Of the many victims of the recent awful calamity in our waters, what name has been most frequently uttered by the pulpit and the press in the accents of lamentation and panegyric? On whose tomb have freedom, philanthropy, and letters been invoked to strew their funeral wreaths? All who have heard of the loss of the Lexington are familiar with the name of CHARLES FOLLEN. And who was he? One of the men officially denounced by President Jackson as a gang of miscreants, plotting insurrection and murder—and, recently, a member of the Executive Committee of the American Anti-Slavery Society.
Let us then, fellow citizens, in view of all these things, thank God and take courage. We are now contending, not merely for the emancipation of our unhappy fellow men, kept in bondage under the authority of our own representatives—not merely for the overthrow of the human shambles erected by Congress on the national domain—but also for the preservation of those great constitutional rights which were acquired by our fathers, and are now assailed by the slaveholders and their northern auxiliaries. That you may remember these auxiliaries and avoid giving them new opportunities of betraying your rights, we annex a list of their dishonored names.
The following twenty-eight members from the Free States voted in the affirmative on the recent GAG RULE.
| MAINE. |
| Virgil D. Parris |
| Albert Smith |
| NEW HAMPSHIRE. |
| Charles G. Atherton |
| Edmund Burke |
| Ira A. Eastman |
| Tristram Shaw |
| NEW YORK. |
| Nehemiah H. Earle |
| John Fine |
| Nathaniel Jones |
| Governeur Kemble |
| James de la Montayne |
| John H. Prentiss |
| Theron R. Strong |
| PENNSYLVANIA. |
| John Davis |
| Joseph Fornance |
| James Gerry |
| George M'Cullough |
| David Petriken |
| William S. Ramsey |
| OHIO. |
| D.P. Leadbetter |
| William Medill |
| Isaac Parrish |
| George Sweeney |
| Jonathan Taylor |
| John B. Weller |
| INDIANA. |
| John Davis |
| George H. Proffit |
| ILLINOIS. |
| John Reynolds |
Let us turn to our more immediate representatives, and we trust more faithful servants. Our State Legislatures will not refuse to hear our prayers. Let us petition them immediately to rebuke the treason by which the Constitution has been surrendered into the hands of the slaveholders—let us implore them to demand from Congress, in the name of the free States, that they shall neither destroy nor abridge the right of petition—a right without which our government would be converted into a despotism.
We call on you, fellow citizens of every religious faith and party name, to unite with us in guarding the citadel of our country's freedom. If there are any who will not co-operate with us in laboring for the emancipation of the slave, surely there are none who will stand aloof from us while contending for the liberty of themselves, their children, and their children's children.
To the rescue, then, fellow citizens! and, trusting in HIM without whom all human effort is weakness, let us not doubt that our faithful endeavors to preserve the rights HE has given us will, through HIS blessing, be crowned with success.
ARTHUR TAPPAN,
JAMES G. BIRNEY,
JOSHUA LEAVITT,
LEWIS TAPPAN,
SAMUEL E. CORNISH,
SIMEON S. JOCELYN,
LA ROY SUNDERLAND,
THEODORE S. WRIGHT,
DUNCAN DUNBAR,
JAMES S. GIBBONS,
HENRY B. STANTON
Executive Committee
of the
American
Anti-Slavery Society.
New York, February 13, 1840.