one of extreme +conservatism. As late as 1830, he shared the common opinions in regard +to woman's sphere, and was strongly opposed to her stepping outside of +it into that occupied by man. A petition of seven hundred women of +Pittsburgh, Pa., to Congress in behalf of the Indians gave his masculine +prejudices a great shock. "This is, in our opinion," he declared, "an +uncalled for interference, though made with holiest intentions. We +should be sorry to have this practice become general. There would then +be no question agitated in Congress without eliciting the informal and +contrariant opinions of the softer sex." This top-lofty sentiment +accorded well with the customary assumption and swagger of one of the +lords of creation. For the young reformer was evidently a firm believer +in the divine right of his sex to rule in the world of politics. But as +he grew taller and broader the horizon of woman widened, and her sphere +embraced every duty, responsibility, and right for which her gifts and +education fitted her. The hard and fast lines of sex disappeared from +his geography of the soul. He perceived for a truth that in humanity +there was neither male nor female, but that man and woman were one in +work and destiny--equals in bearing the world's burden, equals in +building the world's glory. He heard in his heart the injunction of the +eternal wisdom saying: "Whom God hath joined together let no man put +asunder;" and straightway disposed his opinions and prejudices, his +thoughts and purposes in cordial obedience therewith. He saw at once the +immense value of woman's influence in the temperance movement, he saw no +less quickly her importance in the anti-slavery reform, and he had +appealed to her for help in the work of both, and she had justified his +appeal and proven herself the most devoted of coadjutors. + +In the beginning of the movement against slavery the line of demarcation +between the sexes was strictly observed in the formation of societies. +The men had theirs, the women theirs. Each, sexually considered, were +very exclusive affairs. It did not seem to have occurred to the founders +of the New England Anti-Slavery Society, or of the national organization +to admit women to membership in them, nor did it seem to enter the mind +of any woman to prefer a request to be admitted into them. Anti-slavery +women organized themselves into female anti-slavery societies, did their +work apart from the men, who plainly regarded themselves as the +principals in the contest, and women as their moral seconds. The first +shock, which this arrangement, so accordant with the oak-and-ivy notion +of the masculine half of mankind, received, came when representatives of +the gentler sex dropped the secondary role assigned women in the +conflict, and began to enact that of a star. The advent of the sisters +Grimké upon the anti-slavery stage as public speakers, marked the advent +of the idea of women's rights, of their equality with men in the +struggle with slavery. + +At the start these ladies delivered their message to women only, but +by-and-bye as the fame of their eloquence spread men began to appear +among their auditories. Soon they were thrilling packed halls and +meeting-houses in different parts of the country, comprised of men and +women. The lesson which their triumph enforced of women's fitness to +enact the rôle of principals in the conflict with slavery was not lost +upon the sex. Women went, saw, and conquered their prejudices against +the idea of equality; likewise, many men. The good seed of universal +liberty and equality fell into fruitful soil and germinated in due time +within the heart of the moral movement against slavery. + +The more that Sarah and Angelina Grimké reflected upon the sorry +position to which men had assigned women in Church and State the more +keenly did they feel its injustice and degradation. They beat with their +revolutionary idea of equality against the iron bars of the cage-like +sphere in which they were born, and within which they were doomed to +live and die by the law of masculine might. At heart they were rebels +against the foundation principle of masculine supremacy on which society +and government rested. While pleading for the freedom of the slaves, the +sense of their own bondage and that of their sisters rose up before them +and revealed itself in bitter questionings. "Are we aliens," asked +Angelina, "because we are women? Are we bereft of citizenship because we +are the _mothers, wives, and daughters_ of a mighty people? Have _women_ +no country--no interests staked on the public weal--no partnership in a +nation's guilt or shame?" This discontent with the existing social +establishment in its relation to women received sympathetic responses +from many friends to whom the sisters communicated the contagion of +their unrest and dissatisfaction. Angelina records that, "At friend +Chapman's, where we spent a social evening, I had a long talk with the +brethren on the rights of women, and found a very general sentiment +prevailing that it is time our fetters were broken. L.M. Child and Maria +Chapman strongly supported this view; indeed very many seem to think a +new order of things is very desirable in this respect." + +This prevalence of a sentiment favorable to women's rights, which +Angelina observed in Mrs. Chapman's parlors possessed no general +significence. For true to the character of new ideas, this particular +new idea did not bring peace but a sword. It set Abolition brethren +against Abolition brethren, and blew into a flame the differences of +leaders among themselves. But the first irruption of strife which it +caused proceeded from without, came from the church or rather from the +clergy of the Orthodox Congregational churches of Massachusetts. This +clerical opposition to the idea of women's rights found expression in +the celebrated "Pastoral Letter," issued by the General Association of +Ministers of that denomination to the churches of the same in the summer +of 1837. This ecclesiastical bull had two distinct purposes to +accomplish; first, to discourage the agitation of the slavery question +by excluding anti-slavery agents from lecturing upon that subject in the +churches; and, second, to suppress the agitation of the woman's question +by setting the seal of the disapproval of the clergy to the appearance +of women in their new and revolutionary rôle of public speakers and +teachers on the burning subjects of the times. The reverend authors +threw up their hands and eyes in holy horror at the "widespread and +permanent injury" which seemed to them to threaten "the female +character." They scorned the new-fangled notion of woman's independence, +and asked for nothing better than the Pauline definition of her +"appropriate duties and influence." "The power of women," quoth they, +"is in her dependence.... When she assumes the place and tone of man as +a public reformer, our care and protection of her seem unnecessary; we +put ourselves in self-defence against her, she yields the power which +God has given her for protection, and her character becomes unnatural!" + +These Congregational ministers were not the only representatives of the +lordly sex to whom the idea of women's equality was repellent. +Anti-slavery brethren, too, were flinging themselves into all postures +of self-defence against the dangerous innovation, which the sisters +Grimké were letting into the social establishment, by itinerating "in +the character of public lecturers and teachers." Amos A. Phelps was +quite as strongly opposed to women preachers, to women assuming the +"place and tone of man as a public reformer," as Nehemiah Adams himself. +He remonstrated, with them against their continued assumption of the +character of public lecturers and teachers, but to no purpose. Sarah and +Angelina were uncompromising, refused to yield one iota of their rights +as "moral and responsible beings." They firmly declined to make their +Quakerism and not their womenhood their warrant for "exercising the +rights and performing the duties" of rational and responsible beings, +for the sake of quieting tender consciences, like that of Phelps, among +the anti-slavery brethren. They were in earnest and demanded to know +"whether there is such a thing as male and female virtues, male and +female duties." Angelina writes: "My opinion is that there is no +difference, and that this false idea has run the ploughshare of ruin +over the whole field of morality. My idea is that whatever is morally +right for a man to do is morally right for a woman to do. I recognize no +rights but human rights.... I am persuaded that woman is not to be, as +she has been, a mere second-hand agent in the regeneration of a fallen +world, but the acknowledged equal and co-worker with man in this +glorious work." + +The debate on the subject threatened for a short season to push the +woman's question to the level of the slavery question. The contention +became acrimonious, and the alienation of friendships was widespread. +John G. Whittier and Theodore D. Weld, who were both avowed believers in +the idea of women's rights, nevertheless, felt that the agitation of the +subject, under the circumstances, was a grave blunder. "No moral +enterprise, when prosecuted with ability and any sort of energy, _ever_ +failed under heaven," wrote Weld to Sarah and Angelina, "so long as its +conductors pushed the _main_ principle, and did not strike off until +they reached the summit level. On the other hand, every reform that ever +foundered in mid-sea, was capsized by one of these gusty side-winds." +Both Weld and Whittier endeavored to dissuade the sisters from mooting +the question of women's rights at all, and to urge them to devote their +voice and pen to the "_main_ principle" exclusively. But Angelina +confesses that "our judgment is not convinced, and we hardly know what +to do about it, for we have just as high an opinion of Brother +Garrison's views, and _he_ says '_go on_.'" The influence of Weld and +Whittier finally prevailed with "Carolina's high-souled daughters," and +they refrained from further agitation of the subject of Women's rights +lest they should thereby injure the cause of the slave. + +But the leaven of equality was not so effectually disposed of. It had +secured permanent lodgment in the anti-slavery body, and the +fermentation started by it, went briskly on. Such progress did the +principle of women's rights make among the Eastern Abolitionists, +especially among those of Massachusetts, that in the spring of 1838 the +New England Anti-Slavery Society voted to admit women to equal +membership with men. This radical action was followed by a clerical +secession from the society, which made a stir at the time. For among the +seceding members was no less a personage than Amos A. Phelps, who was +the general agent of the Massachusetts Society, and therefore one of +Garrison's stanchest supporters. The reform instituted by the New +England Society, in respect of the character of its membership, was +quickly adopted by the Massachusetts Society and by several local +organizations, all of which set the ball of discord spinning among the +brethren at a great rate. But by this time all the new ideas, +Sabbatical, no-government, perfectionist, non-resistance, as well as +women's rights, were within the anti-slavery arena, and fencing and +fighting for a chance to live, with the old ideas and the old order. + +Garrison championed all of the new ideas, and in doing so arrayed +against himself all of the special champions of the existing +establishments. In his reduced physical state, the reformer was not +equal to the tremendous concussions of this "era of activity," as +Emerson named it. At moments he appeared bewildered amid the loud, +fierce clamor of contending ideas, each asserting in turn its moral +primacy. For an instant the vision of the great soul grew dim, the great +heart seemed to have lost its bearings. All of the new ideas thawed and +melted into each other, dissolved into one vague and grand solidarity of +reforms. The voice of the whole was urging him amid the gathering moral +confusion to declare himself for all truth, and he hearkened irresolute, +with divided mind. "I feel somewhat at a loss to know what to do"--he +confesses at this juncture to George W. Benson, "whether to go into all +the principles of holy reform and make the Abolition cause subordinate, +or whether still to persevere in the _one_ beaten track as hitherto. +Circumstances hereafter must determine this matter." That was written in +August, 1837; a couple of months later circumstances had not determined +the matter, it would seem, from the following extract from a letter to +his brother-in-law: "It is not my intention at present to alter either +the general character or course of the _Liberator_. My work in the +anti-slavery cause is not wholly done; as soon as it is, I shall know +it, and shall be prepared, I trust, to enter upon a mightier work of +reform." + +Meanwhile the relations between the editor of the _Liberator_ and the +managers of the national organization were becoming decidedly strained. +For it seemed to them that Garrison had changed the anti-slavery +character of his paper by the course which he had taken in regard to the +new ideas which were finding their way into its columns to the manifest +harm of the main principle of immediate emancipation. This incipient +estrangement between the pioneer and the executive committee of the +national society was greatly aggravated by an occurrence, which, at the +time, was elevated to an importance that it did not deserve. This +occurrence was what is known in anti-slavery annals as the "Clerical +Appeal." Five clergymen, who were obviously unfriendly to Garrison, and +distrustful of the religious and social heresies which they either saw +or fancied that they saw in the _Liberator_, and withal jealous lest the +severities of the paper against particular pro-slavery ministers should +diminish the influence and sacred character of their order, published, +in August of 1837, in the _New England Spectator_ an acrid arraignment +of editor and paper, upon five several charges, designed to bring +Garrisonism to the block and speedy death. This document was followed by +two other appeals by way of supplement and rejoinder from the same +source, an "Andover Appeal" from kindred spirits and a bitter, personal +letter from one of the "seventy agents," all of them having a common +motive and purpose, viz., sectarian distrust and dislike of Garrison, +and desire to reduce his anti-slavery influence to a nullity. + +In his diseased and suffering bodily condition, Garrison naturally +enough fell into the error of exaggerating the gravity of these attacks +upon himself. Insignificant in an historical sense, they really were an +episode, an unpleasant one to be sure for the time being, but no more. +To Garrison, however, they appeared in a wholly different light. It +seemed a rebellion on a pretty grand scale, which called for all his +strength, all the batteries of the friends of freedom, all his terrible +and unsparing severities of speech to quell it. All his artillery he +posted promptly in positions commanding the camp of the mutineers, and +began to pour, as only he could, broadside after broadside into the +works of the wretched little camp of rebels. He could hardly have +expended more energy and ammunition in attacking a strategical point of +Southern slavery, than was expended in punishing a handful of deserters +and insurgents. But, alas! he was not satisfied to draw upon his own +resources for crushing the clerical sedition, he demanded reinforcements +from the central authorities in New York as well. And then began a +contention between him and the Executive Committee of the National +Society, which issued only in ill. + +Garrison considered it the duty of the Executive Committee to disapprove +officially of the action of the Massachusetts recalcitrants, and also +the duty of its organ, the _Emancipator_, to rebuke the authors of the +"appeals." Not so, replied Lewis Tappan and Elizur Wright, your request +is unreasonable. If you choose to make a mountain out of a molehill, you +choose to make a mistake which the Executive Committee will not repeat. +Your troubles are wholly local, of no general importance whatever. +"What! Shall a whole army stop its aggressive movements into the +territories of its enemies to charge bayonets on five soldiers, +subalterns, company, or even staff officers, because they stray into a +field to pick berries, throw stones or write an 'appeal?' To be frank +with you we shall make bold to say that we do not approve of the appeal, +it is very censurable, its spirit is bad, but neither do we approve of +your action in the premises, it is also very censurable and its spirit +is bad. What then? shall the Executive Committee condemn the authors of +the appeal and not condemn the editor of the _Liberator_ also? If strict +military justice were done should not both parties be cashiered? Let the +Sabbath and the theoretic theology of the priesthood alone for the +present." "I could have wished, yes, I have wished from the bottom of my +soul," it is Wright who now holds the pen, "that you could conduct that +dear paper, the _Liberator_, in the singleness of purpose of its first +years, without traveling off from the ground of our true, noble, +heart-stirring Declaration of Sentiments--without breathing sentiments +which are novel and shocking to the community, and which seem to me to +have no logical sequence from the principles on which we are associated +as Abolitionists. I cannot but regard the taking hold of one great moral +enterprise while another is in hand and but half achieved, as an outrage +upon commonsense, somewhat like that of the dog crossing the river with +his meat. But you have seen fit to introduce to the public some novel +views--I refer especially to your sentiments on government and religious +perfection--and they have produced the effect which was to have been +expected. And now considering what stuff human nature is made of, is it +to be wondered at that some honest-hearted, thorough-going Abolitionists +should have lost their equanimity? As you well know I am comparatively +no bigot to any creed, political or theological, yet to tell the plain +truth, I look upon your notions of government and religious perfection +as downright fanaticism--as harmless as they are absurd. I would not +care a pin's head if they were preached to all Christendom; for it is +not in the human mind (except in a peculiar and, as I think, diseased +state) to believe them." + +Barring the extreme plainness of speech with which Wright and Tappan +gave their advice to Mr. Garrison, it was in the main singularly sound +and wise. But the pioneer did not so regard it. He was possessed with +his idea of the importance of chastising the clerical critics, and of +the duty of the Executive Committee and of the _Emancipator_ to back him +in the undertaking. His temper was, under all circumstances, masterful +and peremptory. It was never more masterful and peremptory than in its +management of this business. The very reasonable course of the Board at +New York suggested to his mind a predominance of "sectarianism at +headquarters," seemed to him "criminal and extraordinary." As the +Executive Committee and its organ would not rebuke the schismatics, he +was moved to rebuke the Executive Committee and its organ for their +"blind and temporizing policy." And so matters within the movement +against slavery went, with increasing momentum, from bad to worse. + +The break in the anti-slavery ranks widened as new causes of controversy +arose between the management in Boston and the management at New York. +The Massachusetts Abolitionists had stood stanchly by Garrison against +the clerical schismatics. They also inclined to his side in his trouble +with the national board. Instead of one common center of activity and +leadership the anti-slavery reform began now to develop two centers of +activity and leadership. Garrison and the _Liberator_ formed the moral +nucleus at one end, the Executive Committee and the _Emancipator_ the +moral nucleus at the other. Much of the energies of the two sides were +in those circumstances, absorbed in stimulating and completing the +processes which were to ultimate in the organic division of the body of +the movement against slavery. When men once begin to quarrel they will +not stop for lack of subjects to dispute over. There will be no lack, +for before one disputed point is settled another has arisen. It is the +old story of the box of evils. Beginnings must be avoided, else if one +evil escapes, others will follow. The anti-slavery Pandora had let out +one little imp of discord and many big and little imps were +incontinently following. + +Against all of the new ideas except one, viz., the idea of anti-slavery +political action, the New York leadership, speaking broadly, had opposed +itself. But as if by some strange perversity of fate, this particular +new idea was the only one of the new ideas to which the Boston +leadership did not take kindly. It became in time as the very apple of +the eye to the management of the National Society. And the more ardently +it was cherished by them, the more hateful did it become with the Boston +Board. It was the only one of the new ideas which had any logical +sequence from the Abolition cause. In a country where the principle of +popular suffrage obtains, all successful moral movements must sometime +ultimate in political action. There is no other way of fixing in laws +the changes in public sentiment wrought during this period of agitation. +The idea of political action was therefore a perfectly natural growth +from the moral movement against slavery. The only reasonable objection +to it would be one which went to show that it had arrived out of due +course, that its appearance at any given time was marked by prematurity +in respect of the reasons, so to speak, of the reform. For every +movement against a great social wrong as was the anti-slavery movement +must have its John-the-Baptist stage, its period of popular awakening to +the nature and enormity of sin and the duty of immediate repentance. + +The anti-slavery enterprise was at the time of the controversy between +the New York and the Boston Boards in this first stage of its growth. It +had not yet progressed naturally out of it into its next phase of +political agitation. True there were tendencies more or less strong to +enter the second stage of its development, but they seem irregular, +personal, and forced. The time had not come for the adoption of the +principle of associated political action against slavery. But the deep +underlying motive of the advocates of the third-party idea was none the +less a grand one, viz., "to have a free Northern nucleus," as Elizur +Wright put it, "a standard flung to the breeze--something around which +to rally." Garrison probed to the quick the question in a passage of an +address to the Abolitionists, which is here given: "Abolitionists! you +are now feared and respected by all political parties, not because of +the number of votes you can throw, so much as in view of the moral +integrity and sacred regard to principle which you have exhibited to the +country. It is the religious aspect of your enterprise which impresses +and overawes men of every sect and party. Hitherto you have seemed to be +actuated by no hope of preferment or love of power, and therefore have +established, even in the minds of your enemies, confidence in your +disinterestedness. If you shall now array yourselves as a political +party, and hold out mercenary rewards to induce men to rally under your +standard, there is reason to fear that you will be regarded as those who +have made the anti-slavery cause a hobby to ride into office, however +plausible or sound may be your pretexts for such a course. You cannot, +you ought not, to expect that the political action of the State will +move faster than the religious action of the Church, in favor of the +abolition of slavery; and it is a fact not less encouraging than +undeniable, that both the Whig and Democratic parties have consulted the +wishes of Abolitionists even beyond the measure of their real political +strength. More you cannot expect under any circumstances." + +Hotly around this point raged the strife among brethren. Actuated by the +noblest motives were both sides in the main, yet, both sides displayed +in the maintenance of their respective positions an amount of weak human +nature, which proves that perfection is not attainable even by the most +disinterested of men. Harsh and abusive language good men uttered +against good men. Distrust, suspicion, anger, and alienation took +possession of the thoughts of the grandest souls. Saints and heroes +beseemed themselves like very ordinary folk, who, when they come to +differences, come directly afterward to high words and thumping blows. +The love of David and Jonathan which once united Garrison and Phelps, +has died. Garrison and Stanton meet and only exchange civilities. They, +too, have become completely alienated, and so on down the long list of +the "goodliest fellowship ... whereof this land holds record." To a +sweet and gentle spirit like Samuel J. May, the acrimony and scenes of +strife among his old associates was unspeakably painful. Writing to +Garrison from South Scituate, May 1, 1839, he touches thus upon this +head: "I now think I shall not go to New York next week. In the first +place, I cannot afford the expense.... But I confess, I do not lament my +inability to go so much as I should do if the prospect of an agreeable +meeting was fairer. I am apprehensive that it will be not so much an +anti-slavery as anti-Garrison and anti-Phelps meeting, or +anti-board-of-managers and anti-executive committee meeting. Division +has done its work, I fear, effectually. The two parties seem to me to +misunderstand, and therefore sadly misrepresent one another. I am not +satisfied with the course you and your partisans have pursued. It +appears to me not consistent with the non-resistant, patient, +long-suffering spirit of the Gospel. And I do not believe that either +the cause of the slave, or the cause of peace and righteousness has been +advanced." + +The situation was further complicated by the discovery of a fresh bone +of contention. As if to give just a shade of sordidness to the strife +there must needs arise a money difficulty between the two rival boards +of leaders. This is how our recent band of brothers happened to stumble +upon their new apple of discord. Soon after the formation of the +National Society an arrangement was made with each of the State +societies whereby they agreed to operate financially their respective +territories and to turn into the national treasury the several sums +which at the annual meeting they obligated themselves to contribute to +the general work. This arrangement was intended to avoid the expense, +conflict, and confusion consequent upon the employment of two sets of +agents to work the same territory. Matters went on quite smoothly under +this plan between the Massachusetts Board and the National Board until +the beginning of the year 1839, when the former fell into arrears in the +payment of its instalments to the latter. Money from one cause or +another, was hard to get at by the Massachusetts Board, and the treasury +in New York was in an extremely low state. The relations between the two +boards were, as we have seen, much strained and neither side was in the +mood to cover with charity the shortcomings of the other. Perhaps the +board at New York was too exacting, perhaps the board at Boston was not +sufficiently zealous, under the circumstances. But what were the real +irritating causes which kept the two boards at loggerheads over the +matter need not here be determined. This fact is clear that the +arrangement was rescinded by the New York management, and their agents +thrown into Massachusetts. This action only added fuel to a fire which +was fast assuming the proportions of a conflagration. All the +anti-Garrisonians formed themselves into a new anti-slavery society, and +the National Board, as if to burn its bridges, and to make +reconciliation impossible, established a new paper in Boston in +opposition to the _Liberator_. The work of division was ended. There was +no longer any vital connection between the two warring members of the +anti-slavery reform. To tear the dead tissues asunder which still joined +them, all that was wanted was another sharp shock, and this came at the +annual meeting of the National Society in 1840 over the woman's +question. The issue, "Shall a woman serve with men on a committee?" was +precipitated upon the convention by the appointment of that brilliant +young Quakeress, Abby Kelley, on the business committee with ten men. +The convention confirmed her appointment by about a hundred majority in +a total vote of 1,008. Whereupon those opposed to this determination of +the question, withdrew from the convention and organized the American +and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society. Garrison had triumphed and he was +immensely elated with his victory. His moral leadership was definitely +established, never again to be disputed by his disciples and followers. + + + + + +CHAPTER XV. + + + +RANDOM SHOTS. + + +The division of the anti-slavery organization into two distinct +societies did not immediately terminate the war between them. From New +York and the American society the contest over the woman's question was +almost directly shifted after the triumph of the Garrisonians in the +convention, to London and the World's Convention, which was held in the +month of June of the year 1840. To this anti-slavery congress both of +the rival anti-slavery organizations in America elected delegates. These +delegates, chosen by the older society and by its auxiliaries of the +States of Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, were composed of women and +men. Lucretia Mott was not only chosen by the National Society, but by +the Pennsylvania Society as well. The Massachusetts Society selected +Lydia Maria Child, Maria Weston Chapman, and Ann Green Phillips together +with their husbands among its list of delegates. England at this time +was much more conservative on the woman's question than America. The +managers of the World's Convention did not take kindly to the notion of +women members, and signified to the American societies who had placed +women among their delegates that the company of the women was not +expected. Those societies, however, made no alteration in deference to +this notice, in the character of their delegations, but stood stoutly by +their principle of "the EQUAL BROTHERHOOD of the entire HUMAN FAMILY +without distinction of color, sex, or clime." + +A contest over the admission of women to membership in the World's +Convention was therefore a foregone conclusion. The convention, +notwithstanding a brilliant fight under the lead of Wendell Phillips in +behalf of their admission, refused to admit the women delegates. The +women delegates instead of having seats on the floor were forced in +consequence of this decision to look on from the galleries. Garrison, +who with Charles Lenox Remond, Nathaniel P. Rogers, and William Adams, +was late in arriving in England, finding, on reaching London the women +excluded from the convention and sitting as spectators in the galleries, +determined to take his place among them, deeming that the act of the +convention which discredited the credentials of Lucretia Mott and her +sister delegates, had discredited his own also. Remond, Rogers, and +Adams followed his example and took their places with the rejected women +delegates likewise. The convention was scandalized at such proceedings, +and did its best to draw Garrison and his associates from the ladies in +the galleries to the men on the floor, but without avail. There they +remained an eloquent protest against the masculine narrowness of the +convention. Defeated in New York, the delegates of the new American and +Foreign Anti-Slavery Society triumphed over their victors in London. But +their achievements in the World's Convention, in this regard, was not of +a sort to entitle them to point with any special pride in after years; +and, as a matter of fact, not one of them would have probably cared to +have their success alluded to in any sketch of their lives for the +perusal of posterity. + +Garrison and his associates were the recipients of the most cordial and +flattering attention from the English Abolitionists. He was quite +lionized, in fact, at breakfasts, fêtes, and soirées. The Duchess of +Sunderland paid him marked attention and desired his portrait, which was +done for Her Grace by the celebrated artist, Benjamin Robert Haydon, who +executed besides a large painting of the convention, in which he grouped +the most distinguished members with reference to the seats actually +occupied by them during its sessions. Of course to leave Garrison out of +such a picture would almost seem like the play of "Hamlet" with _Hamlet_ +omitted, a blunder which the artist was by no means disposed to make. +Garrison was accordingly invited to sit to him for his portrait. Haydon, +who it seems was a student of human nature as well as of the human form, +made the discovery of a fact which at first surprised and angered him. +In making his groupings of heads he decided to place together the Rev. +John Scoble, George Thompson and Charles Lenox Remond. When Scoble sat +to him, Haydon told him of his design in this regard. But, remarked +Haydon, Scoble "sophisticated immediately on the propriety of placing +the negro in the distance, as it would have much greater effect." The +painter now applied his test to Thompson who "saw no objection." +Thompson did not bear the test to Haydon's satisfaction, who observed +that "A man who wishes to place the negro on a level must no longer +regard him as having been a slave, and feel annoyed at sitting by his +side." But when the artist approached Garrison on the subject it was +wholly different. "I asked him," Haydon records with obvious pleasure, +"and he met me at once directly." + +Thompson was not altogether satisfactory to Garrison either during this +visit as the following extract from one of his letters to his wife +evinces: "Dear Thompson has not been strengthened to do battle for us, +as I had confidently hoped he would be. He is placed in a difficult +position, and seems disposed to take the ground of non-committal, +publicly, respecting the controversy which is going on in the United +States." + +Garrison, Rogers, and Remond in the company of Thompson made a +delightful trip into Scotland at this time. Everywhere the American +Abolitionists were met with distinguished attentions. "Though I like +England much, on many accounts," Garrison writes home in high spirits, +"I can truly say that I like Scotland better." An instance, which may be +coupled with that one furnished by Haydon, occurred during this Scottish +tour, and illustrates strongly the kind of stuff of which he was made. +On his way to the great public reception tendered the American delegates +by the Glasgow Emancipation Society, a placard with the caption, _"Have +we no white slaves?"_ was put into his hands. Upon acquainting himself +with its contents he determined to read it to the meeting, and to make +it the text of remarks when he was called upon to address the meeting. +He was presently announced and the immense audience greeted him with +every manifestation of pleasure and enthusiasm, with loud cheering and +waving of handkerchiefs. Nevertheless he held to his purpose to speak +upon the subject of the placard, unwelcome though it should prove to his +hearers. "After reading the interrogation, I said in reply: 'No--broad +as is the empire, and extensive as are the possessions of Great Britain, +not a single _white_ SLAVE can be found in them all;' and I then went on +to show the wide difference that exists between the condition of human +beings who are held and treated as chattels personal, and that of those +who are only suffering from certain forms of political injustice or +governmental oppression.... 'But,' I said, 'although it is not true that +England has any _white_ slaves, either at home or abroad, is it not true +that there are thousands of her population, both at home and abroad, who +are deprived of their just rights, who are grievously oppressed, who are +dying even in the midst of abundance, of actual starvation? YES!' and I +expressly called upon British Abolitionists to prove themselves the true +friends of suffering humanity abroad, by showing that they were the best +friend of suffering humanity at home." Truth, justice, duty, always +overrode with him the proprieties, however sacredly esteemed by others. +Of a piece with this fact of the placard of the _white slave_ was his +custom in refusing the wine proffered by some of his British friends to +their guests. He was not content with a simple refusal and the implied +rebuke which it involved, he must needs couple his declaration with an +express rebuke to host and hostess for tempting men into the downward +way to drunkenness. + +While in attendance upon the sessions of the World's Convention Garrison +received tidings, of the birth of his third child. The second, whom he +named for himself, was born in 1838. The third, who was also a son, the +fond father named after Wendell Phillips. Three children and a wife did +not tend to a solution of the always difficult problem of family +maintenance. The pressure of their needs upon the husband sometimes, +simple as indeed they were owing to the good sense and prudence of Mrs. +Garrison, seemed to exceed the weight of the atmospheric column to the +square inch. The fight for bread was one of the bitterest battles of the +reformer's life. The arrangement made in 1837, whereby the Massachusetts +Anti-Slavery Society assumed the responsibility of the publication of +the _Liberator_, Garrison rescinded at the beginning of 1838, for the +sake of giving himself greater freedom in the advocacy in its columns of +the several other reforms in which he had enlisted, besides +Abolitionism. But Garrison and the paper were now widely recognized as +anti-slavery essentials and indispensables. Many of the leaders of the +movement perceived, as Gerritt Smith expressed it in a letter enclosing +fifty dollars for the editor, that "Among the many things in which the +Abolitionists of our country should be agreed, are the two following: +(1) The _Liberator_ must be sustained; (2) its editor must be kept above +want; not only, nor mainly, for his own or his family's happiness; but +that, having his own mind unembarrassed by the cares of griping poverty, +he may be a more effective advocate of the cause of the Saviour's +enslaved poor." A new arrangement, in accordance with this suggestion +for the support of the paper and the preservation of the editor from +want, was made in 1839, and its performance taken in charge by a +committee of gentlemen, who undertook to raise the necessary funds for +those objects. Thus it was that Garrison, through the wise and generous +provision of friends, was enabled to augment the happiness of an +increasing family, and at the same time add to his own effectiveness as +an anti-slavery instrument. + +Garrison found occasion soon after his return from the World's +Convention for the employment of all his added effectiveness for +continuing the moral movement against slavery. For what with the strife +and schism in the anti-slavery ranks, followed by the excitements of the +long Presidential canvass of 1840, wherein the great body of the +Abolitionists developed an uncontrollable impulse to political action, +some through the medium of the new Liberty party which had nominated +James G. Birney for the Presidency, while others reverted to the two old +parties with which they had formerly acted--what with all these causes +the pure moral movement started by Garrison was in grave danger of +getting abolished or at least of being reduced to a nullity in its +influence upon public opinion. John A. Collins, the able and resourceful +general agent of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, wrote in the +deepest anxiety to Garrison from New Bedford, September 1, 1840, on this +head. Says he: "I really wish you understood perfectly the exact +position the friends of the old organization hold to the two great +political parties, and how generally they have been caught up in the +whirlwind of political enthusiasm. Could you but go where I have been, +and have seen and heard what I have seen and heard; could you see +men--aye, and women, too--who have been and still are your warmest +advocates, who have eschewed sectarianism, and lost their caste in the +circle in which they moved, for their strong adherence to your views and +measures, declare that they would sooner forego their Abolitionism than +their party.... Now, these are not the views of here and there a +straggling Abolitionist, but of seven-tenths of all the voting +Abolitionists of the State.... They are entirely unconscious of the +demoralizing influence of their course. They need light, warning, +entreaty, and rebuke." Besides this demoralization of the Abolitionists, +as described by Collins, the parent society at New York fell into bad +financial straits. It was absolutely without funds, and without any +means of supplying the lack. What should it do in its extremity but +appeal to the Massachusetts Society which was already heavily burdened +by its own load, the _Liberator_. The new organ of the national +organization, _The Anti-Slavery Standard_, surely must not be allowed to +fail for want of funds in this emergency. The Boston management rose to +the occasion. Collins was sent to England in quest of contributions from +the Abolitionists of Great Britain. But, great as was the need of money, +the relief which it might afford would only prove temporary unless there +could be effected a thorough anti-slavery revival. This was vital. And +therefore to this end Garrison now bent his remarkable energies. + +Agents, during this period when money was scarce, were necessarily few. +But the pioneer proved a host in himself. Resigning the editorial charge +of the _Liberator_ into the capable hands of Edmund Quincy, Garrison +itinerated in the rôle of an anti-slavery lecturer in Massachusetts, +Connecticut, and New Hampshire, reviving everywhere the languishing +interest of his disciples. On the return of Collins in the summer of +1841, revival meetings and conventions started up with increased +activity, the fruits of which were of a most cheering character. At +Nantucket, Garrison made a big catch in his anti-slavery net. It was +Frederick Douglass, young, callow, and awkward, but with his splendid +and inimitable gifts flashing through all as he, for the first time in +his life, addressed an audience of white people. Garrison, with the +instinct of leadership, saw at once the value of the runaway slave's +oratorical possibilities in their relations to the anti-slavery +movement. It was at his instance that Collins added Douglass to the band +of anti-slavery agents. The new agent has preserved his recollections of +the pioneer's speech on that eventful evening in Nantucket. Says he: +"Mr. Garrison followed me, taking me as his text; and now, whether I had +made an eloquent plea in behalf of freedom or not, his was one never to +be forgotten. Those who had heard him oftenest, and had known him +longest, were astonished at his masterly effort. For the time he +possessed that almost fabulous inspiration, often referred to but seldom +attained, in which a public meeting is transformed, as it were, into a +single individuality, the orator swaying a thousand heads and hearts at +once, and by the simple majesty of his all-controlling thought, +converting his hearers into the express image of his own soul. That +night there were, at least, a thousand Garrisonians in Nantucket!" + +Here is another picture of Garrison in the lecture-field. It is from the +pen of N.P. Rogers, with whom he was making a week's tour among the +White Mountains, interspersing the same with anti-slavery meetings. At +Plymouth, failing to procure the use of a church for their purpose, they +fell back upon the temple not made with hands. + +"Semi-circular seats, backed against a line of magnificent trees to +accommodate, we should judge, from two to three hundred," Rogers +narrates, "were filled, principally with women, and the men who could +not find seats stood on the green sward on either hand; and, at length, +when wearied with standing, seated themselves on the ground. Garrison, +mounted on a rude platform in front, lifted up his voice and spoke to +them in prophet tones and surpassing eloquence, from half-past three +till I saw the rays of the setting sun playing through the trees on his +head.... They (the auditory) heeded it not any more than he, but +remained till he ended, apparently indisposed to move, though some came +from six, eight, and even twelve miles distance." So bravely prospered +the revival agitation, under the vigorous preaching of the indomitable +pioneer. + +In the midst of the growing activities of the revival season of the +anti-slavery movement, Garrison had some personal experiences of a +distressing nature. One of these was the case of his quondam friend and +partner in the publication of the _Liberator_, Isaac Knapp. He, poor +fellow, was no longer the publisher of the paper. His wretched business +management of his department tended to keep the _Liberator_ in a state +of chronic financial embarrassment. When the committee, who assumed +charge of the finances of the paper, took hold of the problem, they +determined to let Knapp go. He was paid $150 or $175 as a _quid pro quo_ +for his interest in the _Liberator_. Unfortunate in the business of a +publisher, he was yet more unfortunate in another respect. He had become +a victim of intemperance. His inebriety increased upon him, accelerated, +no doubt, by his business failure. Notwithstanding Garrison's strong and +tender friendship for Knapp, the broken man came to regard him as an +enemy, and showed in many ways his jealousy and hatred of his old friend +and partner. Very painful was this experience to the pioneer. + +An experience which touched Garrison more nearly arose out of the sad +case of his brother James, who, the reader will recall, ran away from +his mother in Baltimore and went to sea. He ultimately enlisted in the +United States Navy, and what with the brutalities which he suffered at +the hands of his superiors, by way of discipline, and with those of his +own uncontrolled passions and appetites, he was, when recovered by his +brother William, a total moral and physical wreck. But the prodigal was +gathered to the reformer's heart, and taken to his home where in memory +of a mother long dead, whose darling was James, he was nursed and +watched over with deep and pious love. There were sad lapses of the +profligate man even in the sanctuary of his brother's home. The craving +for liquor was omnipotent in the wretched creature, and he was attacked +by uncontrollable desire for drink. But William's patience was infinite, +and his yearning and pity at such times were as sweet and strong as a +mother's. Death rung the curtain down in the fall of 1842, on this +miserable life with its sorry and pathetic scenes. + +About this time a trial of a different sort fell to the lot of Garrison +to endure. The tongue of detraction was never more busy with his alleged +infidel doctrines or to more damaging effect. Collins, in England, +seeking to obtain contributions for the support of the agitation in +America found Garrison's infidelity the _great lion_ in the way of +success. Even the good dispositions of the venerable Clarkson were +affected by the injurious reports in this regard, circulated in England +mainly by Nathaniel Colver, a narrow and violent sectary of the Baptist +denomination of the United States. It was, of course, painful to +Garrison to feel that he had become a rock of offence in the path of the +great movement, which he had started and to which he was devoting +himself so energetically. To Elizabeth Pease, one of the noblest of the +English Abolitionists, and one of his stanchest transatlantic friends, +he defended himself against the false and cruel statements touching his +religious beliefs. "I esteem the Holy Scriptures," he wrote her, "above +all other books in the universe, and always appeal to 'the law and the +testimony' to prove all my peculiar doctrines." His religious sentiments +and Sabbatical views are almost if not quite identical with those held +by the Quakers. "I believe in an indwelling Christ," he goes on to +furnish a summary of his confession of faith, "and in His righteousness +alone; I glory in nothing here below, save in Christ and in Him +crucified; I believe all the works of the devil are to be destroyed, and +Our Lord is to reign from sea to sea, even to the ends of the earth; and +I profess to have passed from death unto life, and know by happy +experience, that there is no condemnation to them who are in Christ +Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit." These were +the pioneer's articles of faith. Their extreme simplicity and +theological conservatism it would seem ought to have satisfied the +evangelicals of all denominations. They were in essentials thoroughly +orthodox. But in the composition of the shibboleths of beliefs +non-essentials as well as essentials enter, the former to the latter in +the proportion of two to one. It is not surprising, therefore, that +Garrison's essentials proved unequal to the test set up by sectarianism, +inasmuch as his spiritual life dropped the aspirate of the +non-essentials of religious forms and observances. + +But the good man had his compensation as well as his trials. Such of a +very noble kind was the great Irish address brought over from Ireland by +Remond in December 1841. It was signed by Daniel O'Connell, Father +Mathew, and sixty thousand Roman Catholics of Ireland, who called upon +the Irish Roman Catholics of America to make the cause of the slaves of +the United States their cause. Large expectations of Irish assistance in +the anti-slavery agitation were excited in the bosoms of Abolitionists +by this imposing appeal. Garrison shared the high hopes of its +beneficent influence upon the Ireland of America, with many others. +Alas! for the "best laid schemes of mice and men," for the new Ireland +was not populated with saints, but a fiercely human race who had come to +their new home to better their own condition, not that of the negro. +Hardly had they touched these shores before they were Americanized in +the colorphobia sense, out-Heroded Herod in hatred of the colored people +and their anti-slavery friends. Indeed, it was quite one thing to preach +Abolitionism with three thousand miles of sea-wall between one and his +audience, and quite another to rise and do the preaching with no +sea-wall to guard the preacher from the popular consequences of his +preaching, as Father Mathew quickly perceived and reduced to practice +eight years later, when he made his memorable visit to this country. In +vain was the monster document unrolled in Faneuil Hall, and many +Abolitionists with Irish blood were put forward to sweep the chords of +Erin's heart, and to conjure by their eloquence the disciples of St. +Patrick to rally under the banner of freedom. There was no response, +except the response of bitter foes. Erin's harp vibrated to no breeze +which did not come out of the South. The slave-power had been erected +into patron saint by the new Ireland in America, and the new Ireland in +America was very well content with his saintship's patronage and +service. Thus