"Are we not suffering our own hands to be manacled, and our own feet to be fettered, with the chains of slavery? Is it not enough to be told that, by a fraudulent perversion of language in the constitution of the United States, we have falsified the constitution itself, by admitting into both the legislative and executive departments of the government an overwhelming representation of one species of property, to the exclusion of all others, and that the odious property in slaves?
"Is it not enough that, by this exclusive privilege of property representation, confined to one section of the country, an irresistible ascendency in the action of the general government has been secured, not indeed to that section, but to an oligarchy of slaveholders in that section—to the cruel oppression of the poor in that same section itself? Is it not enough that, by the operation of this radical iniquity in the organization of the government, an immense disproportion of all offices, from the highest to the lowest, civil, military, naval, executive, and judicial, are held by slaveholders? Have we not seen the sacred right of petition totally suppressed for the people of the free states during a succession of years, and is it not yet inexorably suppressed? Have we not seen, for the last twenty years, the constitution and solemn treaties with foreign nations trampled on by cruel oppression and lawless imprisonment of colored mariners in the Southern States, in cold-blooded defiance of a solemn adjudication by a Southern judge in the Circuit Court of the Union? And is not this enough? Have not the people of the free states been required to renounce for their citizens the right of habeas corpus and trial by jury; and, to coërce that base surrender of the only practical security to all personal rights, have not the slave-breeders, by state legislation, subjected to fine and imprisonment the colored citizens of the free states, for merely coming within their jurisdiction? Have we not tamely submitted for years to the daily violation of the freedom of the post-office and of the press by a committee of seal-breakers? And have we not seen a sworn Postmaster-general formally avow that, though he could not license this cut-purse protection of the peculiar institution, the perpetrators of this highway robbery must justify themselves by the plea of necessity? And has the pillory or the penitentiary been the reward of that Postmaster-general? Have we not seen printing-presses destroyed; halls erected for the promotion of human freedom levelled with the dust, and consumed by fire; and wanton, unprovoked murder perpetrated with impunity, by slave-mongers? Have we not seen human beings, made in the likeness of God, and endowed with immortal souls, burnt at the stake, not for their offences, but for their color? Are not the journals of our Senate disgraced by resolutions calling for war, to indemnify the slave-pirates of the Enterprise and the Creole for the self-emancipation of their slaves; and to inflict vengeance, by a death of torture, upon the heroic self-deliverance of Madison Washington? Have we not been fifteen years plotting rebellion against our neighbor republic of Mexico, for abolishing slavery throughout all her provinces? Have we not aided and abetted one of her provinces in insurrection against her for that cause? And have we not invaded openly, and sword in hand, another of her provinces, and all to effect her dismemberment, and to add ten more slave states to our confederacy? Has not the cry of war for the conquest of Mexico, for the expansion of reïnstituted slavery, for the robbery of priests, and the plunder of religious establishments, yet subsided? Have the pettifogging, hair-splitting, nonsensical, and yet inflammatory bickerings about the right of search, pandering to the thirst for revenge in France, panting for war to prostrate the disputed title of her king—has the sound of this war-trumpet yet faded away upon our ears? Has the supreme and unparalleled absurdity of stipulating by treaty to keep a squadron of eighty guns for five years without intermission upon the coast of Africa, to suppress the African slave-trade, and at the same time denying, at the point of the bayonet, the right of that squadron to board or examine any slaver all but sinking under a cargo of victims, if she but hoist a foreign flag—has this diplomatic bone been yet picked clean? Or is our indirect participation in the African slave-trade to be protected, at whatever expense of blood and treasure? Is the supreme Executive Chief of this commonwealth yet to speak not for himself, but for her whole people, and pledge them to shoulder their muskets, and to endorse their knapsacks, against the fanatical, non-resistant abolitionists, whenever the overseers may please to raise the bloody flag with the swindling watch-word of 'Union'? O, my friends, I have not the heart to join in the festivity on the First of August—the British anniversary of disenthralled humanity—while all this, and infinitely more that I could tell, but that I would spare the blushes of my country, weigh down my spirits with the uncertainty, sinking into my grave as I am, whether she is doomed to be numbered among the first liberators or the last oppressors of the race of immortal man!
"Let the long-trodden-down African, restored by the cheering voice and Christian hand of Britain to his primitive right and condition of manhood, clap his hands and shout for joy on the anniversary of the First of August. Let the lordly Briton strip off much of his pride on other days of the year, and reserve it all for the pride of conscious beneficence on this day. What lover of classical learning can read the account in Livy, or in Plutarch, of the restoration to freedom of the Grecian cities by the Roman consul Flaminius, without feeling his bosom heave, and his blood flow cheerily in his veins? The heart leaps with sympathy when we read that, on the first proclamation by the herald, the immense assembled multitude, in the tumult of astonishment and joy, could scarcely believe their own ears, and made him repeat the proclamation, and then 'Tum ab certo jam gaudio, tantus cum clamore, plausus est ortus, totiesque repetitus, ut facile appararet nihil omnium bonorum multitudini gratius quam libertatem esse.—Then rang the welkin with long and redoubled shouts of exultation, clearly proving that, of all the enjoyments accessible to the hearts of men, nothing is so delightful to them as liberty.' Upwards of two thousand years have revolved since that day, and the First of August is to the Briton of this age what the day of the proclamation of Flaminius was to the ancient Roman. Yes! let them celebrate the First of August as the day to them of deliverance and glory; and leave to us the pleasant employment of commenting upon their motives, of devising means to shelter the African slaver from their search, and of squandering millions to support, on a pestilential coast, a squadron of the stripes and stars, with instructions sooner to scuttle their ships than to molest the pirate slaver who shall make his flagstaff the herald of a lie!"
