The Trial of Theodore Parker: For the "Misdemeanor" of a Speech in Faneuil Hall against Kidnapping, before the Circuit Court of the United States, at Boston, April 3, 1855, with the DefenceParker, Theodore
Religion
The Trial of Theodore Parker: For the "Misdemeanor" of a Speech in Faneuil Hall against Kidnapping, before the Circuit Court of the United States, at Boston, April 3, 1855, with the Defence
Parker, Theodore
Antislavery movements -- Massachusetts -- Boston; United States -- Fugitive slave law (1850)
Now the few controlling men of the South, the holders of land and
slaves, have Unity of pecuniary Interest--the support of Slavery as a
local measure,--for it is the source of their material wealth, and
also a consequent Unity of political Idea, the support of Slavery as a
universal Principle, for it is the source likewise of their political
power. Accordingly the South presents against the North an even and
well-disciplined front of veteran soldiers, is always hostile to
Freedom, and as her "best educated" men devote much time to politics,
making it the profession of their whole lives, it is plain they become
formidable antagonists.
But the North has a great variety of conflicting interests, a great
amount of intellectual activity, where education and its consequent
habits of reading and thinking are so wide spread, and therefore a
great variety of opinion. Accordingly there is not the same Unity of
pecuniary Interest and of political Idea, which distinguishes the
South. Besides, in the North the ablest and best educated men do not
devote their time to the thankless and stormy calling of politics;
Virginia cares for nothing but Negroes and Politics, her loins and her
brains gender but this twofold product: Massachusetts and New York
care for much beside. So the North does not present against the South
an even and well-disciplined front of veteran soldiers, but a ragged,
discordant line of raw recruits, enlisting for a short time with some
special or even personal local interest to serve.
What makes the matter yet worse for us, Gentlemen of the Jury, is
this: While the great mass of the people at the North, engrossed in
direct productive industry, are really hostile to slavery, those
absorbed in the large operations of commerce, taken as a whole class,
feel little interest in the Idea of Freedom; nay, they are positively
opposed to it. Before the African Slave-trade was treated like other
kindred forms of piracy, as a capital crime, they had their ships in
that felonious traffic; and now their vessels engage in the American
Slave-trade and their hand still deals in the bodies of their fellow
men. In all the great commercial cities, like Philadelphia, New York
and Boston these men prevail, and are the "eminent citizens,"
overslaughing the press, the pulpit, the bar, and the court, with the
Ideas of their lower law, and sweeping along all metropolitan and
suburban fashion and respectability in their slimy flood. Hence the
great cities of the North, governed by the low maxims of this class,
have become the asylum of Northern men with Southern "Principles," and
so the strong-hold of Slavery. And hitherto these great cities have
controlled the politics of the Northern States, crowding the Apostles
of Freedom out from the national board, and helping the party of
slavery to triumph in all great battles.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account