it happened that the great expectations, which were +excited by the Irish address, were never realized. But the pioneer had +other fish in his net, had, in fact, meanwhile, got himself in readiness +for a launch into a new and startling agitation. As to just what this +new and startling agitation was we must refer the reader to the next +chapter. + + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + + + +THE PIONEER MAKES A NEW AND STARTLING DEPARTURE. + + +When Garrison hoisted the banner of immediate emancipation he was +over-confident of success through the instrumentality of the church. It +did not enter his heart to conceive that after he had delivered his +message touching the barbarism of slavery that a church calling itself +Christian, or that a ministry arrogating to itself the character of the +Christ, could possibly say him nay. But he learned sadly enough the +utter folly of such expectations. For from pew and pulpit the first +stones were hurled against him, and the most cruel and persistent +opposition and persecution issued. Then as the movement which he had +started advanced, he saw how it was, why the church had played him false +and the cause of freedom. It was because the poison of slavery which the +evil one had injected into the nation's arteries had corrupted the +springs of justice and mercy in that body. The Church was not free, it, +too, was in bonds to slavery, how then could it help to free the slaves? +That was the reason that pulpit and pew cried out against him and +persecuted him. It was not they but the slave despotism, which ruled +them, which wrought its fell purpose within them. + +If the reformer cast his eyes about him for other help it was the same; +the slime of the serpent was upon State as well as Church. Both of the +two great political parties were bound hands and feet, and given over to +the will of the slave tyranny. In all departments of Government, State +and National, the positive, all-powerful principle was slavery. Its +dread _nolo me tangere_ had forced Congress into the denial of the right +of petition, and into the imposition of a gag upon its own freedom of +debate. It was the grand President-maker, and the judiciary bent without +a blush to do its service. What, then, in these circumstances could the +friends of freedom hope to achieve? The nation had been caught in the +snare of slavery, and was in Church and State helpless in the vast +spider-like web of wrong. The more the reformer pondered the problem, +the more hopeless did success look under a Constitution which united +right and wrong, freedom and slavery. As his reflections deepened, the +conviction forced its way into his mind that the Union was the strong +tower of the slave-power, which could never be destroyed until the +fortress which protected it was first utterly demolished. In the spring +of 1842 the pioneer was prepared to strike into this new path to effect +his purpose. + +"We must dissolve all connection with those murderers of fathers," he +wrote his brother-in-law, "and murderers of mothers, and murderers of +liberty, and traffickers of human flesh, and blasphemers against the +Almighty at the South. What have we in common with them? What have we +gained? What have we not lost by our alliance with them? Are not their +principles, their pursuits, their policies, their interests, their +designs, their feelings, utterly diverse from ours? Why, then, be +subject to their dominion? Why not have the Union dissolved in form as +it is in fact, especially if the form gives ample protection to the +slave system, by securing for it all the physical force of the North? It +is not treason against the cause of liberty to cry, "Down with every +slave-holding Union!" Therefore, I raise that cry. And O that I had a +voice louder than a thousand thunders, that it might shake the land and +electrify the dead--the dead in sin, I mean--those slain by the hand of +slavery." + +A few weeks later the first peal of this thunder broke upon the startled +ears of the country through the columns of the _Liberator_. The May +meeting of the American Anti-Slavery Society was drawing near, and the +reformer, now entirely ready to enter upon an agitation looking to the +dissolution of the Union, suggested "the duty of making the REPEAL OF +THE UNION between the North and the South the grand rallying point until +it be accomplished, or slavery cease to pollute our soil. We are for +throwing all the means, energies, actions, purposes, and appliances of +the genuine friends of liberty and republicanism into this one channel," +he goes on to announce, "and for measuring the humanity, patriotism, and +piety of every man by this one standard. This question can no longer be +avoided, and a right decision of it will settle the controversy between +freedom and slavery." The stern message of Isaiah to the Jews, +beginning, "Hear the word of the Lord, ye scornful men that rule this +people. Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with DEATH and +with HELL are we at agreement," seemed to the American Isaiah to +describe exactly the character of the National Constitution. "Slavery is +a combination of DEATH and HELL," he declares, with righteous wrath, +"and with it the North have made a covenant, and are at agreement. As an +element of the Government it is omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent. As +a component part of the Union, it is necessarily a national interest. +Divorced from Northern protection, it dies; with that protection it +enlarges its boundaries, multiplies its victims, and extends its +ravages." + +The announcement of this new radicalism caused a sensation. Many genuine +Garrisonian Abolitionists recoiled from a policy of disunion. Lydia +Maria Child and James S. Gibbon of the Executive Committee of the +National Society hastened to disavow for the society all responsibility +for the disunion sentiment of the editor of the _Liberator_. His new +departure seemed to them "foreign to the purpose for which it was +organized." Like all new ideas, it was a sword-bearer, and proved a +decided disturber of the peace. The Union-loving portion of the free +States had never taken to the Abolition movement, for the reason that it +tended to disturb the stability of their idol. But now the popular +hatred of Abolitionism was intensified by the avowal of a distinct +purpose on the part of its leader to labor for the separation of the +sections. The press of the North made the most of this design to render +altogether odious the small band of moral reformers, to reduce to a +nullity their influence upon public opinion. + +Notwithstanding its rejection by James Gibbons and Lydia Maria Child the +new idea of the dissolution of the Union, as an anti-slavery object, +found instant favor with many of the leading Abolitionists, like Wendell +Phillips, Edmund Quincy, Parker Pillsbury, Stephen S. Foster and Abby +Kelley. At the anniversary meeting of the American Society in 1842, the +subject was mooted, and, although there was no official action taken, +yet it was apparent that a majority of the delegates were favorable to +its adoption as the sentiment of the society. + +The ultimate object of Garrison was the abolition of slavery. Disunion +led directly to this goal, therefore he planted his feet in that way. +But while he shot the agitation at a distant mark, he did not mean to +miss less remote results. There was remarkable method in his madness. He +agitated the question of the dissolution of the Union "in order that the +people of the North might be induced to reflect upon their debasement, +guilt, and danger in continuing in partnership with heaven-daring +oppressors, and thus be led to repentance." + +The Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society at its annual meeting in January, +1843 "dissolved the Union," wrote Quincy to R.D. Webb, "by a handsome +vote, after a warm debate. The question was afterward reconsidered and +passed in another shape, being wrapped up by Garrison in some of his +favorite Old Testament Hebraisms by way of vehicle, as the apothecaries +say." This is the final shape which Garrison's "favorite Old Testament +Hebraisms" gave to the action of the society: + +"_Resolved_, That the compact which exists between the North and the +South is a covenant with death and an agreement with hell--involving +both parties in atrocious criminality--and should be immediately +annulled." + +At its tenth anniversary, in 1844, the American Society resolved +likewise that there should be no Union with slaveholders; and in May of +the same year the New England Society voted by a large majority to +dissolve the 'covenant with death, and the agreement with hell.' Almost +the whole number of the Garrisonian Abolitionists had by this time +placed upon their banner of immediate emancipation the revolutionary +legend "No Union with slaveholders." _Cathago est delenda_ were now ever +on the lips of the pioneer. 'The Union it must and shall be destroyed' +became the beginning, the middle, and the end of all his utterances on +the slavery question. + +The attitude of the anti-slavery disunionists to the Government which +they were seeking to overthrow was clearly stated by Francis Jackson in +a letter returning to the Governor of Massachusetts his commission as a +justice of the peace. Says he, "To me it appears that the vices of +slavery, introduced into the constitution of our body politic by a few +slight punctures, has now so pervaded and poisoned the whole system of +our National Government that literally there is no health in it. The +only remedy that I can see for the disease is to be found in the +_dissolution of the patient_.... Henceforth it (the Constitution) is +dead to me, and I to it. I withdraw all profession of allegiance to it, +and all my voluntary efforts to sustain it. The burdens that it lays +upon me, while it is held up by others, I shall endeavor to bear +patiently, yet acting with reference to a higher law, and distinctly +declaring that, while I retain my own liberty, I will be a party to no +compact which helps to rob any other man of his." + +The Abolition agitation for the dissolution of the Union was assisted +not a little by sundry occurrences of national importance. The +increasing arrogance and violence of the South in Congress on all +matters relating to the subject of slavery was one of these occurrences. +Freedom of debate and the right of petition, Southern intolerance had +rendered well nigh worthless in the National Legislature. In this way +the North, during several months in every year, was forced to look at +the reverse and the obverse faces, of the Union. These object-lessons +taught many minds, no doubt, to count the cost which the preservation of +the Union entailed upon the free States--"to reflect upon their +debasement, guilt, and danger" in their partnership with slaveholders. +Another circumstance which induced to this kind of reflection was the +case of George Latimer, who was seized as a fugitive slave in Boston in +the autumn of 1842. From beginning to end the Latimer case revealed how +completely had Massachusetts tied her own hands as a party to the +original compact with slavery whose will was the supreme law of the +land. In obedience to this supreme law Chief-Justice Shaw refused to the +captive the writ of _habeas corpus_, and Judge Story granted the owner +possession of the fugitive, and time to procure evidence of his +ownership. But worse still Massachusetts officials and one of her jails +were employed to aid in the return of a man to slavery. This degradation +aroused the greatest indignation in the State and led to the enactment +of a law prohibiting its officials from taking part in the return of +fugitive slaves, and the use of its jails and prisons for their +detention. The passage of this personal liberty measure served to +increase the activity of the anti-Union working forces in the South. + +Then, again, the serious difficulty between Massachusetts and two of the +slave States in regard to their treatment of her colored seamen aided +Garrison in his agitation for the dissolution of the Union by the keen +sense of insult and injury which the trouble begat and left upon the +popular mind. Colored men in Massachusetts enjoyed a fair degree of +equality before her laws, were endowed with the right to vote, and were, +barring the prejudice against color, treated by the commonwealth as +citizens. They were employed in the merchant service of her interstate +trade. But at two of the Southern ports where her vessels entered, the +colored seamen were seized by the local police and confined in houses of +detention until the vessels to which they belonged were ready to depart, +when they were released and allowed to join the vessels. This was a most +outrageous proceeding, outrageous to the colored men who were thus +deprived of their liberty, outrageous also to the owners of the vessels +who were deprived of the service of their employés. Of what avail was +the constitutional guaranty that "the citizens of each State shall be +entitled to all the privileges and immunities of citizens in the several +States", many men began to question? The South was evidently disposed to +support only that portion of the national compact which sustained the +slave system, all the rest upon occasion it trampled on and nullified. +This lesson was enforced anew upon Massachusetts by the affair of her +colored seamen. Unable to obtain redress of the wrong done her citizens, +the State appointed agents to go to Charleston and New Orleans and test +the constitutionality of the State laws under which the local +authorities had acted. But South Carolina and Louisiana, especially the +former, to whom Samuel Hoar was accredited, evinced themselves quite +equal to the exigency to which the presence of the Massachusetts agents +gave rise. To cut a long story short, these gentlemen, honored citizens +of a sister State, and covered with the ægis of the Constitution, found +that they could make no success of the business which they had in hand, +found indeed that as soon as that business was made public that they +stood in imminent peril of their lives. Whereupon, wisely conceiving +discretion to be the better part of valor, they beat a hasty retreat +back to their native air. The Massachusetts agents were driven out of +Charleston and New Orleans. Where was the sacred and glorious union +between Massachusetts and South Carolina and Louisiana that such things +were possible--were constantly occurring? The circumstance made a strong +impression on the State whose rights were thus grossly violated. It +helped to convert Massachusetts to its later opposition to slavery, and +to make its public sentiment more tolerant of the Garrisonian opposition +to the covenant with death and the agreement with hell. To the agitation +growing out of the scheme for the annexation of Texas must, however, be +ascribed the premium among all the anti-Union working facts and forces +of the first few years after Garrison and his coadjutors had raised the +cry of "No union with slaveholders." This agitation renewed the +intensity and sectionalism of the then almost forgotten struggle over +the admission of Missouri nearly a quarter of a century before, and +which was concluded by the Missouri compromise. This settlement was at +the time considered quite satisfactory to the South. But Calhoun took an +altogether different view of the matter twenty years later. The +arrangement by which the South was excluded from the upper portion of +the Louisiana Territory he came to regard as a cardinal blunder on the +part of his section. The fact is that within those two decades the +slave-holding had been completely outstripped by the non-slave-holding +States in wealth, population, and social growth. The latter had obtained +over the former States an indisputable supremacy in those respects. +Would not the political balance settle also in the natural order of +things in the Northern half of the Union unless it could be kept where +it then was to the south of Mason and Dixon's line by an artificial +political make-weight. This artificial political make-weight was nothing +less than the acquisition of new slave territory to supply the demand +for new slave States. Texas, with the territorial dimensions of an +empire, answered the agrarian needs of the slave system. And the South, +under the leadership of Calhoun, determined to make good their fancied +loss in the settlement of the Missouri controversy by annexing Texas. + +But all the smouldering dread of slave domination, all the passionate +opposition to the extension of slavery, to the acquisition of new slave +territory and the admission of new slave States, awoke hotly in the +heart of the North. "No more slave territory." "No more slave States," +resounded during this crisis, through the free States. "Texas or +disunion," was the counter cry which reverberated through the slave +States. Even Dr. Channing, who had no love for Garrison or his +anti-slavery ultraism, was so wrought upon by the scheme for the +annexation of Texas as to profess his preference for the dissolution of +the Union, "rather than receive Texas into the Confederacy." "This +measure, besides entailing on us evils of all sorts," the doctor boldly +pointed out, "would have for its chief end to bring the whole country +under the slave-power, to make the general Government the agent of +slavery; and this we are bound to resist at all hazards. The free States +should declare that the very act of admitting Texas will be construed as +a dissolution of the Union." + +The Northern blood was at fever heat, and an unwonted defiance of +consequences, a fierce contempt of ancient political bugaboos marked the +utterances of men erstwhile timid of speech upon all questions relating +to slavery. In the anti-Texas convention held in Faneuil Hall January +29, 1845, all this timidity disappeared in the presence of the new +peril. It was not a convention of Abolitionists, although Garrison was a +member, but of politicians, mostly of the Whig party. "The anti-slavery +spirit of the convention," wrote Edmund Quincy to R.D. Webb, "was +surprising. The address and the speeches of the gentlemen, not +Abolitionists, were such as caused Garrison to be mobbed ten years ago, +and such as we thought thorough three or four years ago. There were no +qualifications, or excuses, or _twaddle_." + +Garrison flung himself into the anti-Texas movement with all his +customary force and fire. Elected a delegate to the Faneuil Hall +Convention by the influence of Francis Jackson, he took a leading part +in its proceedings, "created the most stir in the whole matter," Wendell +Phillips thought. Charles Sumner, who heard him speak for the first +time, was struck with his "natural eloquence," and described his words +as falling "in fiery rain." Again at a mass meeting for Middlesex +County, held at Concord, to consider the aggressions of the slave-power, +did the words of the pioneer fall "in fiery rain." Apprehensive that the +performance of Massachusetts, when the emergency arose, would fall far +short of her protestations, he exclaimed, "I have nothing to say, sir, +nothing. I am tired of words, tired of hearing strong things said, where +there is no heart to carry them out. When we are prepared to state the +whole truth, and die for it, if necessary--when, like our fathers, we +are prepared to take our ground, and not shrink from it, counting not +our lives dear unto us--when we are prepared to let all earthly hopes go +back to the board--_then_ let us say so; _till_ then, the less we say +the better, in such an emergency as this. 'But who are we, will men +ask.' that talk of such things? 'Are we enough to make a revolution?' +No, sir; but we are enough to _begin_ one, and, once begun, it never can +be turned back. I am for revolution were I utterly alone. I am there +because I _must_ be there. I _must_ cleave to the right. I cannot choose +but obey the voice of God. + +" ... Do not tell me of our past Union, and for how many years we have +been one. We were only one while we were ready to hunt, shoot down, and +deliver up the slave, and allow the slave-power to form an oligarchy on +the floor of Congress! The moment we say no to this, the Union +ceases--the Government falls." + +The Texan struggle terminated in the usual way, in the triumph of the +slave-power. Texas was annexed and admitted into the sisterhood of +States, giving to the Southern section increased slave representation in +both branches of Congress, and thereby aiding to fasten, what at the +moment appeared to be its permanent domination in national affairs. As +Garrison had apprehended, the performance of the North fell far short of +its protestations when the crisis came. It swallowed all its brave +words, and collapsed into feeble and disheartened submission to its +jubilant and hitherto invincible antagonist. The whole North except the +small and irrepressible band of Garrisonian Abolitionists were cast down +by the revulsive wave of this disastrous event. Writing to his friend +Webb, Garrison discourses thus upon the great defeat: "Apparently the +slave-holding power has never been so strong, has never seemed to be so +invincible, has never held such complete mastery over the whole, has +never so successfully hurled defiance at the Eternal and Just One, as at +the present time; and yet never has it in reality been so weak, never +has it had so many uncompromising assailants, never has it been so +filled with doubt and consternation, never has it been so near its +downfall, as at this moment. Upon the face of it, this statement looks +absurdly paradoxical; but it is true, nevertheless. We are groping in +thick darkness; but it is that darkest hour which is said to precede the +dawn of day." + + + + + +CHAPTER XVII. + + + +AS IN A LOOKING GLASS. + + +Garrison was the most dogmatic, as he was the most earnest of men. It +was almost next to impossible for him to understand that his way was not +the only way to attain a given end. A position reached by him, he was +curiously apt to look upon as a sort of _ultima thule_ of human endeavor +in that direction of the moral universe. And, notwithstanding instances +of honest self-depreciation, there, nevertheless, hung around his +personality an air and assumption of moral infallibility, as a reformer. +His was not a tolerant mind. Differences with him he was prone to treat +as gross departures from principle, as evidences of faithlessness to +freedom. He fell upon the men who did not see eye to eye with him with +tomahawk and scalping knife. He was strangely deficient in a sense of +proportion in such matters. His terrible severities of speech, he +visited upon the slave-power and the Liberty party alike. And although a +non-resistent, in that he eschewed the use of physical force, yet there +never was born among the sons of men a more militant soul in the use of +moral force, in the quickness with which he would whip out the rapiers, +or hurl the bolts and bombs of his mother tongue at opponents. The +pioneer must have been an unconscious believer in the annihilation of +the wicked, as he must have been an unconscious believer in the +wickedness of all opposition to his idea of right and duty. This, of +course, must be taken only as a broad description of the reformer's +character. He was a man, one of the grandest America has given to the +world, but still a man with his tendon of Achilles, like the rest of his +kind. + +His narrow intolerance of the idea of anti-slavery political action, and +his fierce and unjust censure of the champions of that idea, well +illustrate the trait in point. Birney and Whittier, and Wright and +Gerritt Smith, and Joshua Leavitt, he apparently quite forgot, were +actuated by motives singularly noble, were in their way as true to their +convictions as he was to his. No, there was but one right way, and in +that way stood the feet of the pioneer. His way led directly, +unerringly, to the land of freedom. All other ways, and especially the +Liberty party way, twisted, doubled upon themselves, branched into +labyrinths of folly and self-seeking. "Ho! all ye that desire the +freedom of the slave, who would labor for liberty, follow me and I will +show you the only true way," was the tone which the editor of the +_Liberator_ held to men, who were battering with might and main to +breach the walls of the Southern Bastile. They were plainly not against +the slave, although opposed to Mr. Garrison, narrowly, unjustly opposed +to him, without doubt, but working strenuously according to their lights +for the destruction of a common enemy and tyrant. This was the test, +which Garrison should have taken as conclusive. The leaders of the +Liberty party, though personally opposed to him and to his line of +action, were, nevertheless, friends of the slaves, and ought to have +been so accounted and treated by the man who more than any other was +devoted to the abolition of slavery. + +But the whole mental and moral frame of the man precluded such +liberality of treatment of opponents. They had rejected his way, which +was the only true way, and were, therefore, anathema maranatha. When a +moral idea which has been the subject of widespread agitation, and has +thereby gained a numerous following, reaches out, as reach out it must, +sooner or later, for incorporation into law, it will, in a republic like +ours, do so naturally and necessarily through political action--along +the lines of an organized party movement. The Liberty party formation +was the product of this strong tendency in America. Premature it +possibly was, but none the less perfectly natural. Now every political +party, that is worthy of the name, is a compound rather than a simple +fact, consisteth of a bundle of ideas rather than a single idea. Parties +depend upon the people for success, upon the people not of one interest +but of many interests and of diversities of views upon public questions. +One