A. C. Baldwin

“ Masters often show that they feel it. They who make laws for slavery, North and South, show that they feel it. The little property which slaves are often allowed to possess, so far from furnishing apology for slavery, is an unwitting tribute to the living principle that destroys the system. Here is a philosophical demonstration that slavery cannot stand in perpetuity. This vital element in human nature, to which a divine institution itself is but an index, is subterranean fire beneath the pyramid of oppression. ”

“ Slavery is characterized as "a demoralizing and cruel system, which it would be an insult to God to imagine that he does not abhor; a system which exhibits power without responsibility, toil without recompense, life without liberty, law without justice, wrongs without redress, infamy without crime, punishment without guilt, and families without marriage; a system which will not only make victims of the present unhappy generation, inflicting upon them the degradation, the contempt, the lassitude, and the anguish of hopeless oppression ”

“ While we disclaim all right or intention to break our compact with you as States, we feel that American slavery is a question of too great moment to ourselves and to unborn generations for us to have no concern with or responsibility for; and as patriots, as philanthropists, as Christians, we are constrained to do all that we rightfully may for the downfall of this hoary system of wrong and woe. If any of you differ with us in opinion on this theme, we trust you will allow us to discuss it to our heart's content; and that you will listen to our reasonings with Christian meekness and candor. ”

“ Now, brother, does not the system of slavery in the United States tolerate, and even authorize, the forcible rending asunder of the marriage tie? Are not husbands, not seldom, but often, sold from their wives, and wives from their husbands, and new matrimonial alliances formed by them, with consent and encouragement of their masters? Thus is flagrant adultery sanctioned in nearly one half of the States of this Christian Republic, and in some cases the crime is almost, if not quite, forced upon the wretched perpetrators of it. ”

“ One cannot thoughtfully observe the signs of the times,—no, nor the workings of his own heart, methinks,—without perceiving that slavery is at war with the moral sense of mankind. If there be any conscience that approves, it must be a conscience perverted by wrong instruction, or by a vicious practice. And can that be a good institution, and worthy of perpetuity, which an unperverted conscience instinctively condemns? ”

“ In another is ruthlessly borne the object dearer to you than all the world beside,—one whom you had solemnly sworn to love, cherish, and protect until death,—the light of your dwelling,—the mother of your children,—the mutual sharer of all your joys and sorrows,—the richest and most precious treasure heaven ever gave you!—there she goes in an agony of wo, to toil under a burning sun, compelled to call another man her husband, or, it may be, to grace her master's seraglio! ”

“ That men of all races and grades are essentially equal before God; that every man has a right to himself, to the fruits of his toil, and to the unmolested pursuit of happiness, in all lawful ways; and hence, that slavery, as existing in these States, is a gigantic system of evil and wrong,—are truths which the moral sense of men is everywhere proclaiming with much emphasis and distinctness. If it be not so, what means this note of remonstrance, long and loud, that comes to our ears over the Atlantic wave? ”

“ The idea that a man can be an article of property and an owner of property by the same supreme warrant is contradictory and absurd.
We now have sure ground for objecting to the system of American slavery, as such. It is directly opposed to the original, authoritative institution of Jehovah. He gives men the right to hold property. Slavery strips them of the divine investiture. He gives men dominion over inferior creatures. Slavery makes them share the subjection of the brute. That slavery does this, the laws of the States in which it exists abundantly declare. ”

“ You, my dear brother, are a husband and father, and can appreciate my meaning, when I speak of the richness, the tenderness, the depth, of connubial and paternal love; how it lights up this dark world with smiles,—how it stimulates us to manly exertion,—how it lightens the burdens of human life, and enables us cheerfully to sustain its ills, while it almost restores to us Eden itself. ”

“ We consider the voluntary enslaving of the one part of the human race by another, as a gross violation of the most precious and sacred rights of human nature; as utterly inconsistent with the law of God, which requires us to love our neighbors as ourselves; and as totally irreconcilable with the spirit and principles of the gospel of Christ, which enjoins that all things 'whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them.' Slavery creates a paradox in the moral system ”

“ We must not, in seeking the extinction of American slavery, so insist on its immediate abolition as to repudiate the responsibility which a master owes to this dependent and depressed class of his fellow beings; but that that end be kept steadily in view, to be accomplished as speedily as is consistent with the best good of the parties concerned. The immediate and total extinction of southern slavery, if not obviously impossible, is of questionable expediency. ”

“ Now, my dear brother, I would candidly, seriously ask you—I would ask all your southern friends—I would ask everybody, Can the sentiment of that Declaration be consistent with American slavery? Are not slaves men? Do color and degradation change a creature of God from a human being to a soulless brute? ”

“ Servants are to be treated by their masters on the principles of equality. Not that they are to be equal with their masters in authority or station or circumstances; but that they are to be treated as having, as men, as husbands, and as parents, equal rights with their masters. It is just as great a sin to deprive a servant of the just recompense for his labor, or to keep him in ignorance, or to take from him his wife or child, as it is to act thus towards a free man. This is the equality which the law of God demands, and on this principle the final judgment is to be administered. ”

“ The ground that calm, reflecting opponents of slavery take, is, that slaveholders should at once cease in their own minds to regard their slaves as chattels to be bought and sold and worked for mere profit, and that they should take immediate measures for the full emancipation of every one, as soon as may be consistent with his greatest good, and that of the community in which he lives. ”

