The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus · Chapter 9Part 9
This chapter is not translated yet. You are reading the original.
But you will say, a great many other Northerners tell us so, who can have no political motives. The interests of the North, you must know, my friends, are very closely combined with those of the South. The Northern merchants and manufacturers are making their fortunes out of the produce of slave labor; the grocer is selling your rice and sugar; how then can these men bear a testimony against slavery without condemning themselves? But there is another reason, the North is most dreadfully afraid of Amalgamation. She is alarmed at the very idea of a thing so monstrous, as she thinks. And lest this consequence might flow from emancipation, she is determined to resist all efforts at emancipation without expatriation. It is not because she approves of slavery, or believes it to be "the corner stone of our republic," for she is as much anti-slavery as we are; but amalgamation is too horrible to think of. Now I would ask you, is it right, is it generous, to refuse the colored people in this country the advantages of education and the privilege, or rather the right, to follow honest trades and callings merely because they are colored? The same prejudice exists here against our colored brethren that existed against the Gentiles in Judea. Great numbers cannot bear the idea of equality, and fearing lest, if they had the same advantages we enjoy, they would become as intelligent, as moral, as religious, and as respectable and wealthy, they are determined to keep them as low as they possibly can. Is this doing as they would be done by? Is this loving their neighbor as themselves? Oh! that such opposers of Abolitionism would put their souls in the stead of the free colored man's and obey the apostolic injunction, to "remember them that are in bonds as bound with them." I will leave you to judge whether the fear of amalgamation ought to induce men to oppose anti-slavery efforts, when they believe slavery to be sinful. Prejudice against color, is the most powerful enemy we have to fight with at the North.
You need not be surprised, then, at all, at what is said against Abolitionists by the North, for they are wielding a two-edged sword, which even here, cuts through the cords of caste, on the one side, and the bonds of interest on the other. They are only sharing the fate of other reformers, abused and reviled whilst they are in the minority; but they are neither angry nor discouraged by the invective which has been heaped upon them by slaveholders at the South and their apologists at the North. They know that when George Fox and William Edmundson were laboring in behalf of the negroes in the West Indies in 1671 that the very same slanders were propogated against them, which are now circulated against Abolitionists. Although it was well known that Fox was the founder of a religious sect which repudiated all war, and all violence, yet even he was accused of "endeavoring to excite the slaves to insurrection and of teaching the negroes to cut their master's throats." And these two men who had their feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of Peace, were actually compelled to draw up a formal declaration that they were not trying to raise a rebellion in Barbadoes. It is also worthy of remark that these Reformers did not at this time see the necessity of emancipation under seven years, and their principal efforts were exerted to persuade the planters of the necessity of instructing their slaves; but the slaveholder saw then, just what the slaveholder sees now, that an enlightened population never can be a slave population, and therefore they passed a law that negroes should not even attend the meetings of Friends. Abolitionists know that the life of Clarkson was sought by slavetraders, and that even Wilberforce was denounced on the floor of Parliament as a fanatic and a hypocrite by the present King of England, the very man who, in 1834 set his seal to that instrument which burst the fetters of eight hundred thousand slaves in his West India colonies. They know that the first Quaker who bore a faithful testimony against the sin of slavery was cut off from religious fellowship with that society. That Quaker was a woman. On her deathbed she sent for the committee who dealt with her—she told them, the near approach of death had not altered her sentiments on the subject of slavery and waving her hand towards a very fertile and beautiful portion of country which lay stretched before her window, she said with great solemnity, "Friends, the time will come when there will not be friends enough in all this district to hold one meeting for worship, and this garden will be turned into a wilderness."
The aged friend, who with tears in his eyes, related this interesting circumstance to me, remarked, that at that time there were seven meetings of friends in that part of Virginia, but that when he was there ten years ago, not a single meeting was held, and the country was literally a desolation. Soon after her decease, John Woolman began his labors in our society, and instead of disowning a member for testifying against slavery, they have for sixty-two years positively forbidden their members to hold slaves.