plank is not broad enough to accommodate their differences and +multiplicity of desires. There must be a platform built of many planks +to support the number of votes requisite to victory at the polls. There +will always be one idea or interest of the many ideas or interests, that +will dominate the organization, be erected into a paramount issue upon +which the party throws itself upon the country, but the secondary ideas +or interests must be there all the same to give strength and support to +the main idea and interest. + +Besides this peculiarity in the composition of the great political +parties in America, there is another not less distinct and marked, and +that is the Constitutional limitations of the Federal political power. +Every party which looks for ultimate success at the polls must observe +strictly these limitations in its aims and issues. Accordingly when the +moral movement against slavery sought a political expression of the idea +of Abolition it was constrained within the metes and bounds set up by +the National Constitution. Slavery within the States lay outside of the +political boundaries of the general Government. Slavery within the +States, therefore, the more sagacious of the Liberty party leaders +placed not among its bundle of ideas, into its platform of national +issues. But it was otherwise with slavery in the District of Columbia, +in the national territories, under the national flag on the high seas, +for it lay within the constitutional reach of the federal political +power, and its abolition was demanded in the Third party platform. These +leaders were confident that the existence of slavery depended upon its +connection with the National Government. Their aim was to destroy the +evil by cutting this connection through which it drew its blood and +nerve supplies. They planted themselves upon the anti-slavery character +of the Constitution, believing that it "does not sanction nor +nationalize slavery but condemns and localizes it." + +This last position of the Liberty party leaders struck Garrison as a +kind of mental and moral enormity. At it and its authors, the +anti-slavery Jupiter, launched his bolts, fast and furious. Here is a +specimen of his chain lightning: "We have a very poor opinion of the +intelligence of any man, and very great distrust of his candor or +honesty, who tries to make it appear that no pro-slavery compromise was +made between the North and the South, at the adoption of the +Constitution. We cherish feelings of profound contempt for the quibbling +spirit of criticism which is endeavoring to explain away the meaning of +language, the design of which as a matter of practice, and the adoption +of which as a matter of bargain, were intelligently and clearly +understood by the contracting parties. The truth is the misnamed +'Liberty party' is under the control of as ambitious, unprincipled, and +crafty leaders as is either the Whig or Democratic party; and no other +proof of this assertion is needed than their unblushing denial of the +great object of the national compact, namely, union at the sacrifice of +the colored population of the United States. Their new interpretations +of the Constitution are a bold rejection of the facts of history, and a +gross insult to the intelligence of the age, and certainly never can be +carried into effect without dissolving the Union by provoking a civil +war." All the same, the pioneer to the contrary notwithstanding, many of +these very Liberty party leaders were men of the most undoubted candor +and honesty and of extraordinary intelligence. + +Garrison was never able to see the Liberty party, and for that matter +Wendell Phillips, Edmund Quincy, and others of the old organization +leaders could not either, except through the darkened glass of personal +antagonisms growing out of the schism of 1840. It was always, under all +circumstances, to borrow a phrase of Phillips, "Our old enemy, Liberty +party." And, as Quincy naïvely confesses in an article in the +_Liberator_ pointing out the reasons why Abolitionists should give to +the Free-soil party incidental aid and comfort, which were forbidden to +their "old enemy, Liberty party," the significant and amusing fact that +the latter was "officered by deserters." Ay, there was indeed the rub! +The military principle of the great leader forbade him to recognize +deserters as allies. Discipline must be maintained, and so he proceeded +to maintain the anti-slavery discipline of his army by keeping up a +constant fusillade into the ranks of the deserter band, who, in turn, +were every whit as blinded by the old quarrel and separation, and who +slyly cherished the modest conviction that, when they seceded, the salt +of old organization lost its savor, and was thenceforth fit only to be +trampled under the Liberty party's feet. Without doubt, those old +Abolitionists and Liberty party people belonged to the category of +"humans." + +The scales of the old grudge dropped from Garrison's eyes directly the +Free-Soil party loomed upon the political horizon. He recognized at once +that, if it was not against the slave, it was for the slave; apprehended +clearly that, in so far as the new party, which, by the way, was only +the second stage in the development of the central idea of his old +enemy, Liberty party, as the then future Republican party was to be its +third and final expression, apprehended clearly I say that, in so far as +the new party resisted the aggressions and pretensions of the +slave-power, it was fighting for Abolition--was an ally of Abolitionism. + +In the summer of 1848, from Northampton, whither he had gone to take the +water cure, Garrison counseled Quincy, who was filling the editorial +chair, in the interim, at the _Liberator_ office, in this sage fashion: +"As for the Free-Soil movement, I feel that great care is demanded of us +disunionists, both in the _Standard_ and the _Liberator_, in giving +credit to whom credit is due, and yet in no case even seeming to be +satisfied with it." In the winter of 1848 in a letter to Samuel May, +Jr., he is more explicit on this head. "As for the Free-Soil movement," +he observes, "I am for hailing it as a cheering sign of the times, and +an unmistakable proof of the progress we have made, under God, in +changing public sentiment. Those who have left the Whig and Democratic +parties for conscience's sake, and joined the movement, deserve our +commendation and sympathy; at the same time, it is our duty to show +them, and all others, that there is a higher position to be attained by +them or they will have the blood of the slave staining their garments. +This can be done charitably yet faithfully. On the two old parties, +especially the Whig-Taylor party, I would expend--_pro tempore_, at +least--our heaviest ammunition." This is as it should be, the tone of +wise and vigilant leadership, the application of the true test to the +circumstances, viz., for freedom if against slavery; not to be +satisfied, to be sure, with any thing less than the whole but disposed +to give credit to whom it was due, whether much or little. Pity that the +pioneer could not have placed himself in this just and discriminating +point of view in respect of his old enemy, Liberty party, praising in it +what he found praiseworthy, while blaming it for what he felt was +blameworthy. But perfection weak human nature doth not attain to in this +terrestrial garden of the passions, and so very likely the magnanimity +which we have desired of Garrison is not for that garden to grow but +another and a heavenly. + +Garrison ill brooked opposition, came it from friends or foes. He was so +confident in his own positions that he could not but distrust their +opposites. Of course, if his were right, and of that doubt in his mind +there was apparently none, then the positions of all others had to be +wrong. This masterful quality of the man was constantly betrayed in the +acts of his life and felt by his closest friends and associates in the +anti-slavery movement. Quincy, writing to Richard Webb, narrates how, at +the annual meeting of the American Anti-Slavery Society in 1843, +Garrison was for removing it to Boston, but that he and Wendell Phillips +were for keeping it where it then was in New York, giving at the same +time sundry good and sufficient reasons for the faith that was in them, +and how, thereupon, "Garrison dilated his nostrils like a war-horse, and +snuffed indignation at us." "If the Boston friends were unwilling to +take the trouble and responsibility," were the petulant, accusative +words put by Quincy into his chief's mouth on the occasion, "then there +was nothing more to be said; we must try to get along as well as we +could in the old way." And how they disclaimed "any unwillingness to +take trouble and responsibility," while affirming "the necessity of +their acting on their own idea." + +Another characteristic of the pioneer is touched upon by the same writer +in a relation which he was making to Webb of Garrison's election to the +presidency of the parent society. Says Quincy: "Garrison makes an +excellent president at a public meeting where the order of speakers is +in some measure arranged, as he has great felicity in introducing and +interlocuting remarks; but at a meeting for debate he does not answer so +well, as he is rather too apt, with all the innocence and simplicity in +the world, to do all the talking himself." + +The same friendly critic has left his judgment of other traits of the +leader, traits not so much of the man as of the editor. It is delivered +in a private letter of Quincy to Garrison on resigning the temporary +editorship of the _Liberator_ to "its legitimate possessor." who had +been for several months health-hunting at Northampton in the beautiful +Connecticut Valley. Quincy made bold to beard the Abolition lion in his +lair, and twist his tail in an extremely lively manner. "Now, my dear +friend," wrote the disciple to the master, "you must know that to the +microscopic eyes of its friends, as well as to the telescopic eyes of +its enemies, _the_ _Liberator_ _has faults_, these they keep to themselves +as much as they honestly may, but they are not the less sensible of +them, and are all the more desirous to see them immediately abolished. +Luckily, they are not faults of principle--neither moral nor +intellectual deficiencies--but faults the cure of which rests solely +with yourself. + +"I hardly know how to tell you what the faults are that we find with it, +lest you should think them none at all, or else unavoidable. But no +matter, of that you must be the judge; we only ask you to listen to our +opinion. We think the paper often bears the mark of haste and +carelessness in its getting up; that the matter seems to be hastily +selected and put in _higgledy-piggledy_, without any very apparent +reason why it should be in at all, or why it should be in the place +where it is. I suppose this is often caused by your selecting articles +with a view to connect remarks of your own with them, which afterward in +your haste you omit. Then we complain that each paper is not so nearly a +complete work in itself as it might be made, but that things are often +left at loose ends, and important matters broken off in the middle. I +assure you, that Brother Harriman is not the only one of the friends of +the _Liberator_ who grieves over your 'more anon' and 'more next +week'--which 'anon' and 'next week' never arrive. + +"Then we complain that your editorials are too often wanting, or else +such, from apparent haste, as those who love your fame cannot wish to +see; that important topics, which you feel to be such, are too often +either entirely passed over or very cursorily treated, and important +moments like the present neglected.... + +"We have our suspicions, too, that good friends have been disaffected by +the neglect of their communications; but of this we can only speak by +conjecture. In short, it appears to those who are your warmest friends +and the stanchest supporters of the paper, that you might make the +_Liberator_ a more powerful and useful instrumentality than it is, +powerful and useful as it is, by additional exertions on your part. It +is very unpleasant to hear invidious comparisons drawn between the +_Liberator_ and _Emancipator_ with regard to the manner of getting it +up, and to have not to deny but to excuse them--and we knowing all the +time that you have all the tact and technical talent for getting up a +good newspaper that Leavitt has, with as much more, intellectual ability +as you have more moral honesty, and only wanting some of his (pardon me) +industry, application, and method." + +Garrison, to his honor, did not allow the exceeding candor of his mentor +to disturb their friendship. The pioneer was not wholly without defence +to the impeachment. He might have pleaded ill health, of which he had +had _quantum suf._ since 1836 for himself and family. He might have +pleaded also the dissipation of too much of his energies in consequence +of more or less pecuniary embarrassments from which he was never wholly +freed; but, above all, he might have pleaded his increasing activity as +an anti-slavery lecturer. His contributions to the movement against +slavery were of a notable character in this direction, both in respect +of quantity and quality. He was not alone the editor of the _Liberator_, +he was unquestionably besides one of the most effective and interesting +of the anti-slavery speakers--indeed in the judgment of so competent an +authority as James Russell Lowell, he was regarded as the most effective +of the anti-slavery speakers. Still, after all is placed to his credit +that can possibly be, Quincy's complaints would be supported by an +altogether too solid basis of fact. The pioneer was much given to +procrastination. What was not urgent he was strongly tempted to put off +for a more convenient time. His work accumulated. He labored hard and he +accomplished much, but because of this habit of postponing for to-morrow +what need not be done to-day, he was necessarily forced to leave undone +many things which he ought to have done and which he might have +accomplished had he been given to putting off for to-morrow nothing +which might be finished to-day. + +The pioneer was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, but never +was he wholly cast down by his misfortunes. His cheerful and bouyant +spirit kept him afloat above his sorrows, above his griefs. The organ of +mirthfulness in him was very large. He was an optimist in the best sense +of that word, viz., that all things work together for good to them that +love goodness. In the darkest moments which the Abolition cause +encountered his own countenance was full of light, his own heart pierced +through the gloom and communicated its glow to those about him, his own +voice rang bugle-like through reverse and disaster. + +In his family the reformer was seen at his best. His wife was his friend +and equal, his children his playfellows and companions. The dust of the +great conflict he never carried with him into his home to choke the love +which burned ever brightly on its hearth and in the hearts which it +contained. What he professed in the _Liberator_, what he preached in the +world, of non-resistance, woman's rights, perfectionism, he practiced in +his home, he embodied as father, and husband, and host. Never lived +reformer who more completely realized his own ideals to those nearest +and dearest to him than William Lloyd Garrison. + +He had seven children, five boys and two girls. The last, Francis +Jackson, was born to him in the year 1848. Two of them died in +childhood, a boy and a girl. The loss of the boy, whom the father had +"named admiringly, gratefully, reverently," Charles Pollen, was a +terrible blow to the reformer, and a life-long grief to the mother. He +seemed to have been a singularly beautiful, winning, and affectionate +little man and to have inspired sweet hopes of future "usefulness and +excellence" in the breasts of his parents. "He seemed born to take a +century on his shoulders, without stooping; his eyes were large, +lustrous, and charged with electric light; his voice was clear as a +bugle, melodious, and ever ringing in our ears, from the dawn of day to +the ushering in of night, so that since it has been stilled, our +dwelling has seemed to be almost without an occupant," lamented the +stricken father to Elizabeth Pease, of Darlington, England. + +"Death itself to me is not terrible, is not repulsive," poured the +heartbroken pioneer into the ears of his English friend, "is not to be +deplored. I see in it as clear an evidence of Divine wisdom and +beneficence as I do in the birth of a child, in the works of creation, +in all the arrangements and operations of nature. I neither fear nor +regret its power. I neither expect nor supplicate to be exempted from +its legitimate action. It is not to be chronicled among calamities; it +is not to be styled "a mysterious dispensation of Divine Providence"; it +is scarcely rational to talk of being resigned to it. For what is more +rational, what more universal, what more impartial, what more +serviceable, what more desirable, in God's own time, hastened neither by +our ignorance or folly?... + +"When, therefore, my dear friend, I tell you that the loss of my dear +boy has overwhelmed me with sadness, has affected my peace by day and my +repose by night, has been a staggering blow, from the shock of which I +find it very difficult to recover, you will not understand me as +referring to anything pertaining to another state of existence, or as +gloomily affected by a change inevitable to all; far from it. Where the +cherished one who has been snatched from us is, what is his situation, +or what his employment, I know not, of course; and it gives me no +anxiety whatever. Until I join him at least my responsibility to him as +his guardian and protector has ceased; he does not need my aid, he +cannot be benefited by my counsel. That he will still be kindly cared +for by Him who numbers the very hairs of our heads, and without whose +notice a sparrow cannot fall to the ground; that he is still living, +having thrown aside his mortal drapery, and occupying a higher sphere of +existence, I do not entertain a doubt. My grief arises mainly from the +conviction that his death was premature; that he was actually defrauded +of his life through unskillful treatment; that he might have been saved, +if we had not been so unfortunately situated at that time. This to be +sure, is not certain; and not being certain, it is only an ingredient of +consolation that we find in our cup of bitterness." + +The pioneer was one of the most generous of givers. Poor indeed he was, +much beyond the common allotment of men of his intelligence and +abilities, but he was never too indigent to answer the appeals of +poverty. If the asker's needs were greater than his own he divided with +him the little which he had. To his home all sorts of people were +attracted, Abolitionists, peace men, temperance reformers, +perfectionists, homoeopathists, hydropathists, mesmerists, +spiritualists, Grahamites, clairvoyants, whom he received with unfailing +hospitality, giving welcome and sympathy to the new ideas, food and +shelter for the material sustenance of the fleshly vehicles of the new +ideas. He evidently was strongly of the opinion that there are "more +things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of" in the philosophy of any +particular period in the intellectual development of man. No age knows +it all. It was almost a lo, here, and a lo, there, with him, so large +was his bump of wonder, so unlimited was his appetite for the incredible +and the improbable in the domain of human knowledge and speculation. +Great was the man's faith, great was his hope, great was his charity. + +He was one of the most observant of men in all matters affecting the +rights of others; he was one of the least observant in all matters +appertaining to himself. With a decided taste for dress, yet his actual +knowledge of the kind of clothes worn by him from day to day was +amusingly inexact, as the following incident shows: Before wearing out +an only pair of trousers, the pioneer had indulged in the unusual luxury +of a new pair. But as there was still considerable service to be got out +of the old pair, he, like a prudent man, laid aside the new ones for +future use. His wife, however, who managed all this part of the domestic +business, determined, without consulting him, the morning when the new +trousers should be donned. She made the necessary changes when her lord +was in bed, putting the new in the place of the old. Garrison wore for +several days the new trousers, thinking all the time that they were his +old ones until his illusions in this regard were dispelled by an +incident which cost him the former. Some poor wretch of a tramp, +knocking in an evil hour at the pioneer's door and asking for clothes, +decided the magnificent possessor of two pairs of trousers, to don his +new ones and to pass the old ones on to the tramp. But when he +communicated the transaction to his wife, she hoped, with a good deal of +emphasis, that he had not given away the pair of breeches which he was +wearing, for if he had she would beg to inform him that he had given +away his best ones! But the pioneer's splendid indifference to _meum_ +and _tuum_ where his own possessions were concerned was equal to the +occasion. He got his compensation in the thought that his loss was +another's gain. That, indeed, was not to be accounted loss which had +gone to a brother-man whose needs were greater than his own. + + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. + + + +THE TURNING OF A LONG LANE. + + +Garrison's forecast of the future, directly after the annexation of +Texas, proved singularly correct. Never, as at that moment, had the +slave-power seemed so secure in its ascendency, yet never, at any +previous period, was it so near its downfall. Freedom had reached that +darkest hour just before dawn; and this, events were speedily to make +clear. If the South could have trammeled up the consequences of +annexation, secure, indeed, for a season, would it have held its +political supremacy in America? But omnipotent as was the slave-power in +the Government, it was not equal to this labor. In the great game, in +which Texas was the stakes, Fate had, unawares, slipped into the seat +between the gamesters with hands full of loaded dice. At the first throw +the South got Texas, at the second the war with Mexico fell out, and at +the third new national territory lay piled upon the boards. + +Calhoun, the arch-annexationist, struggled desperately to avert the war. +He saw as no other Southern leader saw its tremendous significance in +the conflict between the two halves of the Union for the political +balance. The admission of Texas had made an adjustment of this balance +in favor of the South. Calhoun's plan was to conciliate Mexico, to sweep +with our diplomatic broom the gathering war-clouds from the national +firmament. War, he knew, would imperil the freshly fortified position of +his section--war which meant at its close the acquisition of new +national territory, with which the North would insist upon retrieving +its reverse in the controversy over Texas. War, therefore, the great +nullifier resolved against. He cried halt to his army, but the army +heard not his voice, heeded not his orders, in the wild uproar and +clamor which arose at the sight of helpless Mexico, and the temptation +of adding fresh slave soil to the United States South, through her +spoliation; Calhoun confessed that, with the breaking out of hostilities +between the two republics an impenetrable curtain had shut from his eyes +the future. The great plot for maintaining the political domination of +the South had miscarried. New national territory had become inevitable +with the firing of the first gun. Seeing this, Calhoun endeavored to +postpone the evil day for the South by proposing a military policy of +"masterly inactivity" whereby time might be gained for his side to +prepare to meet the blow when it fell. But his "masterly inactivity" +policy was swept aside by the momentum of the national passion which the +war had aroused. + +California and New Mexico became the strategic points of the slavery +struggle at the close of the war. To open both to the immigration of +slave-labor was thenceforth the grand design of the South. Over Oregon +occurred a fierce preliminary trial of strength between the sections. +The South was thrown in the contest, and the anti-slavery principle of +the Ordinance of 1787 applied to the Territory. Calhoun, who was +apparently of the mind that as Oregon went so would go California and +New Mexico, was violently agitated by this reverse. "The great strife +between the North and the South is ended," he passionately declared. +Immediately the charge was made and widely circulated through the slave +States that the stronger was oppressing the weaker section, wresting +from it its just share in the common fruits of common victories. For had +not California and New Mexico been won by the bravery and blood of the +South as of the North, and how then was the North to deprive the South +of its joint ownership of them without destroying the federal equality +of the two halves of the Union? What was it but to subvert the Union +existing among the States? + +Disunion sentiment was thenceforth ladled out to the slave States in +increasing quantities. The turning of the long lane in the domination of +the slave-power was visibly near. With Garrison at one end and Calhoun +at the other the work of dissolution advanced apace. The latter +announced, in 1848, that the separation of the two sections was +complete. Ten years before, Garrison had made proclamation that the +Union, though not in form, was, nevertheless, in fact dissolved. And +possibly they were right. The line of cleavage had at the date of +Calhoun's announcement passed entirely through the grand strata of +national life, industrial, moral, political, and religious. There +remained indeed but a single bond of connection between the +slave-holding and the non-slave-holding States, viz., fealty to party. +But in 1848 not even this slender link was intact. + +The anti-slavery uprising was a fast growing factor in the politics of +the free States. This was evinced by the aggressiveness of anti-slavery +legislation, the repeal of slave sojournment laws, the enactment of +personal liberty laws, the increasing preference manifested by Whig and +by Democratic electors for anti-slavery Whig, and anti-slavery +Democratic leaders. Seward and Chase, and Hale and Hamlin, Thaddeus +Stevens and Joshua R. Giddings, were all in Congress in 1849. A +revolution was working in the North; a revolution was working in the +South. New and bolder spirits were rising to leadership in both +sections. On the Southern stage were Jefferson Davis, Barnwell Rhett, +David Atchison, Howell Cobb, Robert Toombs, and James M. Mason. The +outlook was portentous, tempestuous. + +The tide of excitement culminated in the crisis of 1850. The +extraordinary activity of the under-ground railroad system, and its +failure to open the national Territories to slave immigration had +transported the South to the verge of disunion. California, fought over +by the two foes, was in the act of withdrawing herself from the field of +contention to a position of independent Statehood. It was her rap for +admission into the Union as a free State which precipitated upon the +country the last of the compromises between freedom and slavery. It +sounded the opening of the final act of Southern domination in the +republic. + +The compromise of 1850, a series of five acts, three of which it took to +conciliate the South, while two were considered sufficient to satisfy +the North, was, after prolonged and stormy debate, adopted to save +Webster's glorious Union. These five acts were, in the agonized accents +of Clay, to heal "the five fire gaping wounds" of the country. But the +wounds were immedicable, as events were soon to prove. Besides, two at +least of the remedies failed to operate as emollients. They irritated +and inflamed the national ulcers and provoked fresh paroxysms of the +disease. The admission of California as a free State was a sort of +perpetual _memento mori_ to the slave-power. It hung forever over the +South the Damoclean blade of Northern political ascendency in the Union. +The fugitive slave law on the other hand produced results undreamt of by +its authors. Who would have ventured to predict the spontaneous, +irresistible insurrection of the humane forces and passions of the North +which broke out on the passage of the infamous bill? Who could have +foretold the moral and political consequences of its execution, for +instance, in Boston, which fifteen years before had mobbed anti-slavery +women and dragged Garrison through its streets? The moral indignation +aroused by the law in Massachusetts swept Webster and the Whigs from +power, carried Sumner to the Senate and crowned Liberty on Beacon Hill. +It worked a revolution in Massachusetts, it wrought changes of the +greatest magnitude in the free States. + +From this time the reign of discord became universal. The conflict +between the sections increased in virulence. At the door of every man +sat the fierce figure of strife. It fulmined from the pulpit and frowned +from the pews. The platforms of the free States resounded with the +thunder of tongues. The press exploded with the hot passions of the +hour. Parties warred against each other. Factions arose within parties +and fought among themselves with no less bitterness. Wrath is infectious +and the wrathful temper of the nation became epidemic. The Ishmaelitish +impulse to strike something or someone, was irresistible. The bonds +which had bound men to one another seemed everywhere loosening, and +people in masses were slipping away from old to enter into new +combinations of political activity. It was a period of tumultuous +transition and confusion. The times were topsy-turvy and old Night and +Chaos were the angels who sat by the bubbling abysses of the revolution. + +In the midst of this universal and violent agitation of the public mind +the old dread of disunion returned to torment the American +_bourgeoisie_, who through their presses, especially those of the +metropolis of the Union, turned fiercely upon the Abolitionists. While +the compromise measures were the subject of excited debate before +Congress, the anniversary meeting of the American Anti-Slavery Society +fell due. But the New York journals, the _Herald_ in particular, had no +mind to allow the meeting to take place without renewing the reign of +terror of fifteen years before. Garrison was depicted as worse than +Robespierre, with an insatiable appetite for the destruction of +established institutions, both human and divine. The dissolution of the +Union, the "overthrow of the churches, the Sabbath, and the Bible," all +were required to glut his malevolent passion. "Will the men of sense +allow meetings to be held in this city which are calculated to make our +country the arena of blood and murder," roared the _Herald_, "and render +our city an object of horror to the whole South?... Public opinion +should be regulated. These Abolitionists should not be allowed to +misrepresent New York." In order to suppress the Abolitionists that +paper did not blink at any means, however extreme or revolutionary, but +declared boldly in favor of throttling free discussion. "When free +discussion does not promote the public good," argued the editor, "it has +no more right to exist than a bad government that is dangerous and +oppressive to the common weal. It should be overthrown." The mob thus +invoked came forward on the opening of the convention to overthrow free +discussion. + +The storm which the New York press was at so much labor to brew, +Garrison did not doubt would break over the convention. He went to it in +a truly apostolic spirit of self-sacrifice. "Not knowing the things that +shall befall me there, saving that bonds and afflictions abide with me +in every city," he wrote his wife an hour before the commencement of the +convention. His prevision of violence was quickly fulfilled. He had +called Francis Jackson to the chair during the delivery of the opening +speech which fell to the pioneer to make as the president of the +society. His subject was the Religion of the Country, to which he was +paying his respects in genuine Garrisonian fashion. Belief in Jesus in +the United States had no vital influence on conduct or character. The +chief religious denominations were in practice pro-slavery, they had +uttered no protest against the national sin. There was the Roman +Catholic Church whose "priests and members held slaves without incurring +the rebuke of the Church." At this point the orator was interrupted by +one of those monstrous products of the slums of the American metropolis, +compounded of the bully, the blackleg, and the demagogue in about equal +proportions. It was the notorious Captain Isaiah Rynders, perched with +his band of blackguards in the organ loft of the tabernacle and ready to +do the will of the metropolitan journals by over-throwing the right of +free discussion. He was not disposed to permit Mr. Garrison's censure of +the Roman Catholic Church to pass unchallenged, so he begged to ask +"whether there are no other churches as well as the Catholic Church, +whose clergy and lay members hold slaves?" To which the anti-slavery +leader replied with the utmost composure, not inclined to let even +Captain Rynders interrupt the even and orderly progression of his +discourse: "Will the friend wait for a moment, and I will answer him in +reference to other churches?" "The friend" thereupon resumed his seat in +the organ loft, and Garrison proceeded with his indictment of the +churches. There was the Episcopal Church, whose clergy and laity dealt +with impunity in human flesh, and the Presbyterians, whose ministers and +members did likewise without apparently any compunctious visitings of +conscience, ditto the Baptist, ditto the Methodist. In fact "all the +sects are combined," the orator sternly continued, "to prevent that +jubilee which it is the will of God should come." + +But the bully in the organ loft, who was not content for long to play +the part of Patience on a monument, interrupted the speaker with a +second question which he looked upon, doubtless, as a hard nut to crack. +"Are you aware," inquired the blackleg "that the slaves in the South +have their prayer-meetings in honor of Christ?" The nut was quickly +crushed between the sharp teeth of the orator's scathing retort. Mr. +Garrison--"Not a slave-holding or a slave-breeding Jesus. (Sensation.) +The slaves believe in a Jesus that strikes off chains. In this country +Jesus has become obsolete. A profession in him is no longer a test. Who +objects to his course in Judæa? The old Pharisees are extinct, and may +safely be denounced. Jesus is the most respectable person in the United +States. (Great sensation and murmurs of disapprobation.) Jesus sits in +the President's chair of the United States. (A thrill of horror here +seemed to run through the assembly.) Zachary Taylor sits there, which is +the same thing, for he believes in Jesus. He believes in war, and the +Jesus that 'gave the Mexicans hell.'" (Sensation, uproar, and +confusion.) + +This rather sulphurous allusion to the President of the glorious Union, +albeit in language used by himself in a famous order during the Mexican +War, acted as a red rag upon the human bull in the organ loft, who, now +beside himself with passion, plunged madly down to the platform with his +howling mob at his heels. "I will not allow you to assail the President +of the United States. You shan't do it!" bellowed the blackguard, +shaking his fist at Mr. Garrison. But Mr. Garrison, with that +extraordinary serenity of manner which was all his own, parleyed with +the ruffian, as if he was no ruffian and had no mob at his back. "You +ought not to interrupt us," he remonstrated with gentle dignity. "We go +upon the principle of hearing everybody. If you wish to speak, I will +keep order, and you shall be heard." Rynders was finally quieted by the +offer of Francis Jackson to give him a hearing as soon as Mr. Garrison +had brought his address to an end. + +Rev. W.H. Furness, of Philadelphia, who was a member of the convention +and also one of the speakers, has preserved for us the contrasts of the +occasion. "The close of Mr. Garrison's address," says he, "brought down +Rynders again, who vociferated and harangued at one time on the +platform, and then pushing down into the aisles, like a madman followed +by his keepers. Through the whole, nothing could be more patient and +serene than the bearing of Mr. Garrison. I have always revered Mr. +Garrison for his devoted, uncompromising fidelity to his great cause. +Today I was touched to the heart by his calm and gentle manners. There +was no agitation, no scorn, no heat, but the quietness of a man engaged +in simple duties." + +The madman and his keepers were quite vanquished on the first day of the +convention by the wit, repartee, and eloquence of Frederick Douglass, +Dr. Furness, and Rev. Samuel R. Ward, whom Wendell Phillips described as +so black that "when he shut his eyes you could not see him." But it was +otherwise on the second day when public opinion was "regulated," and +free discussion overthrown by Captain Rynders and his villainous gang, +who were resolved, with the authors of the compromise, that the Union as +it was should be preserved. + +But, notwithstanding the high authority and achievements of this noble +band of patriots and brothers, Garrison's detestation of the Union but +increased, and his cry for its dissolution grew deeper and louder. And +no wonder. For never had the compact between freedom and slavery seemed +more hateful than after the passage of the Fugitive Slave Bill. The +state of panic which it created among the colored people in the free +States will form, if ever written down, one of the most heartrending +chapters in human history. Hundreds and thousands fled from their homes +into the jaws of a Canadian winter to escape the jaws of the +slave-hounds, whose fierce baying began presently to fill the land from +Massachusetts to Ohio. It made no difference whether these miserable +people had been always free or were fugitives from slavery, the terror +spread among them all the same. The aged and the young turned their +backs upon their homes and hurried precipitately into a strange country. +Fathers with wives and children dependant upon them for their daily +bread, were forced by the dread of being captured and returned to +bondage to abandon their homes and loved ones, sometimes without so much +as a touch of their hands or a tone of their voices in token of +farewell. Perhaps on his way to work in the morning some husband or son +has caught a glimpse among the faces on the street of one face, the +remembrance of which to the day of death, he can never lose, a face he +had known in some far away Southern town or plantation, and with which +are connected in the poor fellow's brain the most frightful sufferings +and associations. Crazed at the sight, with no thought of home, of the +labors which are awaiting him, oblivious of everything but the abject +terror which has suddenly taken possession of him, he hastens away to +hide and fly, fly and hide, until he reaches a land where slave-hounds +enter not, and panting fugitives find freedom. Wendell Phillips tells of +an old woman of seventy who asked his advice about flying, though +originally free, and fearful only of being caught up by mistake. The +distress everywhere was awful, the excitement indescribable. From Boston +alone in the brief space of three weeks after the rescue of Shadrach, +nearly a hundred of these panic stricken creatures had fled. The whole +number escaping into Canada Charles Sumner placed as high as six +thousand souls. But in addition to this large band of fugitives, others +emigrated to the interior of New England away from the seaboard centers +of trade and commerce where the men-hunters abounded. + +The excitement and the perils of this period were not confined to the +colored people. Their white friends shared both with them. We are +indebted to Mr. Phillips for the following graphic account of these +excitements and perils in Boston in March, 1851. He has been describing +the situation in the city, in respect of the execution of the infamous +law, to Elizabeth Pease, and goes on thus: "I need not enlarge on this; +but the long evening sessions--debates about secret escapes--plans to +evade where we can't resist--the door watched that no spy may enter--the +whispering consultations of the morning--some putting property out of +their hands, planning to incur penalties, and planning also that, in +case of conviction, the Government may get nothing from them--the doing, +and answering no questions--intimates forbearing to ask the knowledge +which it may be dangerous to have--all remind one of those foreign +scenes which have hitherto been known to us, transatlantic republicans, +only in books." + +On the passage of the Black Bill, as the Abolitionists stigmatised the +law, it was not believed that the moral sentiment of Boston would +execute it, so horrified did the community seem. But it was soon +apparent to the venerable Josiah Quincy that "The Boston of 1851 is not +the Boston of 1775. Boston," the sage goes on to remark, "has now become +a mere shop--a place for buying and selling goods; and, I suppose, also +of _buying and selling men_." The great idol of her shopkeepers, Daniel +Webster, having striven mightily for the enactment of the hateful bill +while Senator of the United States, had gone into Millard Fillmore's +Cabinet, to labor yet more mightily for its enforcement. The rescue of +Shadrach, which Mr. Secretary of State characterized "as a case of +treason," set him to thundering for the Union as it was, and against the +"fanatics," who were stirring up the people of the free States to resist +the execution of the Fugitive Slave Law. But he was no longer "the +God-like" Webster, for he appeared to the editor of the _Liberator_ as +"an ordinary-looking, poor, decrepit old man, whose limbs could scarce +support him; lank with age; whose sluggish legs were somewhat concealed +by an over-shadowing abdomen; with head downcast and arms shriveled, and +dangling almost helpless by his side, and incapable of being magnetized +for the use of the orator." The voice and the front of "the God-like" +had preceded the "poor decrepit old man" to the grave. Garrison dealt no +less roughly and irreverently with another of the authors of the wicked +law and another of the superannuated divinities of a shopkeeping North, +Henry Clay. "HENRY CLAY, with one foot in the grave," exclaimed the +reformer, "and just ready to have both body and soul cast into hell, as +if eager to make his damnation doubly sure, rises in the United States +Senate and proposes an inquiry into the expediency of passing yet +another law, by which every one who shall dare peep or mutter against +the execution of the Fugitive Slave Bill shall have his life crushed +out." + +In those trial times words from the mouth or the pen of Abolitionists +had the force of deadly missiles. Incapacitated as Garrison was to +resort to physical resistance to the Fugitive Slave Law by his +non-resistant doctrine, it seemed that all the energy and belligerency +of the man went into the most tremendous verbal expressions. They were +like adamantine projectiles flung with the savage strength of a catapult +against the walls of slavery. The big sinners, like Webster and Clay, he +singled out for condign punishment, were objects of his utmost +severities of speech. It was thus that he essayed to breach the iron +dungeon in which the national iniquity had shut the national conscience. +Saturated was the reformer's mind with the thought of the Bible, its +solemn and awful imagery, its fiery and prophetic abhorrence and +denunciations of national sins, all of which furnished him an unfailing +magazine whence were drawn the bolts which he launched against the giant +sin and the giant sinners of his time. And so Clay had not only "one +foot in the grave," but was "just ready to have both body and soul cast +into hell." + +While physical resistance of the Slave Law was wholly out of the +question with Garrison, he, nevertheless, refused to condemn the men +with whom it was otherwise. Here he was anything but a fanatic. All that +he required was that each should be consistent with his principles. If +those principles bade him resist the enforcement of the Black Bill, the +apostle of non-resistance was sorry enough, but in this emergency, +though he possessed the gentleness of the dove, he also practised the +wisdom of the serpent. That truth moves with men upon lower as well as +higher planes he well knew. It is always partial and many-colored, +refracted as it is through the prisms of human passion and prejudice. If +it appear unto some minds in the red bar of strife and blood, so be it. +Each must follow the light which it is given him to discern, whether the +blue of love or the red of war. Great coadjutors, like Wendell Phillips, +Theodore Parker, and Dr. Henry I. Bowditch, were for forcible resistance +to the execution of the law. So were the colored people. Preparations to +this end went on vigorously in Boston under the direction of the +Vigilance Committee. The Crafts escaped the clutches of the +slave-hunters, so did Shadrach escape them, but Sims and Burns fell into +them and were returned to bondage. + +From this time on Wendell Phillips became in Boston and in the North +more distinctly the leader of the Abolition sentiment. The period of +pure moral agitation ended with the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law. +That act opened a new era in the movement, an era in which +non-resistance had no place, an era in which a resort to physical force +in settlement of sectional differences, the whole trend of things were +making inevitable. Fighting, the Anglo-Saxon method, as Theodore Parker +characterized it, of making a final settlement of just such +controversies as was the slavery question, was in the air, had become +without any general consciousness of it at the time appearing in the +popular mind, a foregone conclusion, from the moment that the South +wrested from the National Government the right to defy and override the +moral sentiment of free State communities. With this advance of the +anti-slavery agitation a stage nearer the end, when fighting would +supersede all other methods, the fighters gravitated naturally to the +front of the conflict, and the apostle of non-resistance fell somewhat +into the background of the great movement started by him. + +Garrison had begun, indeed, to recognize that there were other ways +besides his way of abolishing slavery--had begun to see that these with +his led to Rome, to the ultimate extinction of the evil, to which +anti-slavery unionists and disunionists were alike devoted. His innate +sagacity and strong sense of justice lifted the reformer to larger +toleration of mind. At a dinner given in Boston in May, 1853, by the +Free Democracy to John P. Hale, he was not only present to testify his +appreciation of the courage and services of Mr. Hale to the common +cause, but while there was able to speak thus tolerantly--tolerantly for +him certainly--of a Union dear to the company about the table yet +hateful beyond measure to himself: "Sir, you will pardon me," spoke the +arch anti-slavery disunionist, "for the reference. I have heard +something here about our Union, about the value of the Union, and the +importance of preserving the Union, Gentlemen, if you have been so +fortunate as to find a Union worth preserving, I heartily congratulate +you. Cling to it with all your souls!" For himself, he has not been so +fortunate. With a price set on his head in one of the Southern States, +and outlawed in all of them, he begs to be pardoned if found lacking in +loyalty to the existing Union, which to him, alas: "is but another name +for the iron reign of the slave-power. We have no common country as yet. +God grant we may have. We shall have it when the jubilee comes--and not +till then," he declared, mindful of the convictions of others, yet +bravely true to his own. The seeds of liberty, of hatred of the +slave-power, planted by Garrison were springing up in a splendid crop +through the North. Much of the political anti-slavery of the times were +the fruit of his endeavor. Wendell Phillips has pointed out how the +Liberty party was benefited by the meetings and speeches of Garrisonian +Abolitionists. What was true of the Liberty party was equally true of +Free Soil and Free Democracy. Although the little band remained small, +it was potent in swelling, year after year, the anti-slavery membership +of all the parties, Whig and Democratic, as well as of those already +mentioned. "Uncle Tom's Cabin" might fairly be classed among the large +indirect results produced by Garrison. "But," as Phillips justly +remarked, "'Uncle Tom' would never have been written had not Garrison +developed the facts; and never would have succeeded had he not created +readers and purchasers." Garrisonism had become an influence, a power +that made for liberty and against slavery in the United States. It had +become such also in Great Britain. George Thompson, writing the pioneer +of the marvelous sale of "Uncle Tom" in England, and of the +unprecedented demand for anti-slavery literature, traced their source to +his friend: "Behold the fruit of your labors," he exclaimed, "and +rejoice." + +Mr. Garrison's pungent characterization of the "Union" at the dinner of +the Free Democracy as "but another name for the iron reign of the +slave-power," found almost instant illustration of its truth in the +startling demand of that power for the repeal of the Missouri +Compromise. In 1850 the South lost California, but it received at the +time an advantage of far-reaching consequence, viz., the admission of +the principle of federal non-intervention upon the subject of slavery in +the national Territories into the bill organizing Territorial +Governments for New Mexico and Utah. The train which was to blow down +the slave wall of 1820 and open to slave immigration the northern half +of the Louisiana Territory, was laid in the compromise measures of 1850. + +Calhoun, strongly dissatisfied as he was with the Missouri settlement, +recoiled from countenancing any agitation on the part of the South +looking to its repeal on the ground that such action was calculated to +disturb "the peace and harmony of the Union." But four years after the +death of the great nullifier, his disciples and followers dared to +consummate a crime, the consequences of which he shrank from inviting. +The political conditions four years had indeed modified in one important +particular at least. In Calhoun's lifetime, there was no Northern leader +bold enough to undertake to engineer an act of abrogation through +Congress. If the North were willing, possessed sufficient magnanimity, +to surrender, in the interest of brotherly love between the sections, +the benefits which inured to it under the Missouri Compromise, neither +Calhoun nor the South would have declined the proffered sacrifice. The +selection of Stephen A. Douglas in 1854 as the leader of the movement +for repeal put a new face on the business, which was thereby made to +appear to proceed from the free, not from the slave States. This was +adroit, the fixing upon the losing section the initiative and the +responsibility of the act of abrogation. + +Besides this element, there was another not less specious which lent to +the scheme an air of fairness, and