Part 1 (1/2)
The Duty of Disobedience to the Fugitive Slave Act.
by Lydia Maria Child.
APPEAL
TO THE
LEGISLATORS OF Ma.s.sACHUSETTS.
I feel there is no need of apologizing to the Legislature of Ma.s.sachusetts because a woman addresses them. Sir Walter Scott says: ”The truth of Heaven was never committed to a tongue, however feeble, but it gave a right to that tongue to announce mercy, while it declared judgment.” And in view of all that women have done, and are doing, intellectually and morally, for the advancement of the world, I presume no enlightened legislator will be disposed to deny that the ”truth of Heaven” _is_ often committed to them, and that they sometimes utter it with a degree of power that greatly influences the age in which they live.
I therefore offer no excuses on that score. But I do feel as if it required some apology to attempt to convince men of ordinary humanity and common sense that the Fugitive Slave Bill is utterly wicked, and consequently ought never to be obeyed. Yet Ma.s.sachusetts consents to that law! Some shadow of justice she grants, inasmuch as her Legislature have pa.s.sed what is called a Personal Liberty Bill, securing trial by jury to those claimed as slaves. Certainly it is _something_ gained, especially for those who may get brown by working in the suns.h.i.+ne, to prevent our Southern masters from taking any of us, at a moment's notice, and dragging us off into perpetual bondage. It is _something_ gained to require legal proof that a man is a slave, before he is given up to arbitrary torture and unrecompensed toil. But is _that_ the measure of justice becoming the character of a free Commonwealth? ”_Prove_ that the man is property, according _your_ laws, and I will drive him into your cattle-pen with sword and bayonet,” is what Ma.s.sachusetts practically says to Southern tyrants. ”Show me a Bill of Sale from the Almighty!” is what she _ought_ to say. No other proof should be considered valid in a Christian country.
One thousand five hundred years ago, Gregory, a Bishop in Asia Minor, preached a sermon in which he rebuked the sin of slaveholding. Indignantly he asked, ”Who can be the possessor of human beings save G.o.d? Those men that you say belong to you, did not G.o.d create them free? Command the brute creation; that is well. Bend the beasts of the field beneath your yoke. But are your fellow-men to be bought and sold, like herds of cattle? Who can pay the value of a being created in the image of G.o.d? The whole world itself bears no proportion to the value of a soul, on which the Most High has set the seal his likeness. This world will perish, but the soul of man is immortal. Show me, then, your t.i.tles of possession. Tell me whence you derive this strange claim. Is not your own nature the same with that of those you call your slaves? Have they not the same origin with yourselves? Are they not born to the same immortal destinies?”
Thus spake a good old Bishop, in the early years of Christianity.
Since then, thousands and thousands of n.o.ble souls have given their bodies to the gibbet and the stake, to help onward the slow progress of truth and freedom; a great unknown continent has been opened as a new, free starting point for the human race; printing has been invented, and the command, ”Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them,” has been sent abroad in all the languages of the earth. And here, in the noon-day light the nineteenth century, in a nation claiming to be the freest and most enlightened on the face of the globe, a portion the population of fifteen States have thus agreed among themselves: ”Other men shall work for us, without wages while we smoke, and drink, and gamble, and race horses, and fight. We will have their wives and daughters for concubines, and sell their children in the market with horses and pigs. If they make any objection to this arrangement, we will break them into subjection with the cow-hide and the bucking-paddle.
They shall not be permitted to read or write, because that would be likely to 'produce dissatisfaction in their minds.' If they attempt to run away from us, our blood-hounds shall tear the flesh from their bones, and any man who sees them may shoot them down like mad dogs. If they succeed in getting beyond our frontier, into States where it is the custom to pay men for their work, and to protect their wives and children from outrage, we will compel the people of those States to drive them back into the jaws of our blood-hounds.”