Abolitionists understand the slaveholding spirit too well to be surprised at any thing that has yet happened at the South or the North; they know that the greater the sin is, which is exposed, the more violent will be the efforts to blacken the character and impugn the motives of those who are engaged in bringing to light the hidden things of darkness. They understand the work of Reform too well to be driven back by the furious waves of opposition, which are only foaming out their own shame. They have stood "the world's dread laugh," when only twelve men formed the first Anti-Slavery Society in Boston in 1831. They have faced and refuted the calumnies of their enemies, and proved themselves to be emphatically peace men by never resisting the violence of mobs, even when driven by them from the temple of God, and dragged by an infuriated crowd through the streets of the emporium of New-England, or subjected by slaveholders to the pain of corporal punishment. "None of these things move them;" and, by the grace of God, they are determined to persevere in this work of faith and labor of love: they mean to pray, and preach, and write, and print, until slavery is completely overthrown, until Babylon is taken up and cast into the sea, to "be found no more at all." They mean to petition Congress year after year, until the seat of our government is cleansed from the sinful traffic of "slaves and the souls of men." Although that august assembly may be like the unjust judge who "feared not God neither regarded man," yet it must yield just as he did, from the power of importunity. Like the unjust judge, Congress must redress the wrongs of the widow, lest by the continual coming up of petitions, it be wearied. This will be striking the dagger into the very heart of the monster, and once this done, he must soon expire.
Abolitionists have been accused of abusing their Southern brethren. Did the prophet Isaiah abuse the Jews when he addressed to them the cutting reproof contained in the first chapter of his prophecies, and ended by telling them, they would be ashamed of the oaks they had desired, and confounded for the garden they had chosen? Did John the Baptist abuse the Jews when he called them "a generation of vipers," and warned them "to bring forth fruits meet for repentance!" Did Peter abuse the Jews when he told them they were the murderers of the Lord of Glory? Did Paul abuse the Roman Governor when he reasoned before him of righteousness, temperance, and judgment, so as to send conviction home to his guilty heart, and cause him to tremble in view of the crimes he was living in? Surely not. No man will now accuse the prophets and apostles of abuse, but what have Abolitionists done more than they? No doubt the Jews thought the prophets and apostles in their day, just as harsh and uncharitable as slaveholders now, think Abolitionists; if they did not, why did they beat, and stone, and kill them?
Great fault has been found with the prints which have been employed to expose slavery at the North, but my friends, how could this be done so effectively in any other way? Until the pictures of the slave's sufferings were drawn and held up to public gaze, no Northerner had any idea of the cruelty of the system, it never entered their minds that such abominations could exist in Christian, Republican America; they never suspected that many of the gentlemen and ladies who came from the South to spend the summer months in traveling among them, were petty tyrants at home. And those who had lived at the South, and came to reside at the North, were too ashamed of slavery even to speak of it; the language of their hearts was, "tell it not in Gath, publish it not in the streets of Askelon;" they saw no use in uncovering the loathsome body to popular sight, and in hopeless despair, wept in secret places over the sins of oppression. To such hidden mourners the formation of Anti-Slavery Societies was as life from the dead, the first beams of hope which gleamed through the dark clouds of despondency and grief. Prints were made use of to effect the abolition of the Inquisition in Spain, and Clarkson employed them when he was laboring to break up the Slave trade, and English Abolitionists used them just as we are now doing. They are powerful appeals and have invariably done the work they were designed to do, and we cannot consent to abandon the use of these until the realities no longer exist.
With regard to those white men, who, it was said, did try to raise an insurrection in Mississippi a year ago, and who were stated to be Abolitionists, none of them were proved to be members of Anti-Slavery Societies, and it must remain a matter of great doubt whether, even they were guilty of the crimes alledged against them, because when any community is thrown into such a panic as to inflict Lynch law upon accused persons, they cannot be supposed to be capable of judging with calmness and impartiality. We know that the papers of which the Charleston mail was robbed, were not insurrectionary, and that they were not sent to the colored people as was reported. We know that Amos Dresser was no insurrectionist though he was accused of being so, and on this false accusation was publicly whipped in Nashville in the midst of a crowd of infuriated slaveholders. Was that young man disgraced by this infliction of corporal punishment? No more than was the great apostle of the Gentile; who five times received forty stripes, save one. Like him, he might have said, "henceforth I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus," for it was for the truth's sake, he suffered, as much as did the Apostle Paul. Are Nelson, and Garrett, and Williams, and other Abolitionists who have recently been banished from Missouri, insurrectionists? We know they are not, whatever slaveholders may choose to call them. The spirit which now asperses the character of the Abolitionists, is the very same which dressed up the Christians of Spain in the skins of wild beasts and pictures of devils when they were led to execution as heretics. Before we condemn individuals, it is necessary, even in a wicked community, to accuse them of some crime; hence, when Jezebel wished to compass the death of Naboth, men of Belial were suborned to bear false witness against him, and so it was with Stephen, and so it ever has been, and ever will be, as long as there is any virtue to suffer on the rack, or the gallows. False witnesses must appear against Abolitionists before they can be condemned.