that was the application to the +Territories of the American principle of local self-government, in other +words, the leaving to the people of the Territories the right to vote +slavery up or vote it down, as they might elect. The game was a deep +one, worthy of the machinations of its Northern and Southern authors. +But, like other elaborate schemes of mice and men, it went to pieces +under the fatal stroke of an unexpected circumstance. The act which +abrogated the Missouri Compromise broke the much-enduring back of +Northern patience at the same time. In the struggle for the repeal +Southern Whigs and Southern Democrats forgot their traditionary party +differences in battling for Southern interests, which was not more or +less than the extension to the national Territories of the peculiar +institution. The final recognition of this ugly fact on the part of the +free States, raised a popular flood in them big enough to whelm the Whig +party and to float a great political organization, devoted to +uncompromising opposition to the farther extension of slavery. The +sectionalism of slavery was at last met by the sectionalism of freedom. +From that moment the old Union, with its slave compromises, was doomed. +In the conflict then impending its dissolution was merely a matter of +time, unless indeed the North should prove strong enough to preserve it +by the might of its arms, seeing that the North still clung passionately +to the idea of national unity. + +Not so, however, was it with Garrison. Sharper and sterner rose his +voice against any union with Slaveholders. On the Fourth of July +following the repeal of the Missouri Compromise, the reformer at +Framingham, Mass., gave a fresh and startling sign of his hatred of the +Union by burning publicly the Constitution of the United States. Before +doing so however, he consigned to the flames a copy of the _Fugitive +Slave Law_, next the decision of Judge Loring remanding Anthony Burns to +slavery, also the charge of Judge Benjamin R. Curtis to the Grand Jury +touching the assault upon the court-house for the rescue of Burns. Then +holding up the United States Constitution, he branded it as the source +and parent of all the other atrocities--a covenant with death and an +agreement with hell--and consumed it to ashes on the spot, exclaiming, +"So perish all compromises with tyranny! And let all the people say, +Amen!" This dramatic act and the "tremendous shout" which "went up to +heaven in ratification of the deed" from the assembled multitude, what +were they but the prophecy of a fiercer fire already burning in the +land, soon to blaze about the pillars of the Union, of a more tremendous +shout soon to burst with the wrath of a divided people over that + + "perfidious bark + Built i' th' eclipse, and rigged with curses dark." + + + + + + +CHAPTER XIX. + + + +FACE TO FACE. + + +Face to face at last were freedom and slavery. The final struggle +between them for mastery had come. Narrow, indeed, was the issue that +divided the combatants, slavery extension on the one side, and slavery +restriction on the other, not total and immediate emancipation, but it +was none the less vital and supreme to the two enemies. Back of the +Southern demand for "More slave soil" stood a solid South, back of the +Northern position, "No more slave soil" was rallying a fast uniting +North. The political revolution, produced by the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, +advanced apace through the free States from Maine to Michigan. A +flood-tide of Northern resistance had suddenly risen against the +slave-power. + +Higher than anywhere else rose this flood-tide in Massachusetts. The +judge who remanded Anthony Burns to slavery was removed from office, and +a Personal Liberty Law, with provisions as bold as they were thorough, +enacted for the protection of fugitive slaves. Mr. Garrison sat beside +the President of the State Senate when that body voted to remove Judge +Loring from his office. Such was Massachusetts's answer to the +abrogation of the Missouri Compromise, and a triumphant slave-power. Its +instant effect was to accelerate in the South the action of the disunion +working forces there, to hurry the inevitable moment when the two +sections would rush together in a death-grapple within or without +Webster's once glorious Union. + +Indeed the foes had already closed in a frightful wrestle for the +possession of Kansas. When the National Government adopted the popular +sovereignty doctrine in solution of the Territorial problem between the +two halves of the Union, freedom and slavery thereupon precipitated +their forces upon the debatable land, and, for the first time, the men +of the North and the men of the South came into actual physical +collision in defence of their respective ideas and institutions. The +possession of land is nine points of the law among Anglo-Saxons, and for +this immense advantage both sides flung themselves into Kansas--the +North by means of emigrant aid societies, the South by means of bands of +Border ruffians under the direction of a United States Senator. It was +distinctly understood and ordained in connection with the repeal of the +compromise of 1820, that final possession of the Territories then thrown +open to slave labor should be determined by the people inhabiting the +same. In the contest for peopling Kansas the superior colonizing +resources of the free States was presently made manifest. They, in any +fair contest with ballots, had a majority of the polls, and were, +therefore, able to vote slavery down. Worsted as the South clearly was +in a show of heads, it threw itself back upon fraud and force to decide +the issue in its favor. The cartridge-box took the place of the +ballot-box in bleeding Kansas, and violence and anarchy, as a +consequence, reigned therein for the space of several years. + +This is no place to depict those scenes of slave-holding outrages, +supported as they were by a Northern President with Southern principles. +The sight of them rapidly changed the pacific character of the free +States. Many a peace man dropped his peace principles before this bloody +duel between the civilization of the South and that of the North. +Ministers and churches took up collections to send, not Bibles, but +Sharp's rifles to their brethren in Kansas. The South had appealed to +the sword, and the North had sternly accepted the challenge. War was in +the air, and the Northern temper, without there being any general +consciousness of it, was fast mounting to the war point in the +thermometer of the passions, thanks to the perfidy and ruffianism of the +slave-power in Congress and Kansas. + +This trend and strong undertow of the nation toward a civil outbreak and +commotion, though unnoted by the multitude, was yet, nevertheless, seen +and felt by many thoughtful and far-seeing minds; and by no one more +clearly than by T.W. Higginson, who at the twentieth anniversary of the +Boston mob, discoursed thus on this head: "Mr. Phillips told us that on +this day, twenty years ago, the military could not protect the meeting, +because the guns were outside in the mob--or the men who should have +carried them! There has been a time since when the men were on the +outside and the guns too; and as surely as this earth turns on its axis, +that time will come again! And it is for you, men, who hear me, to think +what you will do when that time comes; and it is for you, women, who +hear me, to think what you will do, and what you are willing--I will not +say, to _consent_ that those you love should do, but what you are +willing to _urge_ them to do, and to send them from your homes, knowing +that they will do it, whether they live or die." The murderous assault +upon Charles Sumner in the Senate Chamber at Washington by Preston S. +Brooks, served to intensify the increasing belligerency of the Northern +temper, to deepen the spreading conviction that the irrepressible +conflict would be settled not with the pen through any more fruitless +compromises, but in Anglo-Saxon fashion by blood and iron. + +Amid this general access of the fighting propensity, Garrison preserved +the integrity of his non-resistant principles, his aversion to the use +of physical force as an anti-slavery weapon. Men like Charles Stearns +talked of shouldering their Sharp's rifles against the Border ruffians +as they would against wild beasts. For himself, he could not class any +of his fellow-creatures, however vicious and wicked, on the same level +with wild beasts. Those wretches were, he granted, as bad and brutal as +they were represented by the free State men of Kansas, but to him they +were less blameworthy than were their employers and indorsers, the +pro-slavery President and his Cabinet, pro-slavery Congressmen, and +judges, and doctors of divinity, and editors. Incomparably guilty as +these "colossal conspirators against the liberty, peace, happiness, and +safety of the republic" were; and, though his moral indignation "against +their treasonable course" burned like fire, he, nevertheless, wished +them no harm. He shrank from the idea of the physical collision of man +with a brother man, and with him all mankind were brothers. No one is +able to draw a sword or point a rifle at any member of the human family, +"in a Christian state of mind." He held to Jesus, who condemned +violence, forbade the entertainment by his disciples of retaliatory +feelings and the use of retaliatory weapons. When Jesus said "Love your +enemies," he did not mean, "Kill them if they go too far." + +Garrison's moral radicalism and political sagacity were never exhibited +to better advantage than during these tremendous years of the crisis. He +saw the sudden rise of a great political organization opposed to the +farther extension of slavery to national territory. It was by no means a +party after his heart, and for total and immediate emancipation, and the +dissolution of the Union, yet he perceived that while this was true, it +was, nevertheless, in its narrow purpose, battling against the +slave-power, fighting the slave system, and to this extent was worthy of +the commendation of Abolitionists. "It helps to disseminate no small +amount of light and knowledge," the reformer acutely observed, "in +regard to the nature and workings of the slave system, being +necessitated to do this to maintain its position; and thus, for the time +being, it is moulding public sentiment in the right direction, though +with no purpose to aid us in the specific work we are striving to +accomplish, namely, the dissolution of the Union, and the abolition of +slavery throughout the land." While bating no jot of his anti-slavery +principles, he all the same put in practice the apostolic injunction to +give credit to whom credit is due, by cordially commending what he found +worthy of commendation in the purpose and policy of the Republican +party, and by urging a like conduct upon his followers. In the +Presidential canvass of 1856 his sympathies went strongly with Frémont +as against Buchanan and Fillmore, although his Abolition principles +precluded him from voting for the Republican candidate or from urging +his disciples to vote for him. But, barring this moral barrier, had he +"a million votes to bestow" he "would cast them all for Frémont ... not +because he is an Abolitionist or a Disunionist ... but because he is for +the non-extension of slavery, in common with the great body of the +people of the North, whose attachment to the Union amounts to idolatry." + +When the election was over the motto of the _Liberator_ was still "No +union with slaveholders," and would have remained the same though +Frémont instead of Buchanan had triumphed at the polls, until indeed the +domination of the slave-power had ended, and the North and the National +Constitution had been divorced from all criminal connection with +slavery. The anti-slavery agitation for the dissolution of the Union +went on with increased zeal. A State convention, called by T.W. +Higginson and others, "to consider the practicability, probability, and +expediency of a separation between the free and slave States, and to +take such other measures as the condition of the times may require," met +at Worcester, Mass., January 15, 1857, with Frank W. Bird in the chair, +and William Lloyd Garrison among the vice-presidents. The pioneer's +speech on the occasion was a characteristic and noteworthy utterance. +Its tone throughout was grave and argumentative. Here is a specimen of +it, and of the way in which he met the most serious objection to the +Abolition movement for disunion: "The air is filled with objections to a +movement of this kind. I am neither surprised nor disquieted at this. +One of these is of a very singular nature, and it is gravely urged that +it is conclusive against disunion. It is to this effect: We must remain +in the Union because it would be inhuman in us to turn our backs upon +millions of slaves in the Southern States, and to leave them to their +fate! Men who have never been heard of in the anti-slavery ranks, or who +are ever submitting to a compromise of principle, have their bowels +wonderfully moved all at once with sympathy for the suffering slave! +Even our esteemed friend, Theodore Parker (who deals in no cant) says, +in his letter, that he cannot consent to cut himself off from the slave +population. Now, we who are engaged in this movement claim to be equally +concerned for the liberation of the slave. If we have not yet proved our +willingness to suffer the loss of all things, rather than turn and flee, +God knows that we are prepared to bear any new cross that He, in His +Providence, may be disposed to lay upon us. For one, I make no parade of +my anxiety for the deliverance of those in bondage; but I do say that it +strikes me as remarkable that those who, for a quarter of a century, +have borne the heat and burden of the day, should have the imputation +cast upon them of intending to leave four millions of slaves in their +chains, by seeking the overthrow of this Union!... + +" ... I declare that this talk of leaving the slave to his fate is not a +true representation of the case; and it indicates a strange dullness of +comprehension with regard to our position and purpose. What! Is it to +forsake the slave when I cease to be the aider and abettor of his +master? What! When the North is pressing down upon four millions of +slaves like an avalanche, and we say to her, 'Take off that +pressure--stand aside--give the slave a chance to regain his feet and +assert his freedom!' is that turning our backs upon him? Here, for +example, is a man engaged in highway robbery, and another man is acting +as an accessory, without whose aid the robber cannot succeed. In saying +to the accomplice. 'Hands off! Don't aid the villain!' shall I be told +that this is enabling the highwayman to rob with impunity? What an +absurdity! Are we not trying to save the pockets of all travelers from +being picked in seeking to break up all connection with highway +robbery?" + +The convention projected a general convention of the free States to +consider the subject, and "_Resolved_, That the sooner the separation +takes place, the more peaceful it will be; but that peace or war is _a +secondary consideration_ in view of our present perils. Slavery must be +conquered, peaceably if we can, forcibly if we must." The projected +general convention, owing to the monetary crisis of 1857, did not take +place; but the extraordinary public excitement on the slavery question +increased rather than diminished during the year. The increasing menace +to the domination of the slave-power from this source had become so +great that it was deemed prudent on the part of the upholders of that +power to allay it by means of an authoritative utterance upon the vexed +question of slavery in the national Territories from the highest +judicial tribunal in the Land. The Northern respect for the opinion of +the Supreme Court, the South and her allies in the free States counted +upon as the vehicle of the quieting medicament. For, if the Missouri +Compromise were pronounced by that Court unconstitutional and, +therefore, _ab initio_, null and void, no wrong was done the North +through its formal repeal by Congress. The act of abrogation, in this +view, added nothing to the South which did not belong to it as well +before as after its passage, detracted nothing from the North which was +justly its due in the premises. In pursuance of this cunningly devised +scheme the Supreme Court delivered itself of an opinion in the famous +"Dred Scott Case." So abhorrent it was to the intelligence and moral +sense of the free States, that it produced results altogether opposed to +those designed by the men who invoked it. Instead of checking, the +execrated judgment augmented enormously the existing excitement. +Garrison's bitter taunt that "the Union is but another name for the iron +reign of the slave-power," was driven home to the North, by the Dred +Scott decision, with the logic of another unanswerable fact. Confidence +in the independence and impartiality of the Supreme Court was seriously +shaken, and widespread suspicion struck root at the North touching the +subserviency of that tribunal to the interests and designs of the +slave-power. + +The popular agitation at this fresh and alarming evidence of the purpose +and power of the South upset the machinations of the schemers, swelled +the numerical strength of the new Northern party opposed to the +Territorial aggressions and pretensions of the slave section. So rapid +was the growth of the Republican party that the slave leaders +anticipated its accession to power at the then next Presidential +election. So certain were they in their forebodings of defeat that they +set about in dead earnest to put their side of the divided house in +order for the impending struggle for Southern independence. Military +preparations went forward with a vengeance, arms and munitions of war +which were the property of the General Government began to move +southward, to Southern military depots and posts for the defence of the +United States South, when at last the word "DISUNION" should be +pronounced over the Republic. The Lincoln-Douglass debate augmented +everywhere the excitement, fed the already mighty numbers of the new +party. More and more the public consciousness and conviction were +squaring with Mr. Lincoln's oracular words in respect that the Union +could not "endure permanently half slave and half free." + +The darkness and tumult of the rising tempest were advancing apace, when +suddenly there burst from the national firmament the first warning peal +of thunder, and over Virginia there sped the first bolt of the storm. +John Brown with his brave little band, at Harper's Ferry, had struck for +the freedom of the slave. Tired of words, the believer in blood and iron +as a deliverer, had crossed from Pennsylvania into Virginia on the +evening of October 16, 1859, and seized the United States Armory at +Harper's Ferry. Although soon overpowered, captured, tried, and hanged +for his pains by the slave-power, the martyr had builded better than he +knew. For the blow struck by him then and there ended almost abruptly +the period of argument and ushered in the period of arms. The jar from +that battle-ax at the roots of the slave system hurled together in a +death struggle right and wrong, freedom and slavery, in the republic. + +This attempt on the part of John Brown to liberate the slaves seemed to +Garrison "misguided, wild, and apparently insane, though disinterested +and well-intended." On non-resistant grounds he deplored this use of the +sword to effect emancipation, and condemned the leader. But, judging him +according to the standard of Bunker Hill and the men of 1776, he did not +doubt that Brown deserved "to be held in grateful and honorable +remembrance to the latest posterity, by all those who glory in the deeds +of a Wallace or Tell, a Washington or Warren." + +The raid of Brown and his subsequent execution, and their reception at +the North revealed how vast was the revolution in public sentiment on +the slavery question which had taken place there, since the murder of +Lovejoy, eighteen years before. Lovejoy died defending the right of free +speech and the liberty of the press, yet the Attorney-General of +Massachusetts declared that "he died as the fool dieth." Brown died in +an invasion of a slave State, and in an effort to emancipate the slaves +with a band of eighteen followers, and he was acclaimed, from one end of +the free States to the other, hero and martyr. Mr. Garrison commenting +on this immensely significant fact, acutely and justly observed that: +"The sympathy and admiration now so widely felt for him, prove how +marvelous has been the change affected in public opinion during the +thirty years of moral agitation--a change so great indeed, that whereas, +ten years since, there were thousands who could not endure my lightest +word of rebuke of the South, they can now easily swallow John Brown +whole and his rifle into the bargain. In firing his gun, he has merely +told us what time of day it is. It is high noon, thank God!" + +But there is another circumstance hardly less significant of another +change at the North even more momentous than the one just noted. + +On December 2d, the day on which Brown was hung, solemn funeral +observances were held throughout the North by Abolitionists. At the +great meeting in Boston, held in Tremont Temple, and presided over by +Samuel E. Sewall, Garrison inquired as to the number of non-resistants +who were present. To this question there came a solitary reply. There +was but one non-resistant beside himself in the hall. Where were his +followers? Why had they forsaken their principles? The tide of Northern +belligerency, which was everywhere rising to its flood, everywhere +rushing and mounting to the tops of those dams which separate war and +peace had swept away his followers, had caused them to forsake their +principles. True to their Anglo-Saxon instinct, they had reverted to the +more human, if less Christian method of cutting the Gordian knot of the +republic with the sword. + +The irresistible drift of the North toward the point where peace ends +and war begins, which that solitary "I" at the John Brown meeting +denoted, was still further indicated by what appeared not wholly unlike +a change in Mr. Garrison's attitude on the same subject. His +non-resistant position was the same, but somehow his face seemed to turn +warward too, with the rest of the nation, in the following passage taken +from his address at that John Brown meeting: + +"Nevertheless, I am a non-resistant," said he, speaking to that solitary +confession of non-resistance principles, "and I not only desire, but +have labored unremittingly to effect the peaceful abolition of slavery, +by an appeal to the reason and conscience of the slaveholder; yet, as a +peace man, an ultra peace man, I am prepared to say: Success to every +slave insurrection at the South, and in every slave country. And I do +not see how I compromise or stain my peace profession in making that +declaration. Whenever there is a contest between the oppressed and the +oppressor, the weapons being equal between the parties, God knows that +my heart must be with the oppressed, and always against the oppressor. +Therefore, whenever commenced, I cannot but wish success to all slave +insurrections.... Rather than see men wearing their chains, in a +cowardly and servile spirit, I would as an advocate of peace, much +rather see them breaking the head of the tyrant with their chains. Give +me, as a non-resistant, Bunker Hill, and Lexington, and Concord, rather +than the cowardice and servility of a Southern slave plantation." + +The unmistakable signs of disintegration, the swift action of the +national tragedy, the Charleston Convention, the disruption of the +Democratic party, the last bond between the North and the South, filled +the heart of the pioneer with solemn joy. "Only think of it!" he exulted +at the anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society in New York, May +8, 1860; "only think of it! the party which has for so many years cried +out, 'There must be no agitation on this subject' is now the most +agitated of all the parties in the country. The party which declares +that there ought not to be any sectionalism as against slavery, has now +been sundered geographically, and on this very question! The party which +had said, 'Let discussions cease forever,' is busily engaged in the +discussion, so that, possibly, the American Anti-Slavery Society might +adjourn _sine die_, after we get through with our present meetings, and +leave its work to be carried on in the other direction!" This was all +true enough. The sections were at last sundered, and a day of wrath was +rising dark and dreadful over "States dissevered, discordant, +belligerent." + + + + + +CHAPTER XX. + + + +THE DEATH-GRAPPLE. + + +The triumph of the Republican party at the polls was the signal for the +work of dissolution to begin. Webster's terrific vision of "a land rent +with civil feuds" became reality in the short space of six weeks after +Lincoln's election, by the secession of South Carolina from the Union. +Quickly other Southern States followed, until a United States South was +organized, the chief stone in the corner of the new political edifice +being Negro slavery. It was not six weeks after the inauguration of +Abraham Lincoln, when the roar of cannon in Charleston Harbor announced +to the startled country that war between the States had begun. The first +call of the new President for troops to put down the rebellion and to +save the Union, and the patriotic uprising which it evoked made it plain +that the struggle thus opened was to be nothing less than a +death-grapple between the two sections. + +Before the attack on Fort Sumter, Garrison was opposed to coercing the +rebel States back into the Union. He admitted the