Freedom, the Eternal Truth: An Address Delivered in Harveysburg, Ohio, on May 2, 1852
FREEDOM, THE ETERNAL TRUTH: AN ADDRESS DELIVERED
IN HARVEYSBURG, OHIO, ON 2 MAY 1852
Wilmington (Ohio) Herald of Freedom, 7 May 1852. Other texts in Ohio History, 75 : 3—9
(Winter 1966—67); Foner, Life and Writings, 5: 223—29, dated May 1852.
“After the Convention in Cincinnati,” wrote Frederick Douglass on 13 May
1852, “I held meetings in Harveysburg and Columbus; they were largely
attended and I hope proved useful to the cause." A reporter from the Wil-
mington (Ohio) Herald of Freedom who attended the conclave in Harveys-
burg agreed with this assessment. He urged his readers to give the speech a
“candid and careful reading” because it put forth “many brilliant thoughts
and important truths—truths which must be faithfully presented to this nation
in order to effect its reformation.” FDP, 13 May 1852.
We have assembled here for the true worship of God—to sympathize with
the oppressed, and act our part in breaking their bonds. This is true religion.
That is not true religion which is not Godward and also manward. Chris-
tianity teaches the doctrine that if any man has ought against his brother he
should leave his gift at the altar, and go and first be reconciled to his brother
and then make the offering. There is a sable brother—yea three millions of
brethren in this land—to whom the American Church and clergy have yet to
be reconciled.
In addressing you at this time we do not expect to present any new
truth. It will be time to present new truth, when old truths are reduced to
practice. There is no new truth—truth is eternal. The abolitionists have
endeavored to present by lectures and through the press, this truth, that
every man is himself, belongs to himself, that singly he comes into the
world, singly he breathes, singly he lives, singly he dies and singly his
spirit goes to God who gave it. That every man has a right to be free, needs
no proof. It is self evident. The assertion of freedom touches a sympathetic
cord which sends a thrill around the world—a denial of it a shriek.
Nine years have elapsed since it was my privilege to stand here.1Douglass alludes to his western antislavery speaking tour during the so-called “hundred conventions" of 1843. Details of his itinerary remain somewhat sketchy but he spoke at numerous locations in southwestern Ohio during August, October, and November while going to and returning from engagements in Indiana. I
hardly know what was the aspect of this subject then, and it is no dif-
ference, things are substantially the same. The nation is guilty as ever, and
the church is more guilty, for she has more light. When I first commenced
discussing this subject I thought five or six years would accomplish the
work. I had not comprehended the deep root this Upas had taken in Ameri-
can soil. 1 did not know the power slavery had to beget sentiments like
itself. But my disappointment in some respects has served to increase my
confidence, and faith, in the goodness and forbearance of God. I have a
bright faith, and strong hope that slavery will come to an end. It is opposed
by the principles of the great Jehovah, by the constitution of our govern-
ment and the genius of American Institutions. I see its destruction in every
railroad bar, in the electric wire, in the improvements of the age. Some-
thing more must be done for the abolition of slavery. There must be a
struggle to unmask the hypocrisy of those who profess to love God, and yet
hate man. The war must be carried into the Church. The church is the light
of the world. There are individuals out of the church frequently who seize
the torch of God’s truth and outstrip the multitude, even [though] the
church remains behind. But the church is still the light of the world. The
slave can never be redeemed until the organized religion of this land pro-
nounces its fiat against slavery. I need not go to the Presbyterian synods,
the Methodist Conferences, the Baptist associations to show you their
numerous resolutions declaring that they have no sympathy with the
abolitionists. The two hundred years this curse has set in the sanctuary
proves that there is no warfare between slavery and the church. The church
has remained on the side of slavery, and is linked, and interwoven with
slavery[;] she has bolted her doors, barred her gates against anti-slavery
truth. The true representatives of a nation are but the full length and charac-
ter of the nation itself. No people are better than their law makers. The law
makers are the representative characters of the nation or people. The two
old parties aim at availability, not righteousness.
When the Whigs were about to nominate a candidate for the presidency
[during] the last campaign, they took a survey of the morals of the Ameri-
can people, and of the American church. They tried their thurmonitor
[thermometer] and it stood precisely at Zachary height. (Great laughter.)
They said he is a war man—and in the circumstances we would have been
so too; he will swear—he did say in the midst of the groans and shrieks of
the dying, at Buena Vista “give them hell "2Douglass alludes to a highly publicized anecdote that apparently first appeared in James Henry Carleton, The Battle of Buena Vista (New York, 1848). According to Carleton's account, the following exchange took place between General Taylor and artillery captain Braxton Bragg. At a critical juncture in the fighting Taylor asked: “What are you using, Captain, grape or canister?" “Canister, General. " “Single or double?” “Single.” “Well, doubleshot your guns and give 'em hell." Holman Hamilton, Zachary Taylor: Soldier of the Republic (New York, 1941), 240. —we would have done so too
under the circumstances. He owns slaves, traffics in human beings, but he
once honored by his presence a Methodist Episcopal Conference, which is
evidence he is a little disposed to religion, and that is as much as we are.