In July, 1843, the Cincinnati Astronomical Society earnestly solicited Mr. Adams to lay the corner-stone of their Observatory. No invitation could have been more coïncident with the prevailing interest of his heart, and he immediately accepted it, notwithstanding his advanced age, and the great distance which the performance of the duty required him to travel. Some of his constituents having questioned the propriety of this acceptance, and expressed doubts whether the duties it imposed were compatible with his other public obligations, Mr. Adams, in an address to them, at Dedham, on the 4th of July, took occasion to state that the encouragement of the arts and sciences, and of all good literature, is expressly enjoined by the constitution of Massachusetts. The patronage and encouragement of them is therefore one of the most sacred duties of the people of that state, and enjoined upon them and their children as a part of their duty to God. "The voices of your forefathers, founders of your social compact, calling from their graves, command you to this duty; and I deem it, as your representative, a tacit and standing instruction from you to perform, as far as may be my ability, that part of your constitutional duty for you. It is in this sense that, in accepting the earnest invitation from a respectable and learned society, in a far distant state and city of the Union, to unite with them in the act of erecting an edifice for the observation of the heavens, and thereby encouraging the science of astronomy, I am fulfilling an obligation of duty to you, and in your service." The nature of this duty he thus illustrates:
"From the Ptolemies of Egypt and Alexander of Macedon, from Julius Cæsar to the Arabian Caliphs Haroun al Raschid, Almamon, and Almansor, from Alphonso of Castile to Nicholas, the present Emperor of all the Russias,—who, at the expense of one million of rubles, has erected at Pulkova the most perfect and best-appointed observatory in the world,—royal and imperial power has never been exercised with more glory, never more remembered with the applause and gratitude of mankind, than when extending the hand of patronage and encouragement to the science of astronomy. You have neither Cæsar nor Czar, Caliph, Emperor, nor King, to monopolize this glory by largesses extracted from the fruits of your industry. The founders of your constitution have left it as their dying commandment to you, to achieve, as the lawful sovereigns of the land, this resplendent glory to yourselves—to patronize and encourage the arts and sciences, and all good literature."
Mr. Adams left Quincy for Cincinnati on the 25th of October, and returned to Washington on the 24th of November. At Saratoga, Rochester, Buffalo, he was received with marked attention; and in every place where he rested assemblages of the inhabitants took occasion to evidence their respect and interest in his character by congratulatory addresses, and welcomed his presence by every token of civility and regard. At Columbus he was met by a deputation from Cincinnati, and, in approaching that city, he was escorted into it by a procession and cavalcade. No demonstration of honor and gratitude for the exertion he had made, and the fatigues he had undergone, for their gratification, was omitted. His whole progress was an ovation.
In the presence of a large concourse of the citizens of Cincinnati, Mr. Adams was introduced to the Astronomical Society by its president, Judge Burnet, who gave, in an appropriate address, a rapid sketch of the history of his life and his public services, touching with delicacy and judgment on the trials to which his political course had been subjected. The following tributes, from their truth, justice, and appropriateness, are entitled to distinct remembrance:
"Being a son of one of the framers and defenders of the Declaration of Independence, his political principles were formed in the school of the sages of the Revolution, from whom he imbibed the spirit of liberty while he was yet a boy.
"Having been brought up among the immediate descendants of the Puritan fathers, whose landing in Massachusetts in the winter of 1620 gave immortality to the rock of Plymouth, his moral and religious impressions were derived from a source of the most rigid purity; and his manners and habits were formed in a community where ostentation and extravagance had no place. In this fact we see why it is that he has always been distinguished for his purity of motive, simplicity of manners, and republican plainness in his style of living and in his intercourse with society. To the same causes may be ascribed his firmness, his directness of purpose, and his unyielding adherence to personal as well as political liberty. You have recently seen him stand as unmoved as the rock of Gibraltar, defending the right of petition, and the constitutional privileges of the representatives of the people, assembled in Congress, though fiercely assailed by friends and by foes.
"It is a remarkable fact that during the whole of his public life, which has already continued more than half a century, he never connected himself with a political party, or held himself bound to support or oppose any measure for the purpose of advancing or retarding the views of a party; but he has held himself free at all times to pursue the course which duty pointed out, however he may have been considered by some as adhering to a party. This fact discloses the reason why he has been applauded at times, and at other times censured, by every party which has existed under the government. The truth is that, while the American people have been divided into two great political sections, each contending for its own aggrandizement, Mr. Adams has stood between them, uninfluenced by either, contending for the aggrandizement of the nation. His life has been in some respects sui generis; and I venture the opinion that, generally, when his course has differed most from the politicians opposed to him, it has tended most to the advancement of the public good.