The Natick Resolution; or, Resistance to Slaveholders/Letter to John Brown
THE NATICK RESOLUTION.
LETTER TO JOHN BROWN.
Natick, Mass., Nov. 21st, 1859.
Capt. John Brown:
Dear and Honored Friend—(for the friend of the slave is my dear and honored friend)—A very large and enthusiastic meeting of the citizens of this town, without regard to political or religious creeds, was held last evening, for the purpose of considering and acting upon the following resolution:—
Resolved, That it is the right and duty of the slaves to resist their masters, and the right and duty of the people of the North to incite them to resistance, and to aid them in it.
This resolution was adopted by the meeting without a dissenting voice. Though a United States Senator (Henry Wilson) and a United States Postmaster were present, yet not a voice was raised against it by them, nor by any one else, nor against the sentiments it contains. The meeting appointed me a committee to forward their resolution to you. In compliance with their request, and with the promptings of my own heart, I forward it.
The resolution, as you will see, simply affirms the right and duty of resistance, not merely to slavery as a principle or an abstraction, but to slaveholders, the living embodiment of slavery. The South embody slavery and resistance to liberty in their whole life. We would arouse the North to embody liberty and resistance to slavery in their whole life. Wherever the people of the South live, whether in domestic, social, ecclesiastical, political or commercial life, they embody death to liberty. We would stir up the people of the North to embody death to slavery wherever they live. In whatever relations they live, we would incite them to embody liberty as the South does slavery. Death to slavery should, and will, ere long, be the watchword of every domestic and social circle, of every political and religious party, and of every literary and commercial establishment, in the North.
The blessings of the God of the oppressed rest upon you! This is the prayer of thousands who have known you for years, and entirely sympathize with you in the one great object of your life—i.e., to arouse this nation to look the sin, the shame and danger of slavery in the face. We have felt the deepest interest in your plans and movements, as we have known and watched them the last four years; and we have wondered that those who hold to armed resistance to tyrants have not more cheerfully and numerously gathered around your standard of insurrection against slaveholders.
The government and God of this nation daily and hourly proclaim to the people of the North, and to the slaves of the South, their right and duty of armed resistance to slaveholders. You hastened to obey that call to duty made by your country and your God. Virginia herself called you to resist slaveholders, and to free the slaves, by arms and blood, if need be. Why should Virginia hang you? You have only done what she has exhorted you to do from the day of your birth. Why should the North call you a "fanatic," a "maniac," a "ruffian," a "marauder," a "murderer," an "assassin"? You have only done what the religion, the government and God of the nation, for seventy years, proclaimed to be your right and your duty.
Twelve days hence, Virginia will hang your body, but she will not hang John Brown. Better to die a traitor to Virginia, than to live a traitor to yourself and your God. This nation of twenty-five millions will kill your body for treason against them; but had you not done as you have, you would have died a living death for treason against God, as he spoke to you in the depths of your own soul. Acting in obedience to the dictates of your conscience and the behests of your God, you have rendered yourself worthy the honor and glory of a gallows at the hands of slaveholders, who live, not merely as pirates do, to plunder and kill, but for a purpose far more cruel and inhuman—i.e., to turn human beings into chattels.
Who would not thus render himself deserving a gallows at such hands? The highest honor Virginia or the Union can bestow on the champion of liberty, and the living resistant of slavery, is a gallows. From this day, let the friends of the slave march forth to battle with slavery, whether the conflict be on the domestic, social, religious, political or military arena, under the symbol of the gallows, with the martyr and champion of liberty hanging on it.
You must die, as to your corporeal existence. Your visible, tangible presence will no more inspire and urge us on to the conflict; but John Brown, the MAN, the defender of liberty, the assailant of slavery, and the friend of the slave, will live and be with us, to inspire us, to incite us, to spur us up and lead us on to a still closer and more resolute and deadly assault upon slaveholding. You die, conscious that by the gallows you have triumphed, and answered the one great end of your life more effectually than you would have done had you run off thousands of slaves. You triumph by the gallows, not by running off slaves. The nation is aroused. It must now meet slavery face to face, and see it in its deformity and its results. In every department of life, it must meet it and fight it, till it dies, and liberty is "proclaimed throughout all the land, to all the inhabitants thereof."
You, dear friend, whose memory will ever be precious, as that of the slaveholder will ever be detested, have kept your anti-slavery faith; you have fought a good fight, and may say, "Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of glory, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give me in the day when the last slave shall be free. Now, Lord, lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy salvation." Millions will follow thee, weeping, to the gallows. In pitying accents I hear thee say to them, "Friends of the slave! weep not for me, but weep for yourselves and your country; for in this conflict with slavery, there is not an attribute of the Almighty that can take sides with the oppressor." Your execution is but the beginning of that death struggle with slaveholders, which must end in striking the last fetter from the last slave. On the scaffold, thou wilt hear thy God, and the slave's God, saying unto thee, "Fear not, for I am with thee; be not dismayed, for I am thy God; I have chosen thee; thou art my servant; I will strengthen thee; I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness. All they that were incensed against thee shall be ashamed and confounded; they shall be as nothing; they that strive with thee shall perish; the [anti-slavery] whirlwind shall scatter them." My spirit is with thy spirit, in the dungeon and on the scaffold.
Thine, for the slave, and against the slaveholder, unto death,
HENRY C. WRIGHT.