Constitutional power +of the National Government to employ force in maintaining the integrity +of the Republic. "The Federal Government must not pretend to be in +actual operation, embracing thirty-four States," the editor of the +_Liberator_ commented, "and then allow the seceding States to trample +upon its flag, steal its property, and defy its authority with impunity; +for it would then be (as it is at this moment) a mockery and a +laughing-stock. Nevertheless to think of whipping the South (for she +will be a unit on the question of slavery) into subjection, and +extorting allegiance from millions of people at the cannon's mouth, is +utterly chimerical. True, it is in the power of the North to deluge her +soil with blood, and inflict upon her the most terrible sufferings; but +not to conquer her spirit, or change her determination." + +He, therefore, proposed that "the people of the North should recognize +the fact that THE UNION IS DISSOLVED, and act accordingly. They should +see, in the madness of the South, the hand of God, liberating them from +'a covenant with death' and an 'agreement with hell,' made in a time of +terrible peril, and without a conception of its inevitable consequences, +and which has corrupted their morals, poisoned their religion, petrified +their humanity as towards the millions in bondage, tarnished their +character, harassed their peace, burdened them with taxation, shackled +their prosperity, and brought them into abject vassalage." + +It is not to be wondered at that Garrison, under the circumstances, was +for speeding the South rather than obstructing her way out of the Union. +For hardly ever had the anti-slavery cause seen greater peril than that +which hung over it during the months which elapsed between Lincoln's +election and the attack on Sumter, owing to the paralyzing apprehensions +to which the free States fell a prey in view of the then impending +disruption of their glorious Union. Indeed no sacrifice of anti-slavery +accomplishments, policy, and purpose of those States were esteemed too +important or sacred to make, if thereby the dissolution of the Union +might be averted. Many, Republicans as well as Democrats, were for +repealing the Personal Liberty Laws, and for the admission of New Mexico +as a State, with or without slavery, for the enforcement of the Fugitive +State Law, for suppressing the right of free speech and the freedom of +the press on the subject of slavery, and for surrendering the Northern +position in opposition to the extension of slavery to national +Territories, in order to placate the South and keep it in the Union. +Nothing could have possibly been more disastrous to the anti-slavery +movement in America than a Union saved on the terms proposed by such +Republican leaders as William H. Seward, Charles Francis Adams, Thomas +Corwin, and Andrew G. Curtin. The Union, under the circumstances, was +sure death to the slave, in disunion lay his great life-giving hope. +Therefore his tried and sagacious friend was for sacrificing the Union +to win for him freedom. + +As the friends of the Union were disposed to haggle at no price to +preserve it, so was Garrison disposed to barter the Union itself in +exchange for the abolition of slavery. "Now, then, let there be a +CONVENTION OF THE FREE STATES," he suggested, "called to organize an +independent government on free and just principles; and let them say to +the slave States: Though you are without excuse for your treasonable +conduct, depart in peace! Though you have laid piratical hands on +property not your own, we surrender it all in the spirit of magnanimity! +And if nothing but the possession of the Capitol will appease you, take +even that without a struggle! Let the line be drawn between us where +free institutions end and slave institutions begin!" + +But the thunder of the rebel guns in Charleston Harbor wrought in the +reformer a complete revolution in this regard. In the tremendous popular +uprising which followed that insult to the national flag he perceived +that the old order with its compromises and dispositions to agree to +anything, to do anything for the sake of preserving the Union had passed +away forever. When it was suggested as an objection to his change of +base that the "Administration is endeavoring to uphold the Union, the +Constitution, and the Laws, even as from the formation of the +Government," he was not for a moment deceived by its apparent force, but +replied sagely that "this is a verbal and technical view of the case." +"Facts are more potential than words," he remarked with philosophic +composure, "and events greater than parchment arrangements. The truth +is, the old Union is _nan est invenius_, and its restoration, with its +pro-slavery compromises, well-nigh impossible. The conflict is really +between the civilization of freedom and the barbarism of +slavery--between the principles of democracy and the doctrines of +absolutism--between the free North and the man-imbruting South; +therefore, to this extent hopeful for the cause of impartial liberty." + +With the instinct of wise leadership, he adjusted himself and his little +band of Abolitionists, as far as he was able, to the exigencies of the +revolution. In his madness there was always remarkable method. When the +nation was apathetic, dead on the subject of slavery, he used every +power which he possessed or could invent to galvanize it into life. But +with the prodigious excitement which swept over the free States at the +outbreak of the war, Garrison saw that the crisis demanded different +treatment. Abolitionists and their moral machinery he felt should be +withdrawn, for a season at least, from their conspicuous place before +the public gaze, lest it happen that they should divert the current of +public opinion from the South to themselves, and thus injure the cause +of the slave. He accordingly deemed it highly expedient that the usual +anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society, held in New York, +ought, under the circumstances, to be postponed, coming as it would but +a few weeks after the attack on Sumter, and in the midst of the +tremendous loyal uprising against the rebels. This he did, adding, by +way of caution, this timely counsel: "Let nothing be done at this solemn +crisis needlessly to check or divert the mighty current of popular +feeling which is now sweeping southward with the strength and +impetuosity of a thousand Niagaras, in direct conflict with that haughty +and perfidious slave-power which has so long ruled the republic with a +rod of iron, for its own base and satanic purposes." + +The singular tact and sagacity of the pioneer in this emergency may be +again seen in a letter to Oliver Johnson, who was at the time editing +the _Anti-Slavery Standard_. Says the pioneer: "Now that civil war has +begun, and a whirlwind of violence and excitement is to sweep through +the country, every day increasing in interest until its bloodiest +culmination, it is for the Abolitionists to 'stand still and see the +salvation of God,' rather than to attempt to add anything to the general +commotion. It is no time for minute criticism of Lincoln, Republicanism, +or even the other parties, now that they are fusing, for a death-grapple +with the Southern slave oligarchy; for they are instruments in the hands +of God to carry forward and help achieve the great object of +emancipation for which we have so long been striving.... We need great +circumspection and consummate wisdom in regard to what we may say and do +under these unparalleled circumstances. We are rather, for the time +being, to note the events transpiring than seek to control them. There +must be no needless turning of popular violence upon ourselves by any +false step of our own." + +The circumspection, the tact, and sagacity which marked his conduct at +the beginning of the rebellion characterized it to the close of the war, +albeit at no time doing or saying aught to compromise his anti-slavery +principle of total and immediate emancipation. On the contrary, he +urged, early and late, upon Congress and the President the exercise of +the war power to put an end for ever to slavery. Radical Abolitionists +like Stephen S. Foster were for denying to the Administration +anti-slavery support and countenance, and for continuing to heap upon +the Government their denunciations until it placed itself "openly and +unequivocally on the side of freedom," by issuing the edict of +emancipation. Against this zeal without discretion Garrison warmly +protested. "I cannot say that I do not sympathize with the Government," +said he, "as against Jefferson Davis and his piratical associates. There +is not a drop of blood in my veins, both as an Abolitionist and a peace +man, that does not flow with the Northern tide of sentiment; for I see, +in this grand uprising of the manhood of the North, which has been so +long groveling in the dust, a growing appreciation of the value of +liberty and free institutions, and a willingness to make any sacrifice +in their defence against the barbaric and tyrannical power which avows +its purpose, if it can, to crush them entirely out of existence. When +the Government shall succeed (if it shall succeed) in conquering a +peace, in subjugating the South, and shall undertake to carry out the +Constitution as of old, with all its pro-slavery compromises, then will +be my time to criticise, reprove, and condemn; then will be the time for +me to open all the guns that I can bring to bear upon it. But blessed be +God that 'covenant with death' has been annulled, and that 'agreement +with hell' no longer stands. I joyfully accept the fact, and leave all +verbal criticism until a more suitable opportunity." + +But it must be confessed that at times during the struggle, Lincoln's +timidity and apparent indifference as to the fate of slavery, in his +anxiety to save the Union, weakened Garrison's confidence in him, and +excited his keenest apprehensions "at the possibility of the war +terminating without the utter extinction of slavery, by a new and more +atrocious compromise on the part of the North than any that has yet been +made." The pioneer therefore adjudged it prudent to get his battery into +position and to visit upon the President for particular acts, such as +the revocation of anti-slavery orders by sundry of his generals in the +field, and upon particular members of his Cabinet who were understood to +be responsible for the shuffling, hesitating action of the Government in +its relation to slavery, an effective fire of criticism and rebuke. + +Nevertheless Mr. Garrison maintained toward the Government a uniform +tone of sympathy and moderation. "I hold," said he, in reply to +strictures of Mr. Phillips upon the President at the annual meeting of +the Massachusetts Society in 1862; "I hold that it is not wise for us to +be too microscopic in endeavoring to find disagreeable and annoying +things, still less to assume that everything is waxing worse and worse, +and that there is little or no hope." He himself was full of hope which +no shortcomings of the Government was able to quench. He was besides +beginning to understand the perplexities which beset the administration, +to appreciate the problem which confronted the great statesman who was +at the head of the nation. He was getting a clear insight into the +workings of Lincoln's mind, and into the causes which gave to his +political pilotage an air of timidity and indecision. + +"Supposing Mr. Lincoln could answer to-night," continued the pioneer in +reply to his less patient and hopeful coadjutors, "and we should say to +him: 'Sir, with the power in your hands, slavery being the cause of the +rebellion beyond all controversy, why don't you put the trump of jubilee +to your lips, and proclaim universal freedom?'--possibly he might +answer: 'Gentlemen, I understand this matter quite as well as you do. I +do not know that I differ in opinion from you; but will you insure me +the support of a united North if I do as you bid me? Are all parties and +all sects at the North so convinced and so united on this point that +they will stand by the Government? If so, give me the evidence of it, +and I will strike the blow. But, gentlemen, looking over the entire +North, and seeing in all your towns and cities papers representing a +considerable, if not a formidable portion of the people, menacing and +bullying the Government in case it dared to liberate the slaves, even as +a matter of self-preservation, I do not feel that the hour has yet come +that will render it safe for the Government to take that step.' I am +willing to believe that something of this kind weighs in the mind of the +President and the Cabinet, and that there is some ground for hesitancy +as a mere matter of political expediency." This admirable and +discriminating support of the President finds another capital +illustration in weighty words of his in answer to animadversions of +Prof. Francis W. Newman, of England, directed against Mr. Lincoln. Says +Garrison: "In no instance, however, have I censured him (Lincoln) for +not acting upon the highest abstract principles of justice and humanity, +and disregarding his Constitutional obligations. His freedom to follow +his convictions of duty as an individual is one thing--as the President +of the United States, it is limited by the functions of his office, for +the people do not elect a President to play the part of reformer or +philanthropist, nor to enforce upon the nation his own peculiar ethical +or humanitary ideas without regard to his oath or their will." + +Great indeed was the joy of the pioneer when President Lincoln on +January 1, 1863, issued his Emancipation Proclamation. The same +sagacious and statesmanlike handling of men and things distinguished his +conduct after the edict of freedom was made as before. When the question +of Reconstruction was broached in an administrative initiative in +Louisiana, the President gave great offence to the more radical members +of his party, and to many Abolitionists by his proposal to readmit +Louisiana to Statehood in the Union with no provision for the extension +of the suffrage to the negro. This exhibition of the habitual caution +and conservatism of Mr. Lincoln brought upon him a storm of criticism +and remonstrances, but not from Garrison. There was that in him which +appreciated and approved the evident disposition of the President to +make haste slowly in departing from the American principle of local +self-government even in the interest of liberty. Then, too, he had his +misgivings in relation to the virtue of the fiat method of transforming +chattels into citizens. "Chattels personal may be instantly translated +from the auction-block into freemen," he remarked in defence of the +administrative policy in the reconstruction of Louisiana, "but when were +they ever taken at the same time to the ballot-box, and invested with +all political rights and immunities? According to the laws of +development and progress it is not practicable.... Besides, I doubt +whether he has the Constitutional right to decide this matter. Ever +since the Government was organized, the right of suffrage has been +determined by each State in the Union for itself, so that there is no +uniformity in regard to it. + +" ... In honestly seeking to preserve the Union, it is not for President +Lincoln to seek, by a special edict applied to a particular State or +locality, to do violence to a universal rule, accepted and acted upon +from the beginning till now by the States in their individual +sovereignty.... Nor, if the freed blacks were admitted to the polls by +Presidential fiat do I see any permanent advantage likely to be secured +by it; for, submitted to as a necessity at the outset, as soon as the +State was organized and left to manage its own affairs, the white +population with their superior intelligence, wealth, and power, would +unquestionably alter the franchise in accordance with their prejudices, +and exclude those thus summarily brought to the polls. Coercion would +gain nothing." A very remarkable prophecy, which has since been exactly +fulfilled in the Southern States. Garrison, however, in the subsequent +struggle between Congress and Mr. Lincoln's successor over this selfsame +point in its wider relation to all of the Southern States, took sides +against Andrew Johnson and in favor of the Congressional fiat method of +transforming chattels personal into citizens. The elimination of Abraham +Lincoln from, and the introduction of Andrew Johnson upon the National +stage at this juncture, did undoubtedly effect such a change of +circumstances, as to make the Congressional fiat method a political +necessity. It was distinctly the less of two evils which at the moment +was thrust upon the choice of the Northern people. + +The same breadth and liberality of view, which marked his treatment of +Mr. Lincoln upon the subject of emancipation and of that of +reconstruction, marked his treatment also of other questions which the +suppression of the rebellion presented to his consideration. Although a +radical peace man, how just was his attitude toward the men and the +measures of the War for the Union. Nothing that he did evinced on his +part greater tact or toleration than his admirable behavior in this +respect. To his eldest son, George Thompson, who was no adherent of the +doctrine of non-resistance, and who was commissioned by Governor Andrew, +a second lieutenant in the Fifty-fifth Massachusetts Regiment, the +pioneer wrote expressing his regret that the young lieutenant had not +been able "to adopt those principles of peace which are so sacred and +divine to my soul, yet you will bear me witness that I have not laid a +straw in your way to prevent your acting up to your own highest +convictions of duty." Such was precisely his attitude toward the North +who, he believed, in waging war against the South for the maintenance of +the Union, was acting up to her own highest convictions of duty. And not +a straw would he place across her path, under those circumstances, +though every step bore witness to one of the most gigantic and +destructive wars in history. + +Garrison did not have to wait for posthumous appreciation from his +countrymen. His steady and discriminating support of the Government, and +his ardent sympathy with the arms of the North won him appreciation in +his lifetime. Indeed, there came to him, if not popularity, something +closely akin to it during the war. His visit to the capital in June, +1864, well illustrates the marvelous changes which had taken place in +the Union touching himself and his cause. On his way to Washington the +pioneer stopped over at Baltimore, which he had not revisited for +thirty-four years, and where the Republican Convention, which +renominated Lincoln was in session. He watched the proceedings from the +gallery, and witnessed with indescribable emotions the enthusiastic +demonstrations of joy with which the whole body of delegates greeted the +radical anti-slavery resolution of the Convention. To the reformer it +was "a full indorsement of all the Abolition fanaticism and +incendiarism" with which he had been branded for years. The jail where +he had been held a prisoner for seven weeks, like the evil which he had +denounced, was gone, and a new one stood in its place, which knew not +Garrison. In the court-house where he was tried and sentenced he was +received by a United States judge as an illustrious visitor. Judge Bond +hunted up the old indictment against the junior editor of the _Genius of +Universal Emancipation_, where it had lain for a generation, during +which that guiltless prisoner had started a movement which had shaken +the nation by its mighty power, and slavery out of it. "Eight or nine of +the original jurymen who gave the verdict against Mr. Garrison are still +living," wrote Theodore Tilton, at the time, to the _Independent_, "and +Judge Bond jocosely threatened to summon them all into Court, that Mr. +Garrison might forgive them in public." + +At Washington the pioneer's reception seemed to him like a dream. And no +wonder. He was heartily received by President Lincoln and Secretary +Stanton. He was accorded the most marked attentions on the floor of both +branches of Congress. On every side there rose up witnesses to the +vastness of the revolution which had taken place, and to the fact that +the great Abolitionist was no longer esteemed an enemy of the Republic +but one of its illustrious citizens. This was evinced in a signal and +memorable manner a little later when the National Government extended to +him an invitation to visit Fort Sumter as its guest on the occasion of +the re-raising over it of the Stars and Stripes. He went, and so also +went George Thompson, his lifelong friend and coadjutor, who was the +recipient of a similar invitation from the Secretary of War. + +This visit of Mr. Garrison, taken in all its dramatic features, is more +like a chapter of fiction, with its strange and improbable incidents and +situations, than a story of real life. The pioneer entered Georgia and +trod the streets of Savannah, whose legislature thirty-three years +before had set a price upon his head. In Charleston he witnessed the +vast ruin which the war had wrought, realized how tremendous had been +the death-struggle between Freedom and Slavery, and saw everywhere he +turned that slavery was beaten, was dead in its proud, rebellious +center. Thousands upon thousands of the people whose wrongs he had made +his own, whose woes he had carried in his soul for thirty-five years, +greeted him, their deliverer, in all stages of joy and thanksgiving. +They poured out at his feet their overflowing love and gratitude. They +covered him with flowers, bunches of jessamines, and honeysuckles and +roses in the streets of Charleston, hard by the grave where Calhoun lay +buried. "'Only listen to that in Charleston streets!' exclaimed +Garrison, on hearing the band of one of the black regiments playing the +air of 'Old John Brown', and we both broke into tears," relates Rev. +Theodore L. Cuyler, who stood by the side of the pioneer that April +morning under the spire of St. Michael's church. + +"The Government has its hold upon the throat of the monster, slavery," +Mr. Garrison assured an audience of nearly four thousand freedmen, "and +is strangling the life out of it." It was even so. Richmond had fallen, +and Lee had surrendered. The early and total collapse of the rebellion +was impending. The Government was, indeed, strangling the life out of it +and out of slavery, its cause and mainspring. The monster had, however, +a crowning horror to add to a long list of horrors before fetching its +last gasp. The assassination of President Lincoln was the dying blow of +slavery, aimed through him at the Union which he had maintained. +Appalling as was the deed, it was vain, for the Union was saved, and +liberty forever secured to the new-born nation. As Garrison remarked at +the tomb of Calhoun, on the morning that Lincoln died, "Down into a +deeper grave than this slavery has gone, and for it there is no +resurrection." + + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + + +THE LAST. + + +"Garrison," said George Thompson on the steamer which was conveying the +Government party out of Charleston Harbor on their return trip; +"Garrison you began your warfare at the North in the face of rotten eggs +and brickbats. Behold you end it at Charleston on a bed of roses!" The +period of persecution had indeed ended, the reign of missiles had +ceased, but with the roses there came to the pioneer not a few thorns. +Bitter was the sorrow which visited him in the winter of 1863. Without +warning his wife was on the night of December 29th, stricken with +paralysis, which crippled her for the rest of her life. No words can +adequately express all that she had been to the reformer in his struggle +with slavery. She was a providential woman raised up to be the wife and +helpmate of her husband, the strenuous man of God. "As a wife for a +period of more than twenty-six years," he wrote her on the completion of +her fiftieth year, "you have left nothing undone to smooth the rugged +pathway of my public career--to render home the all-powerful magnet of +attraction, and the focal point of domestic enjoyment--to make my +welfare and happiness at all times a matter of tender solicitude--and to +demonstrate the depth and fixedness of that love which you so long ago +plighted to me.... Whatever of human infirmity we may have seen in each +other, I believe few have enjoyed more unalloyed bliss in wedded life +than ourselves." For twelve years after that sad December night the +lovely invalid was the object of her husband's most tender and assiduous +care. And when at last she left him in January, 1876, the loneliness +which fell upon his heart seemed more than he could bear. + +Differences with old associates was a grievous thorn which came to the +pioneer during the progress of the war. The first marked disagreement +between him and them occurred at the annual meeting of the Massachusetts +Anti-Slavery Society not a month after his wife's prostration. The clash +came between the leader and his great coadjutor Wendell Phillips over a +resolution introduced by the latter, condemning the Government and +declaring its readiness "to sacrifice the interest and honor of the +North to secure a sham peace." Garrison objected to the severity of this +charge. He believed that there was but one party at the North of which +it was true, and that was the party of Copperheads. He endeavored, +therefore, to modify the harshness of the resolution by giving it a more +moderate tone. But the anti-Lincoln feeling of the Convention proved too +strong for his resistance, and Mr. Phillips's resolution was finally +adopted as the sentiment of the society. + +The discordant note thus struck grew sharper and louder during the year. +The divergence of views in the ranks of the Abolitionists touching the +Southern policy of the Administration grew wider, until the subject of +Mr. Lincoln's renomination sundered the little band into two wings--one +for renomination, headed by Garrison, the other against renomination, +and led by Phillips. These differences presently developed into, if not +positive antagonism, then something closely akin to it between the two +wings and the two leaders. No little heat was generated from the strong, +sharp things said on both sides. Garrison was wiser than Phillips in his +unwillingness to have the country, in the homely speech of the +President, "swap horses while crossing a stream." + +Serious differences of opinion sprang up also between the two leaders +and the two wings in relation to the proper time for dissolving the +anti-slavery organizations. Garrison held on one side that this time had +come with the adoption of the thirteenth amendment abolishing slavery, +while Phillips held on the other that the societies should continue +their operations until the negro was invested with the right to vote. +And here it seems that Phillips was wiser than Garrison in his purpose +not to abandon in 1865 the old machinery for influencing public +sentiment in the negro's interest. + +At the anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society, in May, 1865, +Garrison contended for its dissolution, declaring that "Nothing is more +clear in my own mind, nothing has ever been more clear, than that this +is the fitting time to dissolve our organization, and to mingle with the +millions of our fellow-countrymen in one common effort to establish +justice and liberty throughout the land." For two days the debate upon +this question raged in the convention, but when the vote was taken it +was found that a large majority of the delegates agreed with Mr. +Phillips. Mr. Garrison was, nevertheless, reëlected President, but +declined and withdrew from the society. The controversy was renewed at +the annual meeting of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society in January, +1866. But here again a large majority voted against dissolution. Warm +words fell from both Garrison and Phillips and their respective +supporters, which tried sorely the friendship of the two leaders. + +In accordance with his views touching the discontinuance of the +anti-slavery societies, Garrison discontinued the publication of the +_Liberator_ after the completion of its thirty-fifth volume in December, +1865. He did not mean by this act to cease his labors for the negro. Far +from it. For he, like Phillips, stood for his absolute equality before +the law. But he perceived that old things had passed away, and with them +the need of the old instruments, and that what remained to be done for +the black man required to be done with new means. "The object," said he +in his valedictory, "for which the _Liberator_ was commenced, the +extermination of chattel slavery, having been gloriously consummated, it +seems to me specially appropriate to let its existence cover the +historic period of the great struggle; leaving what remains to be done +to complete the work of emancipation to other instrumentalites (of which +I hope to avail myself), under new auspices, with more abundant means, +and with millions instead of hundreds for allies." + +With the discontinuance of the _Liberator_ Garrison's occupation, from +which he had derived a regular though somewhat uncertain income for the +support of his family, was gone. He was not in destitute circumstances, +however, thanks to the generosity of friends, who had already secured +him the home in Roxbury, where he spent the remaining years of his life. +He had also been one of the legatees under the will of Charles F. Hovey, +who left about forty thousand dollars to the anti-slavery cause. But the +age of the reformer, he was then sixty, and the state of his health, +which was much impaired, together with the helplessness of his wife, +made some provision for his and her support, other than the little which +he possessed, a matter of anxious thought on the part of himself and his +friends. He had given thirty-five years of his life to the public good. +His services to his country and to the world were above all price, all +money considerations. It was felt that to him who had given so much to +the world, the world should in his need make some substantial +acknowledgement in return. + +Some of his countrymen, accordingly, conceived the plan of a national +testimonial to the philanthropist, which should ensure to him during the +rest of his life a competence. + +A committee having this end in view was organized March 28, 1866, at the +house of Dr. Henry I. Bowditch. John A. Andrew, who was its chairman, +wrote the address to the public, to which were appended the chief names +in the politics and literature of the land. Nearly two years afterward, +on March 10, 1868, the committee were able to place in Mr. Garrison's +hands the handsome sum of thirty-one thousand dollars with a promise of +possibly one or two thousand more a little later. To the energy and +devotedness of one man, the Rev. Samuel May, Jr., more than to any +other, and perhaps than all others put together, this noble achievement +was due. The pioneer was deeply moved at the high and generous character +of the recognition accorded his labors. "Little, indeed, did I know or +anticipate how prolonged or how virulent would be the struggle," said he +in his reply to the committee, "when I lifted up the standard of +immediate emancipation, and essayed to rouse the nation to a sense of +its guilt and danger. But having put my hands to the plow, how could I +look back? For, in a cause so righteous, I could not doubt that, having +turned the furrows, if I sowed in tears I should one day reap in joy. +But, whether permitted to live to witness the abolition of slavery or +not, I felt assured that, as I demanded nothing that was not clearly in +accordance with justice and humanity, sometime or other, if remembered +at all, I should stand vindicated in the eyes of my countrymen." The +names of John Bright, John Stuart Mill, William E. Foster, and Samuel +Morley, among the contributors to the fund, lent to the testimonial an +international character. + +In May, 1867, Garrison went abroad the fourth time, and traveled in +Great Britain and on the Continent. Everywhere that he went he was +received as an illustrious visitor and as a benefactor of mankind. At a +breakfast in London which "was intended to commemorate one of the +greatest of the great triumphs of freedom, and to do honor to a most +eminent instrument in the achievement of that freedom," and at which +were gathered the genius, the wealth, and aristocracy of England and +Scotland, John Bright, who presided, welcomed the illustrious guest +"with a cordiality which knows no stint and no limit for him and for his +noble associates, both men and women," and ventured to speak a verdict +which he believed would be sanctioned by all mankind, viz., that +"William Lloyd Garrison and his fellow-laborers in that world's +work--are they not + + "On Fame's eternal bead-roll worthy to be filed?" + + +With the discontinuance of the _Liberator_ Garrison's active career came +to a close. But his sympathetic interest in the freedmen, temperance, +the cause of women, and in other reformatory enterprises continued +unabated. He watched with stern and vigilant eye, and bleeding heart the +new rebellion at the South whose purpose was the nullification of the +civil and political rights of the blacks, and the overthrow of the +military rule of the National Government in the Southern States. He did +not see what time has since made clear that a genuine reconstruction of +the South, and the ultimate solution of the Southern problem had, in +accordance with social laws, to proceed from within, from the South +itself, not from without and from Washington. The old fire again burned +in his speech as tidings of the violence of the whites and the +sufferings of the blacks reached him from the former slave section. +Indeed, the last written words of his, addressed to the public, were +words in defence of the race to whose freedom he had devoted his +life--words which, trumpet-tongued raised anew the rallying-cry of +"Liberty and equal rights for each, for all, and for ever, wherever the +lot of man is cast within our broad domains!" + +True to his grand motto "My country is the world! my countrymen are all +mankind," he espoused the cause of the Chinese, and denounced the +National policy of excluding them on the ground of race from the +republic but a few months before his death. The anti-Chinese movement +appeared to him "narrow, conceited, selfish, anti-human, +anti-Christian." "Against this hateful spirit of caste," wrote the dying +philanthropist, "I have earnestly protested for the last fifty years, +wherever it has developed itself, especially in the case of another +class, for many generations still more contemned, degraded, and +oppressed; and the time has fully come to deal with it as an offence to +God, and a curse to the world wherever it seeks to bear sway." + +On the same grand principle of human fraternity Mr. Garrison dealt with +the questions of trade and tariffs also. He believed in liberty, civil, +religious, and commercial. He was in fact a radical free trader on moral +and humanitary grounds. "He is the most sagacious political economist," +was a remark of his, "who contends for the highest justice, the most +far-reaching equality, a close adherence to natural laws, and the +removal of all those restrictions which foster national pride and +selfishness." And here is another like unto it: "Believing that the +interests of the American people in no wise materially differ from those +of the people of any other country, and denying the rectitude or +feasibility of building ourselves up at their expense by an exclusive +policy, obstructing the natural flow of material exchanges, I avow +myself to be a radical free trader, even to the extent of desiring the +abolition of all custom-houses, as now constituted, throughout the +world. That event is far distant, undoubtedly, but I believe it will +come with the freedom and enlightenment of mankind. My faith is absolute +that it will prove advantageous to every branch of industry, whether at +home or abroad." + +The closing years of the reformer's life were years of great bodily +suffering. A disease of the kidneys and a chronic catarrh of the head +made steady inroads upon the resources of his constitution, made life at +times a wheel on which he was racked with physical tortures, all of +which he bore with the utmost fortitude and serenity of spirit. "The +longer I live, the longer I desire to live," he wrote Samuel J. May, +"and the more I see the desirableness of living; yet certainly not in +this frail body, but just as it shall please the dear Father of us all." +One by one he saw the little band of which he was leader dwindle as now +one and now another dropped by the way. And it was he or Mr. Phillips, +or both, who spoke the last loving words over their coffins. As the +little band passed on to the unseen country, a new joy awoke in the soul +of the leader left behind, the joy of anticipation, of glad reunion +beyond the grave. "How unspeakably pleasant it will be to greet them, +and to be greeted by them on the other side of the line," it seemed to +him as he, too, began to descend toward the shore of the swift, silent +river. The deep, sweet love for his mother returned with youthful +freshness and force to him, the man of seventy-three years, at the +thought of coming again into her presence. A strange yearning was +tugging at his heart for all the dear ones gone before. The fond mother, +who had watched over his childhood, and the fond wife, who had been the +stay of his manhood, were the first two whom he yearned to meet after +crossing the river. The joyous thought of his approaching meeting with +those white-souled women cheered and comforted the reformer amid +excruciating physical sufferings. Worn out by heroic and Herculean +labors for mankind and by a complication of diseases, he more and more +longed for rest, to go home to beloved ones as he expressed it. To the +question, "What do you want, Mr. Garrison?" asked by the attending +physician on the day before his death, he replied, weariedly, "To finish +it up!" And this he did at the home of his daughter, Mrs. Henry Villard, +in New York, in the midst of children and grandchildren, near midnight, +on May 24, 1879. + +"While that ear could listen," said Wendell Phillips over the +illustrious champion of liberty as he lay dead in the old church in +Roxbury; "While that ear could listen, God gave what he has rarely given +to man, the plaudits and prayers of four millions of victims." But as he +lay there he had, besides, the plaudits and praise of an emancipated +nation. The plaudits and praise of an emancipated race, mingling +melodiously with those of an emancipated nation made noble music about +his bier. In the city, where forty-three years before he was mobbed, the +flags floated at half-mast in his honor; and on Beacon Hill, where the +Government once desired his destruction, the voice of appreciation was +heard and tokens of the State's sorrow met the eye. Great in life great +also in death was William Lloyd Garrison. + + + "Men of a thousand shifts and wiles, look here! + See one straightforward conscience put in pawn + To win a world; see the obedient sphere + By bravery's simple gravitation drawn! + + + Shall we not heed the lesson taught of old, + And by the present's lips repeated still, + In our own single manhood to be bold, + Fortressed in conscience and impregnable will?" + + + + +INDEX. + + + +Adams, Charles Francis, 372. + +Adams, John Quincy, 54, 250-251. + +Adams, Nehemiah, 278. + +Adams, William, 292. + +Alcott, A. Bronson, 90, 91, 134. + +American Anti-Slavery Society, 174, 311, 340, + 373, 387. + +Andover Seminary, 190. + +Andrew, John A., 381, 389. + +Annexation of Texas, 335. + +_Anti-Slavery Standard_, 299. + +Atchison, David, 338, 374. + +Attucks, Crispus, 227. + + +Bacon, Leonard W., 162. + +Bartlett, Ezekiel, 18, 20. + +Beecher, Lyman, 110, 111, 161, + 189, 190, 269. + +Benson, George, 194, 263. + +Benson, George W., 168, 178, 234, + 260, 281. + +Benson, Henry E., 212, 263. + +Benton, Thomas H., 105-106, 252, + 253. + +Bird, Frank W., 361. + +Birney, James G., 203, 298, 320. + +Bond, Judge, 382. + +Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society, 217, 233, 240. + +Bourne, Rev. George, 108, 203. + +Bowditch, Henry I., 233, 349, 389. + +Bright, John, 390, 391. + +Brooks, Preston S., 359. + +Brown, John, 365-368. + +Buffum, Arnold, 139, 177. + +Burleigh, Charles C., 221, 223, 235. + +Buxton, Thomas Fowell, 152, 154, 204. + + +Calhoun, John C., 246, 252, 315, + 335, 336, 337, + 352, 353, 384. + +Campbell, John Reid, 225. + +Channing, Dr. W.E., 110, 111, 256, + 316. + +Chapman, Maria Weston, 223, 258, 259, + 277, 292. + +Chase, Salmon P., 338. + +Child, David Lee, 134, 136, 138, + 203. + +Child, Lydia Maria, 186, 203, 210, + 277, 292, 309. + +Clay, Henry, 339, 348. + +Clerical Appeal, 282. + +Clarkson, Thomas, 155, 303. + +Coffin, Joshua, 139, 198. + +Cobb, Howell, 338. + +Collier, Rev. William, 40. + +Collins, John A., 298, 299, 300, + 303. + +Colonization Society, 60, 72, + 144-156, 162. + +Colored Seaman, 313-314. + +Colorphobia, 157-169. + +Colver, Nathaniel, 303. + +_Commercial Advertiser_, New York, 170. + +_Courier_, Boston, 128, 129, 217. + +_Courier and Enquirer_, New York, 171. + +Corwin, Thomas, 372. + +Cox, Abraham L., 185, 203, 209. + +Crandall, Prudence, 165-168, 199. + +Cresson, Elliott, 150, 151, 153. + +Cropper, James, 154, 205. + +Curtin, Andrew G., 372. + +Curtis, Benjamin R., 354. + +Cuyler, Rev. Theodore L., 384. + + +Davis, Jefferson, 338, 376. + +Disunion Convention at Worcester, 361-363. + +Dole, Ebenezer, 86. + +Douglas, Stephen A., 353, 365. + +Douglass, Frederick, 300, 344. + +Dred Scott Case, 364. + +Duncan, Rev, James, 108-109. + +_Emancipator, The_, 283, 285, 286, + 328. + +Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 281. + +_Evening Post_, New York, 208. + +Everett, Edward, 30, 31, 243, + 244. + + +Farnham, Martha, 16. + +Fessenden, Samuel, 141, 148. + +Follen, Prof. Charles, 201, 203, 247. + +Forten, James, 144. + +Foster, Stephen S., 310, 375. + +Foster, William E., 390. + +Frémont, John C., 361. + +_Free Press_, 27, 34. + +Fugitive Slave Law, effect of, 345-347. + +Fugitive Slaves, The Crafts, Shadrach, Sims, Burns, 349. + +Fuller, John E., 219. + +Furness, Rev. W.H., 344. + + +Garrison, Abijah, 12-15, 18. + +Garrison, Charles Follen, 331-332. + +Garrison, Francis Jackson, 330. + +Garrison, George Thompson, 381. + +Garrison, Helen Eliza, 194-196, 219, + 297, 331, + 385-386. + +Garrison, James, 19, 20, + 302-303. + +Garrison, Joseph, 11, 12. + +Garrison, Wendell Phillips, 297. + +Garrison, William Lloyd, + + Early years, 11-26; + + Publishes _Free Press,_ 27-34; + + seeks work in Boston, 35; + + nominates Harrison Gray Otis for Congress, 35-36; + + temperance and the _Philanthropist_, 39-44; + + meets Lundy, 44; + + early attitude on the slavery question, 46-50; + + on war, 51; + + first experience with ministers on the subject of slavery, 52; + + Anti-slavery Committee of twenty, 53; + + goes to Bennington, Vt., to edit the + _Journal of the Times_, 54-55; + + monster anti-slavery petition to Congress, 55; + + anticipates trouble with the South, 56; + + begins to preach freedom, 56-57; + + agrees to help Lundy edit the _Genius of Universal + Emancipation_, 58; + + Congregational Societies of Boston invite him to + deliver Fourth-of-July oration, 60; + + the address, 61-67; + + goes to Baltimore, 69; + + raises the standard of immediate emancipation, 70; + + Lundy and he agree to differ, 71; + + defends Free People of Color, 73-74; + + makes acquaintance with barbarism of slavery, 74; + + ship _Francis_ and Francis Todd, 75-77; + + prosecuted and imprisoned, 77-83; + + released, 83; + + visits the North, 84; + + returns to Baltimore but leaves it again for good, 87; + + lectures on slavery, 88-91; + + character, 92-94; + + incarnation of immediate emancipation, 109; + + Dr. Lyman Beecher, 110-111; + + difficulties in the way of publishing the _Liberator_, 112-115; + + his method of attacking slavery, 118; + + he is heard, 120; + + Walker's appeal, 121-122; + + Nat Turner, 125-126; + + southern excitement, 127-128; + + New England Anti-Slavery Society, 137-138; + + appointed agent, 141; + + thoughts on African colonization, 143-150; + + first visit to England, 152-156; + + Mr. Buxton's mistake, 152; + + prejudice against color, 157; + + Prudence Crandall, 166, 168; + + organization of New York City Anti-Slavery Society and + beginning of the mob period, 170-172; + + formation of American Anti-Slavery Society, 174-185; + + declaration of sentiments, 182-184; + + increased agitation, 185-186; + + marriage, 193; + + the wife, 194-196; + + poverty of the _Liberator_, 197-200; + + the paper displeases friends, 201-204; + + George Thompson, 204-206; + + Faneuil Hall meeting to put the Abolitionists down, 211-215; + + gallows for two, 215-216; + + the Broad-Cloth Mob, 218-232; + + Thompson leaves the country, 238; + + appears before a committee of Massachusetts legislature, 245-246; + + Pennsylvania Hall, 257-260; + + Marlboro Chapel, 260-261; + + ill health, 263; + + Educational Convention of anti-slavery agents, 264-265; + + the Sabbath question, 265-272; + + The woman's question, 273-280; + + clerical appeal, 282-285; + + anti-slavery political action, 286-288; + + conflict between the New York and the Boston boards, 289-291; + + the World's Convention, 292-295; + + visit to Scotland, 295-296; + + in the lecture field, 300-301; + + his brother James, 302-303; + + meets charges of infidelity, 303-304; + + Irish Address, 304-305; + + no union with slaveholders, 306-312; + + Texas agitation, 316-318; + + dislikes Liberty party, 319-323; + + some characteristics, 326-334; + + the Rynders Mob, 340-344; + + publicly burns the United States Constitution, 354; + + answers objections to his disunionism, 362-363; + + Harper's Ferry, 365-367; + + secession: first attitude to it, 370-373; + + second attitude, 373; + + adapts himself to circumstances, 373-381; + + Lincoln and emancipation, 379; + + visits Baltimore, Washington, Charleston, 381-384; + + illness and death of his wife, 385-386; + + differences with anti-slavery associates, 386-388; + + discontinues the _Liberator_, 388; + + national testimonial, 389-390; + + fourth visit to England, 390-391; + + champions cause of Southern negroes, 391; + + champions cause of Chinese, 392; + + believes in Free Trade, 392-393; + + illness and death, 393-395. + +Garrison, William Lloyd, Jr., 297. + +_Gazette_, Boston, 217. + +_Genius of Universal Emancipation_, 58, 69, 71-75. + +Gibbons, James S., 309. + +Giddings, Joshua R., 338. + +Goodell, William, 149, 203, 247, + 248. + +Green, William, Jr., 184. + +Grimké, Angelina E., 235, 258-259. + +Grimké, Sisters, 275-280. + + +Hale, John P., 338, 350. + +Hamilton, Alexander, 104. + +Hamlin, Hannibal, 338. + +Haydon, Benjamin Robert, 294, 295. + +Hayne, Robert Y., 209. + +_Herald_, Newburyport, 21, 26. + +_Herald_, New York, 340, 341. + +Higginson, T.W., 358-359, 361. + +Hoar, Samuel, 314. + +Horton, Jacob, 61. + +Hovey, Charles F., 389. + + +Jackson, Francis, 233, 240-241, + 311-312, 317, + 341, 344. + +Jewett, Daniel E., 175. + +Jocelyn, Rev. Simeon Smith, 203. + +Johnson, Andrew, 380. + +Johnson, Oliver, 114, 134, 137, + 139, 160-161, + 374. + +_Journal_, Camden (S.C.), 128. + +_Journal_, Louisville (Ky.), 120. + + +Kansas, Struggle over, 357-358. + +Kelley, Abby, 259, 291, 310. + +Kimball, David T., 175. + +Knapp, Isaac, 113, 127, 139, + 197, 200, 265, + 301-302. + +Kneeland, Abner, 90, 268. + + +Lane Seminary, 189. + +Latimer, George, 312. + +Leavitt, Joshua, 149, 320, 329. + +Leggett, Samuel, 86. + +_Liberator, The_, 111-120, + 126-129, 131, + 141, 163, 165, + 169, 176, + 197-204, 236, + 237, 265, 284, + 297, 327-329, + 388. + +Lincoln, Abraham, 365, 370, 375, + 376, 377, 378, + 379, 380, 382, + 384. + +Lloyd, Fanny, 13-20, 24-26, + 44-45. + +Longfellow, Stephen, 148. + +Loring, Edward Greeley, 354. + +Loring, Ellis Grey, 134, 135, 136, + 138, 245, 264. + +Lovejoy, Elijah P., 254-257. + +Lowell, James Russell, 136, 329. + +Lumpkin, Wilson, 128. + +Lundy, Benjamin, 44, 45, 46, + 48-54, 57, + 58, 69, 71, + 72, 75, 108, + 133. + +Lunt, George, 244, 247, 248. + +Lyman, Theodore, 223, 224, 227, + 228. + + +Macaulay, Zachary, 154. + +Malcolm, Rev. Howard, 52. + +Martineau, Harriet, 94, 240. + +Mason, James M., 338. + +Mason, Jeremiah, 111. + +Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, 265, 280, 297, + 310. + +Mathew, Father, 304, 305. + +May, Samuel, Jr., 325, 389. + +May, Samuel J., 90, 93, 94, + 134, 166, 167, + 179, 180, 186, + 199, 245, 272, + 289, 393. + +McDowell, James, 124, 125. + +McKim, James Miller, 149. + +McDuffie, Governor, 243, 246. + +_Mercury_, Charleston, 126, + +Mill, John Stuart, 390. + +Missouri Compromise, Repeal of, 352-354. + +Moore, Esther, 259. + +Morley, Samuel, 390, + +Mott, Lucretia, 178, 259, 292, + 293. + +_National Intelligencer_, 128. + +New England Anti-Slavery Society, 137-141, 200, + 280, 311. + +_New England Spectator_, 282. + +Newman, Prof. Francis W., 378. + + +O'Connell, Daniel, 154, 170, 171, + 304. + +Otis, Harrison Gray, 35, 129, 130, + 131, 213, 214, + 215. + + +Palmer, Daniel, 11. + +Palmer, Mary, 11, 12. + +Parker, Mary S., 222, 234. + +Parker, Theodore, 121, 349, 350, + 362. + +Pastoral Letter, 277. + +Paxton, Rev. J.D., 186. + +Pease, Elizabeth, 303, 331, 346. + +Pennsylvania Hall, 257-260. + +Phelps, Amos A., 149, 186, 203, + 278, 280, 288. + +Phillips Academy (Andover), 190. + +Phillips, Ann Green, 292, 293. + +Phillips, Wendell, 190, 257, 310, + 317, 323, 326, + 344, 346-347, + 349, 351, 386, + 387, 388, 393, + 394. + +Pillsbury, Parker, 310, + +Prentice, George D., 120. + +Purvis, Robert, 144, 162, 178. + + +Quincy, Edmund, 299, 310, 316, + 323, 324, 325, + 326, 327-329. + +Quincy, Josiah, 347. + + +Rankin, John, 177. + +Remond, Charles Lenox, 293, 295, 304. + +Rhett, Barnwell, 338. + +Rogers, Nathaniel P., 149, 293, 295, + 301. + +Rynders, Isaiah, 341-344. + + +Scoble, Rev. John, 294. + +Sewall, Samuel E., 90, 91, 134, + 135, 136, 137, + 138, 175, 236, + 367. + +Seward, William H., 338, 372. + +Shaw, Chief-Justice, 312. + +Slavery, Rise and Progress of, 95-107. + +Smith, Gerritt, 147, 236, 297, + 320. + +Sprague, Peleg, 213, 214. + +Stanton, Edwin M., 382. + +Stanton, Henry B. 253, 288. + +Stearns, Charles, 359. + +Stevens, Thaddeus, 338. + +Stuart, Charles, 201, 202, 264. + +Sumner, Charles, 234, 317, 339, + 346, 359. + + +Tappan, Arthur, 83, 84, 164, + 171, 184, 209, + 210. + +Tappan, Lewis, 149, 177, 201, + 209, 283, 285. + +Texas Agitation, 314-318. + +Thompson, George, 204-206, 210, + 212, 213, 216, + 217, 218, 238, + 294, 295, 351, + 383, 385. + +Thurston, David, 180. + +Tilton, Theodore, 382. + +Todd, Francis, 75, 76, 77, + 81, 82, 87. + +Toombs, Robert, 338. + +Travis, Joseph, 124. + +Turner, Nat., 124-125. + + +Uncle Tom's Cabin, 351-352. + + +Villard, Mrs. Henry, 394. + + +Walker, David, 121, 122, 123, + 126. + +Ward, Rev. Samuel R., 344. + +Ware, Rev. Henry, Jr., 203. + +Webb, Richard D., 310, 316, 318, + 326. + +Webster, Daniel, 35, 101, 110, + 111, 117, 249, + 338, 339, 347, + 348, 370. + +Weld, Theodore D., 149, 190, 264, + 279. + +Wesley, John, 70, 107. + +White, Nathaniel H., 41. + +Whitney, Eli, 98. + +Whittier, John Greenleaf, 34, 175, 179, + 186, 202, 234, + 279, 320. + +Wilberforce, William, 152, 154. + +Winslow, Isaac, 177. + +Winslow, Nathan, 177. + +Wright, Elizur, 147, 149, 185, + 186, 202, 210, + 283-285, 287, + 320. + + +Yerrington, James B., 113. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's William Lloyd Garrison, by Archibald H. Grimke + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14555 *** |