"Thou shalt not deliver unto his master the servant which is escapedfrom his master unto thee."—DEUT. 23:15.
APPEAL TO THE LEGISLATORS OF MASSACHUSSETTS.
APPEAL TO THE CONSTITUTIONALITY OF THE FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT.
I feel there is no need of apologizing to the Legislatureof Massachusetts because a woman addresses them. SirWalter Scott says: "The truth of Heaven was never committedto a tongue, however feeble, but it gave a right to thattongue to announce mercy, while it declared judgment." Andin view of all that women have done, and are doing, intellectuallyand morally, for the advancement of the world, I presumeno enlightened legislator will be disposed to deny thatthe "truth of Heaven" is often committed to them, and thatthey sometimes utter it with a degree of power that greatlyinfluences the age in which they live.
I therefore offer no excuses on that score. But I do feelas if it required some apology to attempt to convince men ofordinary humanity and common sense that the Fugitive SlaveBill is utterly wicked, and consequently ought never to beobeyed. Yet Massachusetts consents to that law! Someshadow of justice she grants, inasmuch as her Legislaturehave passed what is called a Personal Liberty Bill, securingtrial by jury to those claimed as slaves. Certainly it issomething gained, especially for those who may get brown byworking in the sunshine, to prevent our Southern mastersfrom taking any of us, at a moment's notice, and dragging usoff into perpetual bondage. It is something gained to requirelegal proof that a man is a slave, before he is given upto arbitrary torture and unrecompensed toil. But is thatthe measure of justice becoming the character of a free Commonwealth?"Prove that the man is property, accordingyour laws, and I will drive him into your cattle-pen withsword and bayonet," is what Massachusetts practically saysto Southern tyrants. "Show me a Bill of Sale from theAlmighty!" is what she ought to say. No other proofshould be considered valid in a Christian country.
One thousand five hundred years ago, Gregory, a Bishopin Asia Minor, preached a sermon in which he rebukedthe sin of slaveholding. Indignantly he asked, "Whocan be the possessor of human beings save God? Thosemen that you say belong to you, did not God createthem free? Command the brute creation; that is well.Bend the beasts of the field beneath your yoke. But areyour fellow-men to be bought and sold, like herds of cattle?Who can pay the value of a being created in the image ofGod? The whole world itself bears no proportion to thevalue of a soul, on which the Most High has set the sealhis likeness. This world will perish, but the soul of man isimmortal. Show me, then, your titles of possession. Tellme whence you derive this strange claim. Is not your ownnature the same with that of those you call your slaves?Have they not the same