I will now say a few words on George Thompson's mission to this country. This Philanthropist was accused of being a foreign emissary. Were Lafayette, and Steuben, and De Kalb, and Pulawski, foreign emissaries when they came over to America to fight against the tories, who preferred submitting to what was termed, "the yoke of servitude," rather than bursting the fetters which bound them to the mother country? They came with carnal weapons to engage in bloody conflict against American citizens, and yet, where do their names stand on the page of History. Among the honorable, or the base? Thompson came here to war against the giant sin of slavery, not with the sword and the pistol, but with the smooth stones of oratory taken from the pure waters of the river of Truth. His splendid talents and commanding eloquence rendered him a powerful coadjutor in the Anti-Slavery cause, and in order to neutralize the effects of these upon his auditors, and rob the poor slave of the benefits of his labors, his character was defamed, his life was sought, and he at last driven from our Republic, as a fugitive. But was Thompson disgraced by all this mean and contemptible and wicked chicanery and malice? No more than was Paul, when in consequence of a vision he had seen at Treas, he went over the Macedonia to help the Christians there, and was beaten and imprisoned, because he cast out a spirit of divination from a young damsel which had brought much gain to her masters. Paul was as much a foreign emissary in the Roman colony of Philippi, as George Thompson was in America, and it was because he was a Jew, and taught customs it was not lawful for them to receive or observe being Romans, that the Apostle was thus treated.
It was said, Thompson was a felon, who had fled to this country to escape transportation to New Holland. Look at him now pouring the thundering strains of his eloquence, upon crowded audiences in Great Britain, and see in this a triumphant vindication of his character. And have the slaveholder, and his obsequious apologist, gained anything by all their violence and falsehood? No! for the stone which struck Goliath of Gath, had already been thrown from the sling. The giant of slavery who had so proudly defied the armies of the living God, had received his death-blow before he left our shores. But what is George Thompson doing there? Is he not now laboring there, as effectually to abolish American slavery as though he trod our own soil, and lectured to New York or Boston assemblies? What is he doing there, but constructing a stupendous dam, which will turn the overwhelming tide of public opinion over the wheels of that machinery which Abolitionists are working here. He is now lecturing to Britons on American Slavery, to the subjects of a King, on the abject condition of the slaves of a Republic. He is telling them of that mighty Confederacy of petty tyrants which extends over thirteen States of our Union. He is telling them of the munificent rewards offered by slaveholders, for the heads of the most distinguished advocates for freedom in this country. He is moving the British Churches to send out to the churches of America the most solemn appeals, reproving, rebuking, and exhorting, them with all long suffering and patience to abandon the sin of slavery immediately. Where then I ask, will the name of George Thompson stand on the page of History? Among the honorable, or the base?
What can I say more, my friends, to induce you to set your hands, and heads, and hearts, to the great work of justice and mercy. Perhaps you have feared the consequences of immediate emancipation, and been frightened by all those dreadful prophecies of rebellion, bloodshed and murder, which have been uttered. "Let no man deceive you;" they are the predictions of that same "lying spirit" which spoke through the four hundred prophets of old, to Ahab king of Israel, urging him on to destruction. Slavery may produce these horrible scenes if it is continued five years longer, but Emancipation never will.
I can prove the safety of immediate Emancipation by history. In St. Domingo in 1793 six hundred thousand slaves were set free in a white population of forty-two thousand. That Island "marched as by enchantment towards its ancient splendor", cultivation prospered, every day produced perceptible proofs of its progress, and the negroes all continued quietly to work on the different plantations, until in 1802, France determined to reduce these liberated slaves again to bondage. It was at this time that all those dreadful scenes of cruelty occurred, which we so often unjustly hear spoken of, as the effects of Abolition. They were occasioned not by Emancipation, but by the base attempt to fasten the chains of slavery on the limbs of liberated slaves.
In Guadaloupe eighty-five thousand slaves were freed in a white population of thirteen thousand. The same prosperous effects followed manumission here, that had attended it in Hayti, every thing was quiet until Buonaparte sent out a fleet to reduce these negroes again to slavery, and in 1802 this institution was re-established in that Island. In 1834, when Great Britain determined to liberate the slaves in her West India colonies, and proposed the apprenticeship system; the planters of Bermuda and Antigua, after having joined the other planters in their representations of the bloody consequences of Emancipation, in order if possible to hold back the hand which was offering the boon of freedom to the poor negro; as soon as they found such falsehoods were utterly disregarded, and Abolition must take place, came forward voluntarily, and asked for the compensation which was due to them, saying, they preferred immediate emancipation, and were not afraid of any insurrection. And how is it with these islands now? They are decidedly more prosperous than any of those on which the apprenticeship system was adopted, and England is now trying to abolish that system, so fully convinced is she that immediate Emancipation is the safest and the best plan.