“ I am not going to inflict upon you a dissertation, or a series of syllogisms on this hackneyed subject, but I beg that you and your friends will calmly look again at what, I doubt not, you have seen before,—the palpable incongruity between the system of holding persons perpetually in slavery without their consent, and those declared, self-evident, heaven bestowed, unalienable rights professedly secured to all men in these United States by our glorious constitution. ”

“ In view of all the considerations which have now passed before our minds, is it too much to believe, that the diffusion of kindly and scriptural sentiments, with the blessing of heaven producing general agreement in principles and measures, must be the means of our country's salvation from the guilt and perils of slavery? If it is not extended, misguided, infatuated men may, indeed, threaten to dissolve the Union. Still we fear that extension most; for religion teaches us to fear God more than man. ”

“ They need a written and preached gospel, were it only to fit them to exchange, with advantage, a state of vassalage for the dignity of freemen; for all experience proves that the Bible and the pulpit are of all instruments the best to qualify men safely to exercise the right of self-government. But there is a servitude more dreadful by far than any domestic bondage that men have ever groaned under; and your slaves need the Bible, and the Bible preached, to prove God's instruments of breaking the chains imposed by Satan, and making them Christ's freemen. ”

“ To understand what is meant by the term domestic happiness, it is necessary for you and me only to look at the circles around our own firesides, and listen to the musical accents of the loved ones who dwell there, as they pronounce the words husband, father, mother, brother, sister, and exchange with them kind looks and the affectionate embrace. What earthly joys can be compared with those of home? ”

“ It is because they are held as property, that slaves are sold; because they are property, families are torn asunder; because they are property, instruction is denied them; because they are property, the law, and the public sentiment that makes the law, crush them as men.
We do not here call in question the mitigations with which Christian masters temper into mildness the hard working of an evil system. Those mitigations do not, however, logically or morally defend slavery. ”

“ We must not, in our efforts to subvert slavery, indulge in an unchristian spirit, or in language adapted needlessly to anger and alienate those whom it should be our aim to win. A cause that is intrinsically good may be advocated in a bad spirit, or with improper weapons; and such may have sometimes been the case with ours. Would that all men had ever borne it in mind, that truth and love are the only weapons with which to wage a successful conflict with this or any other deep-seated moral evil. ”

“ Slavery, as it exists among us, sets up between parents and their children an authority higher than the impulse of nature and the laws of God; breaks up the authority of the father over his own offspring, and at pleasure separates the mother at a returnless distance from her child, thus outraging all decency and justice. ”

“ Thus have we contemplated several distinct reasons for believing that slavery is no good thing,—has not the sanction of Jehovah,—and cannot with propriety be perpetuated. Its contrariety to nature,—its antagonism to the moral sense of mankind,—its disgraceful parentage and manner of support,—its condemnation by the Bible,—and its disastrous influence on financial prosperity, on character, and on public morals,—all proclaim that slavery, so far from being a good thing, is a tremendous curse; yea, more, that it is a stupendous wrong ”

“ It is an ungenerous reflection upon the courtesy, Christian candor, piety, and good-sense, both of the North and South. I hold that good citizens and good Christians can, if they will, discuss any subject without giving the least occasion for offence, or endangering that compact which so happily binds us together. As it is in the family circle, there are certain great principles most dear to us all, on which we can fall back, and which, if we are true to ourselves and to them, will prove efficient safeguards to our temper and good-fellowship. ”

“ The upas of American slavery has struck its roots so deep, and shot its branches so far, and so interlaced itself with all surrounding objects, that, to have it instantaneously and unreservedly uprooted, might prove, in many cases, disastrous; and, at all events, is not to be expected. To say nothing of other obstacles to the immediate abolition of Southern slavery, the highest good of many of the slaves makes it inexpedient. ”

“ Christians may become in a legal sense owners of slaves, while they heartily deprecate the system of oppression, while they are ready to unite with good men in feasible and wise measures for its removal, and while they obey the Christian precepts towards their servants, rendering unto them what is just and equal to men and brethren in Christ. Such Christians and such men do not hold slaves in the sense which God forbids; and they cannot be charged with the wickedness of laws by which they, as well as the slaves, are oppressed. On their estates a higher law than that of slavery has sway. ”

“ Property lies in the foundation of every happy home, however humble; and property gilds the pinnacle of every consecrated temple. The wise and impartial Disposer, therefore, makes the endowments of his creatures equal with their responsibilities: to all those on whom he lays the obligations of religion and of the family state, he gives the right of holding the property on which the dwelling and the sanctuary must be founded. ”

“ As the central wrong of slavery consists in making men articles of property by law, the rectification is to lift from them by law the curse of the false and irreligious doctrine, that they can be rightfully held as property. ”

“ But how much weightier does this argument become, when it is remembered that the opposers of slavery, besides being exceedingly numerous, have, many of them, been eminent,—not merely for a conscientious piety, but for talent, for research, for scholarship, for broad and comprehensive views of things;—and that the list embraces distinguished southern, as well as northern men; and men of celebrity in both church and state. There have been found in the anti-slavery ranks, presidents and noble men, jurists and legislators, statesmen and divines, scholars and authors, poets and orators. ”