And what do the people of the other eighteen States of that enlightened country answer to this monstrous demand? What says Ma.s.sachusetts, with the free blood of the Puritans coursing in her veins, and with the sword uplifted in her right hand, to procure ”peaceful repose under liberty”? Ma.s.sachusetts answers: ”O yes. We will be your blood-hounds, and pay our own expenses. Only prove to our satisfaction that the stranger who has taken refuge among us is one of the men you have agreed among yourselves to whip into working without wages, and we will hunt him back for you. Only prove to us that this woman, who has run away from your harem, was bought for a concubine, that you might get more drinking-money by the sale of the children she bears you, and our soldiers will hunt her back with alacrity.”
Shame on my native State! Everlasting shame! Blot out the escutcheon of the brave old Commonwealth! Instead of the sword uplifted to protect liberty, let the slave-driver's whip be suspended over a blood-hound, and take for your motto, Obedience to tyrants is the highest law.
Legislators of Ma.s.sachusetts, can it be that you really understand what Slavery _is_, and yet consent that a fugitive slave, who seeks protection here, shall be driven back to that dismal house of bondage? For sweet charity's sake, I must suppose that you have been too busy with your farms and your merchandise ever to have imagined yourself in the situation of a slave. Let me suppose a case for you; one of a cla.s.s of cases occurring by hundreds every year. Suppose your father was Governor of Carolina and your mother was a slave.
The Governor's wife hates your mother, and is ingenious in inventing occasions to have you whipped. _You_ don't know the reason why, poor child! but your mother knows full well. If they would only allow her to go away and work for wages, she would gladly toil and earn money to buy you. But that your father will not allow. His laws have settled it that she is his property, ”for all purposes whatsoever,” and he will keep her as long as suits his convenience.
The mistress continually insists upon her being sold far away South; and after a while, she has her will. Your poor mother clings to you convulsively; but the slave-driver gives you both a cut of his whip, and tells you to stop your squalling. They drive her off with the gang, and you never hear of her again; but, for a long time afterward, it makes you very sad to remember the farewell look of those large, loving eyes. Your poor mother had handsome eyes; and that was one reason her mistress hated her.
You also are your father's property; and when he dies, you will be the property of your whiter brother. You black his shoes, tend upon him at table, and sleep on the floor in his room, to give him water if he is thirsty in the night. You see him learning to read, and you hear your father read wonderful things from the newspapers. Very naturally, you want to read, too. You ask your brother to teach you the letters. He gives you a kick, calls you a ”d.a.m.ned nig,” and informs his father, who orders you to be flogged for insolence.
Alone on the hard floor at night, still smarting from your blows, you ponder over the great mystery of knowledge and wonder why it would do _you_ any more harm than it does your brother. Henceforth, all sc.r.a.ps of newspapers you can find are carefully laid by.
Helplessly you pore over them, at stolen moments, as if you expected some miracle would reveal the meaning of those printed signs.
Cunning comes to your aid. It is the only weapon of the weak against the strong. When you see white boys playing in the street, you trace a letter in the sand, and say, ”My young master calls that B.” ”That ain't B, you dammed n.i.g.g.e.r. That's A”! they shout. Now you know what shape is A; and diligently you hunt it out wherever it is to be found on your sc.r.a.ps of newspaper. By slow degrees you toil on, in similar ways, through all the alphabet. No student of Greek or Hebrew ever deserved so much praise for ingenuity and diligence. But the years pa.s.s on, and still you cannot read. Your master-brother now and then gives you a copper. You h.o.a.rd them, and buy a primer; screening yourself from suspicion, by telling the bookseller that your master wants it for his sister's little boy. You find the picture of a cat, with three letters by its side; and now you know how cat is spelt. Elated with your wonderful discovery, you are eager to catch a minute to study your primer. Too eager, alas! for your mistress catches you absorbed in it, and your little book is promptly burned. You are sent to be flogged, and your lacerated back is washed with brine to make it heal quickly. But in spite of all their efforts, your intelligent mind is too cunning for them. Before twenty years have pa.s.sed, you have stumbled along into the Bible; alone in the dark, over a rugged road of vowels and consonants. You keep the precious volume concealed under a board in the floor, and read it at s.n.a.t.c.hes, by the light of a pine knot. You read that G.o.d has created of one blood all the nations of the earth; and that his commandment is, to do unto others as we would that they should do unto us. You think of your weeping mother, torn from your tender arms by the cruel slave-trader; of the interdicted light of knowledge; of the Bible kept as a sealed book from all whose skins have a tinge of black, or brown, or yellow; of how those brown and yellow complexions came to be so common; of yourself, the son of the Governor, yet obliged to read the Bible by stealth, under the penalty of a bleeding back washed with brine. These and many other things revolve in your active mind, and your unwritten inferences are worth whole folios of theological commentaries.
