The Dangers of Extending Slavery
| Preis: | 12.95 EUR* (inkl. MWST zzgl. Versand - Preis kann jetzt höher sein!) |
| Versand: | 0.00 EUR Versandkostenfrei innerhalb von Deutschland |
| Partner: | buecher.de |
| Hersteller: | Forgotten Books (Seward, William Henry) |
| Stand: | 2015-08-04 03:50:33 |
Produktbeschreibung
Excerpt from The Dangers of Extending Slavery: And the Contest and the Crisis The nation wag founded on the simple and practically new principle of the equal and inalienable rights of all men, and therefore it necessarily became a republic. Other Governments, founded on the ancient principle of the inequality of men, are, by force of an equal necessity, monarchies or aristocracies. Whenever either of these kinds of Government loses by lapse of time and change of circumstances its elementary principle, whether of equality or inequality, thenceforward it takes a rapid and irresistible course toward a reorganization of the opposite kind. We one, here or elsewhere, is so disloyal to his country or to mankind as to be willing to see our republican system fail. All agree that in ever) case, and throughout all hazards, aristocracy must be abhorred and avoided, and republican institutions must be defended and preserved. Think it not strange or extravagant when I say that an aristocracy has already arisen here, and that it is already undermining the Republic. An aristocracy could not arise in any country where there was no privileged class,, and no special foundation on which such a class could permanently stand. On the contrary, every State, however republican its Constitution may be, is sure to become an aristocracy, sooner or later, if it has a privileged class standing firmly on an enduring special foundation; and if that class is continually growing stronger and stronger, and the unprivileged classes are continually growing weaker and weaker. It is not at all essential to a privileged class that it rest on feudal tenures, or on military command, or on ecclesiastical authority, or that its rights be hereditary, or even that it be distinguished by titles of honor. It may be even the more insidious and more dangerous for lacking all these things, because it will be less obnoxious to popular hostility. A privileged class has existed in this country, from an early period of its settlement. Slaveholders constitute that class. They have a special foundation on which to stand namely, personal dominion over slaves. Conscience and sound policy forbid all men alike from holding slaves, but some citizens disregard the injunction. Some of the States enforce the inhibition; other States neglect or refuse to enforce it. In all of the States, there are but three hundred and fifty thousand citizens who avail themselves of this peculiar indulgence; and those, protected by the laws of their States, constitute a privileged class. They confess themselves to be such a class, when they designate the system of Slavery as a peculiar institution. The spirit of the revolutionary age was adverse to that privileged class, America and Europe were firmly engaged then in prosecuting what was expected to be a speedy, complete, and universal abolition of African Slavery. Nearly all of the privileged class admitted that Slavery as a permanent system was indefensible, and favored its removal. They asked only, what seemed by no means unreasonable, some securities against a sudden, rash, and violent removal of the evil. Under these circumstances, even the most decided opponents of Slavery consented to some provisions of the Federal Constitution which were inconsistent with the stern logic of equality that pervaded all its other parts, and pervaded the whole of the Declaration of American Independence, on which the Constitution itself was based. We are not to censure the fathers for these concessions; they had a union of the States to areata, and to their ardent and generous minds the voluntary removal of Slavery, by the action of the several States themselves, without Federal interference, seemed not only certain, but close at hand. These provisions of the Constitution were: First: That the foreign slave trade should not be abolished before 1808.
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