And why not try it in the Southern States, if it never has occasioned rebellion; if not a drop of blood has ever been shed in consequence of it, though it has been so often tried, why should we suppose it would produce such disastrous consequences now? "Be not deceived then, God is not mocked," by such false excuses for not doing justly and loving mercy. There is nothing to fear from immediate Emancipation, but every thing from the continuance of slavery.
Sisters in Christ, I have done. As a Southerner, I have felt it was my duty to address you. I have endeavoured to set before you the exceeding sinfulness of slavery, and to point you to the example of those noble women who have been raised up in the church to effect great revolutions, and to suffer for the truth's sake. I have appealed to your sympathies as women, to your sense of duty as Christian women. I have attempted to vindicate the Abolitionists, to prove the entire safety of immediate Emancipation, and to plead the cause of the poor and oppressed. I have done—I have sowed the seeds of truth, but I well know, that even if an Apollos were to follow in my steps to water them, "God only can give the increase." To Him then who is able to prosper the work of his servant's hand, I commend this Appeal in fervent prayer, that as he "hath chosen the weak things of the world, to confound the things which are mighty," so He may guise His blessing, to descend and carry conviction to the hearts of many Lydias through these speaking pages. Farewell—Count me not your "enemy because I have told you the truth," but believe me in unfeigned affection,
Your sympathizing Friend,
ANGELINA E. GRIMKÉ.
Shrewsbury, N.J., 1836.
1837.
LETTER, ETC.
PETERBORO', October 28, 1836.
Rev. JAMES SMYLIE,
Late Stated Clerk of the Presbytery of Mississippi:
SIR,—Accept my thanks for your politeness in sending me a copy of your book on slavery. This book proves, that the often repeated assertion, that the whole South is opposed to the discussion of the question of slavery, is not true:—and so far, I rejoice in its appearance. I presume—I know, indeed, that you are not the only man in the South, who is in favor of this discussion. There are, doubtless, many persons in the South, who believe, that all attempts to suppress it, are vain, as well as wicked. Besides, you virtually admit, that the South is compelled to discuss the question of slavery; or, at least, to give her own views of it, in order to prevent the conscience of Southern Christians—that conscience, "which does make cowards of us all"—from turning traitor to the cause of slavery. I rejoice, too, that you accompanied the copy sent to me, with the request, that I should review it, and make "candid remarks" upon it; and, that you have thus put it in my power to send to the South some of my views on slavery, without laying myself open to the charge of being discourteous and obtrusive.
You undertake to show that slavery existed, and, with the Divine approbation, amongst the Old Testament Jews; and that it also existed, whilst our Saviour and his Apostles were on the earth, and was approved by them. You thence argue, that it is not only an innocent institution, but one which it is a religious duty to maintain.
I admit, for the sake of argument, that there was a servitude in the patriarchal families which was approved by God. But what does this avail in your defence of slavery, unless you show, that that servitude and slavery are essentially alike? The literal terms of the relation of master and servant, under that servitude, are not made known to us; but we can, nevertheless, confidently infer their spirit from facts, which illustrate their practical character; and, if this character be found to be opposite to that of slavery, then it is manifest, that what you say of patriarchal servitude is impertinent, and tends to mislead, rather than enlighten your readers. To a few of these facts and a few of the considerations arising from them, I now call your attention.
1st. Read the first eight verses of the eighteenth chapter of Genesis, and tell me, if you ever saw Gov. McDuffie or any other Southern patriarch (for the governor desires to have all slaveholders looked upon in the character of patriarchs) putting himself on a level with his servants, and "working with his hands," after the manner of Abraham and Sarah?
2d. There was such a community of interest—so much of mutual confidence—between Abraham and his servants, that they fought his battles. Indeed, the terms of this patriarchal servitude were such, that in the event of the master's dying without issue, one of his servants inherited his property (Gen. 15: 3). But, according to the code of Southern slavery, the slave can no more own property, than he can own himself. "All that a slave possesses belongs to his master"—"Slaves are incapable of inheriting or transmitting property." These, and many similar phrases, are found in that code. Severe as was the system of Roman slavery, yet in this respect, it was far milder than yours; for its subjects could acquire property (their peculium); and frequently did they purchase their liberty with it. So far from Southern slaves being, as Abraham's servants were, a dependence in war, it is historically true, that they are accustomed to improve this occasion to effect their escape, and strengthen the hands of the enemy. As a further proof that Southern slavery begets none of that confidence between master and slave, which characterized the mutual intercourse of Abraham and his servants—the slave is prohibited, under severe penalties, from having any weapons in his possession, even in time of peace; and the nightly patrol, which the terror-stricken whites of Southern towns keep up, in peace, as well as in war, argues any thing, rather than the existence of such confidence. "For keeping or carrying a gun, or powder or shot, or a club, or other weapon whatsoever, offensive or defensive, a slave incurs, says Southern statute book, for each offence, thirty-nine lashes."
