登陆注册
15397100000016

第16章 THE VINDICATION OF LIBERTY(1)

With the changed attitude of the South towards emancipation there was associated an active hostility to dearly bought human liberty.Freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of worship, the right of assembly, trial by jury, the right of petition, free use of the mails, and numerous other fundamental human rights were assailed.Birney and other abolitionists who had immediate knowledge of slavery early perceived that the real question at issue was quite as much the continued liberty of the white man as it was the liberation of the black man and that the enslavement of one race involved also the ultimate essential enslavement of the other.

In 1831 two slave States and six free States still extended to free negroes the right to vote.During the pro-slavery crusade these privileges disappeared; and not only so, but free negroes were banished from certain States, or were not permitted to enter them, or were allowed to remain only by choosing a white man for a guardian.It was made a crime to teach negroes, whether slaves or free men, to read and write.Under various pretexts free negroes were reduced to slavery.Freedom of worship was denied to negroes, and they were not allowed to assemble for any purpose except under the strict surveillance of white men.Negro testimony in a court of law was invalid where the rights of a white man were involved.The right of a negro to his freedom was decided by an arbitrary court without a jury, while the disputed right of a white man to the ownership of a horse was conditioned by the safeguard of trial by jury.

The maintenance of such policies carries with it of necessity the suppression of free discussion.When Southern leaders adopted the policy of defending slavery as a righteous institution, abolitionists in the South either emigrated to the North or were silenced.In either case they were deprived of a fundamental right.The spirit of persecution followed them into the free States.Birney could not publish his paper in Kentucky, nor even at Cincinnati, save at the risk of his life.Elijah Lovejoy was not allowed to publish his paper in Missouri, and, when he persisted in publishing it in Illinois, he was brutally murdered.

Even in Boston it required men of courage and determination to meet and organize an anti-slavery society in 1832, though only a few years earlier Benjamin Lundy had traveled freely through the South itself delivering anti-slavery lectures and organizing scores of such societies.The New York Anti-Slavery Society was secretly organized in 1832 in spite of the opposition of a determined mob.Mob violence was everywhere rife.Meetings were broken up, negro quarters attacked, property destroyed, murders committed.

Fair-minded men became abolitionists on account of the crusade against the rights of white men quite as much as from their interest in the rights of negroes.Salmon P.Chase of Ohio was led to espouse the cause by observing the attacks upon the freedom of the press in Cincinnati.Gerrit Smith witnessed the breaking up of an anti-slavery meeting in Utica, New York, and thereafter consecrated his time, his talents, and his great wealth to the cause of liberty.Wendell Phillips saw Garrison in the hands of a Boston mob, and that experience determined him to make common cause with the martyr.And the murder of Lovejoy in 1837 made many active abolitionists.

It is difficult to imagine a more inoffensive practice than giving to negro girls the rudiments of an education.Yet a school for this purpose, taught by Miss Prudence Crandall in Canterbury, Connecticut, was broken up by persistent persecution, a special act of the Legislature being passed for the purpose, forbidding the teaching of negroes from outside the State without the consent of the town authorities.Under this act Miss Crandall was arrested, convicted, and imprisoned.

Having eliminated free discussion from the South, the Southern States sought to accomplish the same object in the North.In pursuance of a resolution of the Legislature, the Governor of Georgia offered a reward of five thousand dollars to any one who should arrest, bring to trial, and prosecute to conviction under the laws of Georgia the editor of the Liberator.R.G.Williams, publishing agent for the American Anti-Slavery Society, was indicted by a grand jury of Tuscaloosa County, Alabama, and Governor Gayle of Alabama made a requisition on Governor Marcy of New York for his extradition.Williams had never been in Alabama.

His offense consisted in publishing in the New York Emancipator a few rather mild utterances against slavery.

同类推荐
热门推荐
  • 黑袍飞扬

    黑袍飞扬

    他,刘默。一袭黑袍,有人看到他说,你怎么不换身衣服,出来装bi,天天穿这个?吓唬谁勒!刘默淡淡的一笑,四十五度角一个侧踢,将那人踢飞。
  • 情义录

    情义录

    “情为何物?”“情为世间红尘!人在其中则迷!”“义为何物?”“义为刚正忠孝!刚正先忠孝后!”“情义为何物?”“情义合为江湖!一江情一湖义!”“江湖在何处?”“江湖在人心!心有江湖自在江湖!”“心若坏了,江湖安在?”“那便是一个徒有其表的空壳罢!”
  • 绝迹心跳

    绝迹心跳

    遗世石板,是先人执念还是先人咒怨,孰与何人解?
  • Chaucer

    Chaucer

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。
  • 让身体不再荒凉

    让身体不再荒凉

    妈生下我的时候,我很丑,头发黄黄,又瘦又小。妈说:“这么丑的妮子,又这么小,能养活吗?给人家吧。”娘说“说什么傻话,恁不要俺要。”从此,我便有了娘。都说傻有傻福,丑有丑福,有了娘或许就是我福气的开始……
  • 解锁99式:娇妻服不服

    解锁99式:娇妻服不服

    明珠,几点了?”“三点整。”“好,整!”事后,明珠腰酸背疼,不满的嘀咕道:“我说的是时间。”“哦!”某男拉长音调,问道,“那现在几点了!”“五点半!”“好,办!”明珠先发制人,趴在某男的胸膛上画圈圈,“顾南城,打个商量呗,有人追求我了,我想尝尝恋爱的感觉!”“去问问小公主,介意换个爹地吗?再说了,恋爱有啥意思,有本事咱结婚!”
  • 福妻驾到

    福妻驾到

    现代饭店彪悍老板娘魂穿古代。不分是非的极品婆婆?三年未归生死不明的丈夫?心狠手辣的阴毒亲戚?贪婪而好色的地主老财?吃上顿没下顿的贫困宭境?不怕不怕,神仙相助,一技在手,天下我有!且看现代张悦娘,如何身带福气玩转古代,开面馆、收小弟、左纳财富,右傍美男,共绘幸福生活大好蓝图!!!!快本新书《天媒地聘》已经上架开始销售,只要3.99元即可将整本书抱回家,你还等什么哪,赶紧点击下面的直通车,享受乐乐精心为您准备的美食盛宴吧!)
  • 吃货厨娘:公子你等下

    吃货厨娘:公子你等下

    作为一名专业的吃货,女主从小就想穿越回去古代,吃最正宗的美食。
  • 贫总裁的富甜心

    贫总裁的富甜心

    七年前,他第一次见到她,是被她爸爸以贫民孩子的身份带到她的家。当那个男人把他领到她面前,介绍他以后就是她的哥哥,她沉默了许久,就在他以为她将要嘲笑他,讽刺他,她突然跑到自己面前,小手拉上他的脏兮兮手,开心的说到,我有哥哥了,我有哥哥了﹗拉着自己在硕大的院子里跑来跑去,望着她娇小的背影,他在心底默默的发誓,此生此世,护她一世!转眼间,七年过去。再次相见当初的女孩已成长成如今的少女,当初的男孩也拥有属于自己的势力,“哥哥,你,还认识我吗?”不知现在的你,还能否遵守当年的誓言?
  • 夜香

    夜香

    “文革”手抄本恐怖小说《一只绣花鞋》作者张宝瑞最新力作。老庆是文化人中的另类,是女人堆里公认的“好汉”,平日不修边幅,混迹于北京街头,一副北京大爷的模样,比狗爷还“狗”,比阿Q还“Q”,幻想恐怖,制造悬疑,是现代版“阿Q”演绎的幽默人生。《夜香》中老庆这个人物是被爱情遗忘的角落里生长起来的一棵奇草。