The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Part 2 of 4

by American Anti-Slavery Society

The influence of anti-slavery principles in Massachusetts has become decisive, if we are to judge from the change of sentiment in the legislative body. The governor of that commonwealth saw fit to introduce into his inaugural speech, delivered in January, 1836, a severe censure of the abolitionists, and to intimate that they were guilty of an offence punishable at common law. This part of the speech was referred to a joint committee of five, of which a member of the senate was chairman. To the same committee were also referred communications which had been received by the governor from several of the legislatures of the slaveholding states, requesting the Legislature of Massachusetts to enact laws, making it PENAL for citizens of that state to form societies for the abolition of slavery, or to speak or publish sentiments such as had been uttered in anti-slavery meetings and published in anti-slavery tracts and papers. The managers of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, in a note addressed to the chairman of the committee, requested permission, as a party whose rights were drawn in question, to appear before it. This was granted. The gentlemen selected by them to appear on their behalf were of unimpeachable character, and distinguished for professional merit and general literary and scientific intelligence. Such was then the unpopularity of abolitionism, that notwithstanding the personal influence of these gentlemen, they were ill--not to say rudely--treated, especially by the chairman of the committee; so much so, that respect for themselves, and the cause they were deputed to defend, persuaded them to desist before they had completed their remarks. A Report, including Resolutions unfavorable to the abolitionists was made, of which the following is a copy:--

The Joint Special Committee, to whom was referred so much of the governor's message as related to the abolition of slavery, together with certain documents upon the same subject, communicated to the Executive by the several Legislatures of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, transmitted by his Excellency to the Legislature, and hereunto annexed, have considered the same, and ask leave, respectfully, to submit the following:--

Resolved, That this Legislature distinctly disavow any right whatever in itself, or in the citizens of this commonwealth, to interfere in the institution of domestic slavery in the southern states: it having existed therein before the establishment of the Constitution; it having been recognised by that instrument; and it being strictly within their own keeping.

Resolved, That this Legislature, regarding the agitation of the question of domestic slavery as having already interrupted the friendly relations which ought to exist between the several states of this Union, and as tending permanently to injure, if not altogether to subvert, the principles of the Union itself; and believing that the good effected by those who excite its discussion in the non-slaveholding states is, under the circumstances of the case, altogether visionary, while the immediate and future evil is great and certain; does hereby express its entire disapprobation of the doctrine upon this subject avowed, and the general measures pursued by such as agitate the question; and does earnestly recommend to them carefully to abstain from all such discussion, and all such measures, as may tend to disturb and irritate the public mind.

The report was laid on the table, whence it was not taken up during the session--its friends being afraid of a lean majority on its passage; for the alarm had already been taken by many of the members who otherwise would have favored it. From this time till the election in the succeeding autumn, the subject was much agitated in Massachusetts. The abolitionists again petitioned the Legislature at its session begun in January, 1837; especially, that it should remonstrate against the resolution of Mr. Hawes, adopted by the House of Representatives in Congress, by which all memorials, &c, in relation to slavery were laid, and to be laid, on the table, without further action on them. The abolitionists were again heard, in behalf of their petitions, before the proper committee.[[A]] The result was, the passage of the following resolutions with only 16 dissenting voices to 378, in the House of Representatives, and in the Senate with not more than one or two dissentients on any one of them:--

[Footnote [A]: The gentleman who had been chairman of the committee the preceding year, was supposed, in consequence of the change in public opinion in relation to abolitionists, to have injured his political standing too much, even to be nominated as a candidate for re-election.]

"Whereas, The House of Representatives of the United States, in the month of January, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and thirty-seven, did adopt a resolution, whereby it was ordered that all petitions, memorials, resolutions, propositions, or papers, relating in any way, or to any extent whatever, to the subject of slavery, or the abolition of slavery, without being either printed or referred, should be laid upon the table, and that no further action whatever should be had thereon; and whereas such a disposition of petitions, then or thereafter to be received, is a virtual denial of the right itself; and whereas, by the resolution aforesaid, which is adopted as a standing rule in the present House of Representatives, the petitions of a large number of the people of this commonwealth, praying for the removal of a great social, moral, and political evil, have been slighted and contemned: therefore,--

Resolved, That the resolution above named is an assumption of power and authority at variance with the spirit and intent of the Constitution of the United States, and injurious to the cause of freedom and free institutions; that it does violence to the inherent, absolute, and inalienable rights of man; and that it tends, essentially, to impair those fundamental principles of natural justice and natural law which are antecedent to any written constitutions of government, independent of them all, and essential to the security of freedom in a state.

Resolved, That our Senators and Representatives in Congress, in maintaining and advocating the right of petition, have entitled themselves to the cordial approbation of the people of this commonwealth.

Resolved, That Congress, having exclusive legislation in the District of Columbia, possess the right to abolish slavery in said district, and that its exercise should only be restrained by a regard to the public good."