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to the officers of the law — and left Charleston, while a person in the crowd was heard to offer himself as "the leader of a tarand-feather gang, to be called into the service of the city on the occasion." Nor is this all. The Legislature a second time "caught" the fever, and, yielding to its influence passed another statute! forbidding, under severe penalties, any person within the State from accepting a commission to befriend these colored mariners; and under penalties severer still, extending even to imprisonment for life, prohibiting any person "on his own behalf, or by virtue of any authority from any State," to come within South-Carolina for this purpose; and then, to complete its work, the Legislature took away the writ of habeas corpus from all such mariners.
Such is a simple narrative, founded on authentic documents. I do not adduce it now for criticism, but simply to enroll it in all its stages — beginning with the earliest pretension of South-Carolina, continuing in violence, and ending in yet other pretensions — among the special instances where the Barbarism of Slavery stands confessed even in official conduct. And yet this transaction, which may well give to South-Carolina the character of a shore "where shipwrecked mariners dread to land," has been openly vindicated in all its details from beginning to end by both the Senators from that State, while one of them, [Mr. Hammond,] in the same breath, has borne his testimony from personal knowledge to the character of the public agent thus maltreated, saying: "He was a pleasant, kind old gentleman, and I had a sort of friendship for him during the short time I sat near him in Congress.
Thus, sir, whether we look at individuals, or at the community where Slavery exists, at lawless outbreaks or at official conduct Slave-masters are always the same. Enough, you will say, has been said. Yes; enough to expose Slavery, but not enough for Truth. The most instructive and most grievous part & still remains. It is the exhibition of Slave-masters in Congressional history. Of course, the representative reflects the character as well as the political opinions of the constituents, whose will it is his boast to obey. It follows that the passions and habits of Slave-masters are naturally represented in Congress — chastened to a certain extent, perhaps, by the requirements of Parliamentary Law, but breaking out in