As youth ripens into manhood, life bears for you, as it does for others, its brightest, sweetest flower. You love young Amy, with rippling black hair, and large dark eyes, with long, silky fringes.
You inherit from your father, the Governor, a taste for beauty warmly-tinted, like Cleopatra's. You and Amy are of rank to make a suitable match; for you are the son of a Southern Governor, and she is the daughter of a United States Senator, from the North, who often shared her master's hospitality; her handsome mother being a portion of that hospitality, and he being large-minded enough to ”conquer prejudices.” You have good sympathy in other respects also, for your mothers were both slaves; and as it is conveniently and profitably arranged for the masters that ”the child shall follow the condition of the _mother_,” you are consequently both of you slaves.
But there are some compensations for your hard lot. Amy's simple admiration flatters your vanity. She considers you a prodigy of learning because you can read the Bible, and she has not the faintest idea how such skill can be acquired. She gives you her whole heart, full of the blind confidence of a first love. The divine spark, which kindles aspirations for freedom in the human soul, has been glowing more and more brightly since you have emerged from boyhood, and now her glances kindle it into a flame. For her dear sake, you long to be a free man, with power to protect her from the degrading incidents of a slave-girl's life. Wages acquire new value in your eyes, from a wish to supply her with comforts, and enhance her beauty by becoming dress. For her sake, you are ambitious to acquire skill in the carpenter's trade, to which your, master-brother has applied you as the best investment of his human capital. It is true, he takes all your wages; but then, by acquiring uncommon facility, you hope to accomplish your daily tasks in shorter time, and thus obtain some extra hours to do jobs for yourself. These you can eke out by working late into the night, and rising when the day dawns. Thus you calculate to be able in time to buy the use of your own limbs. Poor fellow! Your intelligence and industry prove a misfortune. They charge twice as much for the machine of your body on account of the soul-power which moves it.
Your master-brother tells you that you would bring eighteen hundred dollars in the market. It is a large sum. Almost hopeless seems the prospect of earning it, at such odd hours as you can catch when the hard day's task is done. But you look at Amy, and are inspired with faith to remove mountains. Your master-brother graciously consents to receive payment by instalments. These prove a convenient addition to the whole of your wages. They will enable him to buy a new race horse, and increase his stock of choice wines. While he sleeps off drunkenness, you are toiling for him, with the blessed prospect of freedom far ahead, but burning brightly in the distance, like a Drummond Light, guiding the watchful mariner over a midnight sea.
When you have paid five hundred dollars of the required sum, your lonely heart so longs for the comforts of a home, that you can wait no longer. You marry Amy, with the resolution of buying her also, and removing to those Free States, about which you have often talked together, as invalids discourse of heaven. Amy is a member of the church, and it is a great point with her to be married by a minister. Her master and mistress make no objection, knowing that after the ceremony, she will remain an article of property, the same as ever. Now come happy months, during which you almost forget that you are a slave, and that it must be a weary long while before you can earn enough to buy yourself and your dear one, in addition to supporting your dissipated master. But you toil bravely on, and soon pay another hundred dollars toward your ransom. The Drummond Light of Freedom burns brighter in the diminished distance.