3d. When I read your quotation from the twenty-fourth chapter of Genesis, made for the purpose of showing that God allowed Abraham to have slaves, I could not but wonder at your imprudence, in meddling with this chapter, which is of itself, enough to convince any unbiased mind, that Abraham's servants held a relation to their master and to society, totally different from that held by Southern slaves. Have you ever known a great man in your state send his slave into another to choose a wife for his son?—And if so, did the lily white damsel he selected call the sable servant "my lord?"—And did her family spare no pains to manifest respect for their distinguished guest, and promote his comfort? But this chapter, which you call to your aid, informs us, that Abraham's servant was honored with such tokens of confidence and esteem. If a Southern slave shall ever be employed in such a mission, he may count himself highly favored, if he be not taken up by the way, imprisoned, and "sold for his jail fees."
4th. Did you ever know Southern slaves contend for their rights with their masters? When a Southern master reads the thirteenth verse of the thirty-first chapter of Job, he must think that Job was in the habit of letting down his dignity very low.
5th. Do Southern masters accord religious privileges and impart religious instruction equally to their slaves and their children? Your laws, which visit with stripes, imprisonment, and death, the attempt to teach slaves to read the Bible, show but too certainly, that the Southern master, who should undertake to place "his children and his household" on the same level, in respect to their religious advantages, as it is probable that Abraham did (Gen. 18:19), would soon find himself in the midst of enemies, not to his reputation only, but to his life also.
And now, sir, admitting that the phrase, on which you lay so much stress—"bought with his money"—was used in connexion with a form of servitude which God approved—I put it to your candor, whether this phrase should be allowed to weigh at all against the facts I have adduced and the reasonings I have employed to show the true nature of that servitude, and how totally unlike it is to slavery? Are you not bound by the principles of sound reasoning, to attach to it a meaning far short of what, I grant, is its natural import in this age, and, especially, amongst a people who, like ourselves, are accustomed to associate such an expression with slavery? Can you deny, that you are bound to adopt such a meaning of it, as shall harmonize with the facts, which illustrate the nature of the servitude in question, and with the laws and character of Him, whose sanction you claim for that servitude? An opposite course would give a preference to words over things, which common sense could not tolerate. Many instances might be cited to show the absurdity of the assumption that whatever is spoken of in the Scriptures as being "bought," is property. Boaz "purchased" his wife. Hosea "bought her (his wife) for fifteen pieces of silver." Jacob, to use a common expression, "took his wages" in wives. Joseph "bought" the Egyptians, after they had said to him "buy us." But, so far from their having become the property of Joseph or of his king, it was a part of the bargain, that they were to have as much land as they wanted—seed to sow it—and four-fifths of the crops. The possessors of such independence and such means of wealth are not the property of their fellow-men.
I need say no more, to prove that slavery is entirely unlike the servitude in the patriarchal families. I pass on, now, to the period between the promulgation of the Divine law by Moses, and the birth of Christ.
You argue from the fifth and sixth verses of the twenty-first chapter of Exodus, that God authorized the enslavement of the Jews: but, on the same page, on which you do so, you also show the contrary. It may, nevertheless, be well for me to request you to read and read again Leviticus 25:39-42, until your remaining doubts, on this point, shall all be put to flight. I am free to admit the probability, that under some of the forms of servitude, in which Jews were held, the servant was subjected to a control so extensive as to expose him to suffer great cruelties. These forms corresponded with the spirit and usages of the age, in which they existed; entirely unsuited, as they are, to a period and portion of the world, blessed with the refining and softening influences of civilization and the gospel. Numerous as were the statutory regulations for the treatment of the servant, they could not preclude the large discretion of the master. The apprentice, in our country, is subjected to an authority, equaling a parent's authority, but not always tempered in its exercise, with a parent's love. His condition is, therefore, not unfrequently marked with severity and suffering. Now, imagine what this condition would be, under the harsh features of a more barbarous age, and you will have in it, as I conjecture, no distant resemblance to that of some of the Jewish servants. But how different is this condition from that of the slave!