Press enter after choosing selection

Facts For The People

Facts For The People image
Parent Issue
Day
10
Month
November
Year
1841
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

Shxvery was abolished in Prussia in 1776; St. Domingo, Cayenne.Guadaloupe and Martinique in 1794; by' the French m Java 1811; Ceylon 1815; Buenos Ayres 1816; St. Helena 1819; Columbia and Chih 1821 ; Cape Colony 1823; Malacca 1825; Southern Bermah and Bolivia 1826 Peru, Guatemala, Monte Video 1823; Jamaica, Barbadoes, Bermudas, Bahamas Mauritus, St. Christophers, Nevis, Virgin lsles, Antigua, Montscrratt, Dominica, St. Vincents, Grenada, Berbice, Tobago, St. Lucia, TrinidadjHonduras, Demarara,and Cape of Good Hope, Aug. 1, 1834; and yet ihis "land of the free" thi3 "only pure republic," thisk'cradle of liberty," with the exception of Pennsylvaaia since 1780, Connecticut and Rhode Island siace 1784, New York since 1799, New Jersey since 1804, Vermom siace 1777, Massachusetts since 1780, New Hampshire since 1784, has most inconsistently neglected the Jegislative power as a means of annihilating this monstrous absurdity in our midst. It issaid that when the present qucen ofEngland (a monarchy) was recommended to adopt a certain measure in her civil administration as 'expedient,'replied, "Talk not of expedienta but teil me is it right?" Must our republic be urged to iaiitate the better theoretical as well as practical exampleof a monarchy? This would secm to be the truc State of the case, when weconsider the foílqwing civil énactmèölé existing in some of our Siatcá.I In Louisiami, it is decided that free jpeople of colur ought never to presume to think themselves equal to the whites. - 1 Martin's Digest, 40-2. ín South Carolina, if a free negro harbors a runaway slave, he is Hable to be sold a slave íor tifa; In Mississippi, District of Columbia and nearly uil the slave States, every free llack or mulatto not able to prove himself free, is sold, also, as a slave for life, with all his posterity after him. Another favorito enaelment is more or lcss prevalent in the slaveholding States, ihat a slave found beyond his mastera planlation, without a ''pass" f rom a white man, may be apprehended and have inflicted upon his bare buck, sometimos 20, and sonielimes an unlimiled number of lashes. Brevard's Digest 231: Prince's Digest 427-447; 1 Virginia Rev. Code 422; 2 Missouri La ws 741-2, G14; Haywoud's Manual 518, 524. To teach a ïrce negro to read or write, in the cily of Savannah, is punished by a penalty of thirty dollars. In Maryland, if a slave strike a whhe person, for thc sucond oíFence he is to suffer death. Seventy-oneofíences in the slave code of Virginia, are puncha ble with death, which aro not capital when committed by the whites. ín Louisiana, thc ñne for insíructing a íree black in a Sunday school is, for ihe first oíFence, $'500, and for the secorid, doulh ! ! ! And who has not heard of the ear cropping, brand burning, flaying alive, crucifying, and burning process ut the South? But it pains me to go on with this horrid detail; though the thuusandths part has not yet been told, rn Ihe number of such quotations, or in the enormilies they disclose; which Arkansas has sealed upon her for lile, by that clause in her constitution e:. actin that síavery should never be abolished within her limits! After such disclosures as have been made by works expressly devoted to the representntion of "slavery as it is," wc need not wonder at the statements of the following goveniors of the slave holding States:Governor McDuffie, of South Carolina, in his message to the Jegislalure, saye: 1 vou!d have thoöe who oppose sluverj', if caught within our jurisdiction, puttodealh without benefit ofclergy. Governor Lynch, of Mississippi, says of abolilionists: "Necessity wiil sometimos prompt a summary mode of trial and pun. ishment,unUnown to the law." Governor Swaim, of Norih Caroünia, says: ''The characier of slavery is not to be discussed We have an indubitable right to demand of the frec States to suppresa such discussions totally andpromptly." Governor Lumpkin, of Georgia, in his message tothe legislatura contends against the right to discuas the question of slavery. Güvernor Tazewell, of Virginia, says: "We have a perfect right to require all the free States to adopt prompt and efficiënt means to suppress all associations for the discussion of the subject.' 1 remarked ;hat after the fearful developments that have been made by discussing the subject of slavery, we need not wonder that those participating in the guilt of it, should wish to suppress such discussion. Tliis might be expectcd of depraved human nature. But that Northern States men should tolérate such a system of slavery Q aay State seems to me eurprisitig.