Alas! in an unlucky hour, your tipsy master-brother sees your gentle Amy, and becomes enamored of her large dark eyes, and the rich golden tint of her complexion. Your earnings and your ransom-money make him flush of cash. In spite of all your efforts to prevent it, she becomes his property. He threatens to cowhide you, if you ever speak to her again. You remind him that she is your wife; that you were married by a minister. ”Married, you d.a.m.ned n.i.g.g.e.r!” he exclaims; ”what does a slave's marriage amount to? If you give me any more of your insolence, you'll get a taste of the cowhide.”
Anxious days and desolate nights pa.s.s. There is such a heavy pain at your heart, it is a mystery to yourself that you do not die. At last, Amy contrives to meet you, pale and wretched as yourself. She has a mournful story to tell of degrading propositions, and terrible threats. She promises to love you always, and be faithful to you till death, come what may. Poor Amy! When she said that, she did not realize how powerless is the slave, in the hands of an unprincipled master. Your interview was watched, and while you were sobbing in each other's arms, you were seized and ordered to receive a hundred lashes. While you are lying in jail, stiff with your wounds, your master-brother comes to tell you he has sold you to a trader from Arkansas. You remind him of the receipt he has given you for six hundred dollars, and ask him to return the money. He laughs in your face, and tells you his receipt is worth no more than so much brown paper; that no contracts with a slave are binding. He coolly adds, ”Besides, it has taken all my spare money to buy Amy.” Perhaps you would have killed him in that moment of desperation, even with the certainty of being burnt to cinders for the deed, but you are too horribly wounded by the lash to be able to spring upon him. In that helpless condition, you are manacled and carried off by the slave-trader. Never again will Amy's gentle eyes look into yours.
What she suffers you will never know. She is suddenly wrenched from your youth, as your mother was from your childhood. The pall of silence falls over all her future. She cannot read or write; and the post-office was not inst.i.tuted for slaves.
Looking back on that dark period of desolation and despair, you marvel how you lived through it. But the nature of youth is elastic.
You have learned that law offers colored men nothing but its _penalties_; that white men engross all its _protection_; still you are tempted to make another bargain for your freedom. Your new master seems easy and good-natured, and you trust he will prove more honorable than your brother has been. Perhaps he would; but unfortunately, he is fond of cards; and when you have paid him two hundred dollars, he stakes them, and you also, at the gaming-table, and loses. The winner is a hard man, noted for severity to his slaves. Now you resolve to take the risk of running away, with all its horrible chances. You hide in a neighboring swamp, where you are bitten by a venomous snake, and your swollen limb becomes almost incapable of motion. In great anguish, you drag it along, through the midnight darkness, to the hut of a poor plantation-slave, who binds on a poultice of ashes, but dares not, for fear of his life, shelter you after day has dawned. He helps you to a deep gully, and there you remain till evening, half-famished for food. A man in the neighborhood keeps blood-hounds, well trained to hunt runaways. They get on your track, and tear flesh from the leg which the snake had spared. To escape them, you leap into the river. The sharp ring of rifles meets your ear. You plunge under water. When you come up to take breath, a rifle ball lodges in your shoulder and you plunge again. Suddenly, thick clouds throw their friendly veil over the moon. You swim for your life, with b.a.l.l.s whizzing round you. Thanks to the darkness and the water, you baffle the hounds, both animal and human. Weary and wounded, you travel through the forests, your eye fixed hopefully on the North Star, which seems ever beckoning you onward to freedom, with its bright glances through the foliage.
In the day-time, you lie in the deep holes of swamps, concealed by rank weeds and tangled vines, taking such rest as can be obtained among swarms of mosquitoes and snakes. Through incredible perils and fatigues, footsore and emaciated, you arrive at last in the States called Free. You allow yourself little time to rest, so eager are you to press on further North. You have heard the masters swear with peculiar violence about Ma.s.sachusetts, and you draw the inference that it is a refuge for the oppressed. Within the borders of that old Commonwealth, you breathe more freely than you have ever done.
You resolve to rest awhile, at least, before you go to Canada. You find friends, and begin to hope that you may be allowed to remain and work, if you prove yourself industrious and well behaved.