Slave Laws Not Obligatory
I allow not to human laws, be they primary or secondary, no matter by wbat numbers, or with what solemnities ordained, tho least semblance of right to establish slavery, to make property of my fellow, ereated equally with inyself, in the image of my God. Individually, or as political communities, men have no more right to enact slavery, than they have to enact murder, or blasphcmy, or incest, or adultery. To establish slavery is to dethrone right, to trample on juslice, the orrly true foundation of governments whlch exist not for the destcuction of liberty,but for its defence; not for theannihilation of men's rights, but their preservation. Do they incorpórate in their organic law the element oïinjmtice? - do they liveby admilting it Ãn practice? Then do they destrov their own foundation, and absol ve all men f rom the duty of allegiance. Ãs any man so besotted as, for a moment, to suppose that the slaveholder has an atora of right to bis slave; or that the slave has resting on him an atom of obligation to obey the laws that enslave him,thal rob him of everything - of himselÃ? No one - else why do all just men of atl countries rejoice, when thehear that the opsressedofany land have achieved their iberty, at whatcver cost to their tyrants? On this ground, were there no other, I should say, we cannot receive Texds as a slave territory. We have no right to continue chains which we have no right
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Signal of Liberty
Old News