[It may be proper to introduce one or two extracts, that the reader may know the character of the papers read. The following are taken from an address to the Colonization Society of Kentucky, by R. J. Breckenridge.]
"There are some crimes so revolting in their nature, that the just observance of the decencies of speech deprives us of the only epithets which are capable of depicting their enormity. Every well regulated heart is smitten with horror at the bare idea of their perpetration; and we are uncertain whether most to loathe at the claim of those who habitually commit them to companionship with human nature, or to marvel that the unutterable wrath of heaven doth not scathe and blast them in the midst of their enormities. Let the father look upon the dawning intelligence of the boy that prattles around his knee, the pride of his fond heart, and the hope and stay of his honest name; and then, if he can, let him picture him in distant bondage, the fountain of his affections dried up, the light of knowledge extinguished in his mind, his manly and upright spirit broken by oppression, and his free person and just proportions marred and lacerated by the incessant scourge. Let the husband look upon the object in whose sacred care he has "garnered up his heart," and on the little innocent who draws the fountain of its life from her pure breast, recalling, as he gazes on one and the other, the freshness and the strength of his early and his ardent love; and then if he be able, let him picture those objects, in comparison with which all that earth has to give is valueless in his eyes, torn from him by violence, basely exchanged for gold, like beasts at the shambles, bent down under unpitied sorrows, their persons polluted, and their pure hearts corrupted—hopeless and unpitied slaves, to the rude caprice and brutal passions of those we blush to call men. Let him turn from these spectacles, and look abroad on the heritage where his lot has been cast, glad and smiling under the profuse blessings which heaven has poured on it, let him look back on the even current of a life overflowing with countless enjoyments, and before him on a career full of anticipated triumphs, and lighted by the effulgence of noble and virtuous deeds, the very close of which looks placid, under the weight of years made venerable by generous and useful actions, and covered by the gratitude and applause of admiring friends; let the man-stealer come upon him, and behold the wreck of desolation! Shame, disgrace, infamy, the blighting of all hopes, the withering of all joys; long unnoticed wo, untended poverty, a dishonored name, an unwept death, a forgotten grave; all, and more than all, are in these words, he is a slave! He who can preserve the even current of his thoughts in the midst of such reflections, may have some faint conception of the miseries which the slave trade has inflicted on mankind. I am unable to state with accuracy the number of the victims of this horrible traffic; but if the least dependance can be placed on the statements of those persons who have given the most attention to the subject, with the best means of information, it
unquestionably exceeds ten millions of human beings exported by violence and fraud from Africa. This appalling mass of crime and suffering has every atom of it been heaped up before the presence of enlightened men, and in the face of a Holy God, by nations boasting of their civilization, and pretending to respect the dictates of christianity. The mind is overwhelmed at the magnitude of such atrocity, and the heart sickens at the contemplation of such an amount of human anguish and despair."
"The legislative acts which, with a cool atrocity, to be equalled only by the preposterous folly of the claim they set up over the persons of God's creatures, doom to slavery the free African the moment his eyes are opened on the light of heaven, for no other offence than being the child of parents thus doomed before him, can, in the judgment of truth and the estimation of a just posterity, be held inferior in heinousness only to the first act of piracy which made them slaves. It is in vain that we cover up and avoid such reflections. They cling to us, and earth cries shame upon us that their voice has been so long unheeded. The free Lybian, in his scorching deserts, was as much a slave when he rushed, in the wild chase, upon the king of beasts, as is his unhappy offspring before our laws cleave to him. God creates no slaves. The laws of man do oftentimes pervert the best gifts of nature, and wage an impious warfare against her decrees. But you can discover what is of the earth and what is from above. You may take man at his birth, and by an adequate system make him a slave, a brute, a demon. This is man's work. The light of reason, history and philosophy, the voice of nature and religion, the Spirit of God himself, proclaims that the being he created in his own image he must have been created free."
"It can be no less incorrect to apply any arguments drawn from the right of conquest, or the lapse of time, as against the offspring of persons held to involuntary servitude. For neither force nor time has any meaning when applied to a nonentity. He cannot be said to be conquered, who never had the opportunity or means of resistance; nor can time run against one unborn. Those who lean to a contrary doctrine should well consider to what it leads them. For no rule of reason is better received, or clearer, than that force may be always resisted by force; and whatever is thus established, may, at time, be lawfully overthrown. Or, on the other hand, if error is made sacred by its antiquity, there is no absurdity or crime which may not be dug up from its dishonored tomb, and erected into an idol around which its scattered votaries may reassemble."
Mr. Bradley then went on to argue upon the tendency of the libels, and contended that they were not calculated to excite sedition. They are not addressed to the colored people, nor adapted to excite insurrection and revolution among them. They are calm appeals to reason, designed to produce measures to arrest a danger which they think threatens them, in common with their brethren of the South.
He next adverted to the law of publication. There were two grounds of publication—one is legally to be inferred—the other actually proved. The monstrous doctrine is contended for by the prosecutor, that if a man has a libel in his possession, if it was publicly circulated in the country, the possession is prima facia evidence that he put it in circulation. To show the absurdity of such a position he took a case of a favorite popular libel, which would be all sold in a day, and said that it would be impossible to find an
impartial jury to try a case under such a law—because it would not be easy to find twelve men drawn as jurors who would not have been possessors in some way of the libel, and of course equally criminal.
Having a written copy of a published libel in one's own handwriting may be prima facia evidence; but it is not so with a printed copy. The publication must be brought home to the defendant. An actual publication is when the party puts the libel in circulation—when he gives it to a third party, either by himself or an agent, for the purpose of having it put in circulation.
The evidence in this case, he contended, afforded not only no proof, but no presumption that he published the libel. The one copy he allowed King to take was not given to be circulated. He had been warned of the danger, and had avowed his opposition to having such papers put in circulation. There could be no pretence that it was given to stir up mischief; and if any one was responsible for any evil effects, supposing any to accrue, it was Mr. King who had shown it, and left it exposed openly in a shop. But he argued that the loan of the paper to King was simple possession—he had afterwards taken it back from the shop, and no evil had been done or intended.