(Much laughter.) What did our people care for that? Show me the man at
whose presence the drum beats, and the houses and streets are illuminated
on account of his deeds of blood, and I will show you a man much more
popular than a man imbued with the principles of Jesus Christ. The church
must be Opposed in this enterprise. Necessity compels us to do it; we attack
it because we feel it to be our duty.
The noble Garrison thought that he would only have to announce to the
church her duty relative to this subject and it would rush to the rescue.
Therefore he asked the clergy to come with their learning, their logic, their
influence, their eloquence, to the slave’s rescue, but they thundered their
an[a]them[a] upon him, and any other that would plead the cause of the
dumb. Slavery had coiled itself in the pulpit, vaulted itself over the sanctu-
ary. It had traced the sacred pages of the New Testament finding no comfort.
It came to the church praying for protection, the church threw its mantle over
it, stood by it, and declared it a Bible Institution. The most learned doctors
of divinity came forth and advocated the doctrine that man may hold
property in man. God is favorable to it, nature not opposed to it. Drs.
Sharp,3Daniel Sharp. Spring,4Presbyterian clergyman Gardiner Spring (1785-1873), a native of Newburyport, Massachusetts, was ordained in 1810 after attending Yale College and Andover Theological Seminary. Throughout most of his career he was affiliated with New York City's prestigious Brick Presbyterian Church. The author of numerous books and pamphlets, Spn'ng did not confine his preaching to theological matters, but frequently spoke out on public issues. During the early 1850s he condemned abolitionists for “flaunting the government in their opposition to the Fugitive Slave Law." It was wrong to defy the law, Spring argued, “because government is divinely given, so that to disobey its law is, ultimately to disobey God." One of Spring's major political goals was preservation of the Union. In May 1861 at a meeting of the Old School Presbyterian Synod of New York, he sponsored a series of resolutions opposing secession and committing the church to the Union cause. At the Presbyterian General Assembly of 1869 Spring played a leading role in reuniting the Old School and New School wings of American Presbyterianism. Gardiner Spring, Personal Reminiscences of the Life and Times of Gardiner Spring (New York, 1866); idem, First Things: A Series of Lectures on the Great Facts and Moral Lessons First Revealed to Mankind, 2 vols. (New York, 1851), 2: 308—80; William R. Hoyt, “The Religious Thought of Gardiner Spring, With Particular Reference to His Doctrine of Sin and Salvation" (Ph.D. diss., Duke University, 1962), 23-27; ACAB, 5: 639-40; NCAB, 5: 409; DAB, 17: 479—80. Spencer,5The Reverend Ichabod Smith Spencer (1798-1854) was born in Suffield, Connecticut, and graduated in 1822 from Union College in Schenectady. New York. After graduation he remained in Schenectady for several years teaching school and studying theology. In 1828 he accepted a call from the Congregational Church of Northampton, Massachusetts, and four years later he became pastor of the Second Presbyterian Church in Brooklyn, New York, where he built up a strong following through his “energetic and fearless preaching. “ On 24 November I850 Spencer set forth his position on the Fugitive Slave Law in a sermon entitled “The Religious Duty of Obedience to Law": “I am not justifying slavery. . . . Slavery may be wrong. . . . I am not justifying the fugitive slave law. It may be wrong. . . . I am only insisting upon religious obedience to Law. . . . Such obedience is a religious duty. It is the will of God. " Nevin, Presbyterian Church in the United States, 848; Ichabod Spencer, Fugitive Slave Law: The Religious Duty of Obedience to Law (New York, 1850). Lord,6John Chase Lord. Dewey7Orville Dewey. and others declared that Bible
Christianity is in favor of slavery. This causes us to make war upon the
church. Such organizations as these are opposed to Christianity. We must
have a better religion—a religion which is love to God and man. Love to
man only is not sufficient, this might render us selfish, it is not sufficient to
hold us up. To use a homely expression, I might as well expect to raise
myself up by my boot straps as to raise man up looking only to man. I look
to God, and in proportion as I get a glimpse of God I embrace Christianity,
love God, and love his purity.
The mass of the religionists of the day would call me an infidel. But I
think I now drink at the true fount of Christianity.
In the middle of the nineteenth century you may see the church and the
slave-prison next door to each other, while the groans of the slave are
drowned by the deafening shouts of the church. Revivals of religion and
revivals of slave-selling at the same time. Devils clothed in Angel’s robes
stand in the church and pray, Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be
thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is done in
Heaven, &c. and we thank thee, O God, that we live in a land of liberty
where every man can worship thee under his own vine and fig tree, when
none dare to make him afraid, &c. We pray for righteous rulers that they
may rule this people in fear, &c. And the next day go back to the ballot-
box, and vote for the oppressor, the warrior! for Whigs. But what is a
Whig?—a compromise man. Goes for negro hunting, negro catching.
Perhaps there are Whigs here who this morning prayed that God would
bless their families, that God would enable them to love him, while they are
the very men of all others who are upholding the system of man-stealing,
women-catching, and cradle plundering. That minister who does not preach
against the sin of slavery is not a minister of God. Men may be converted
under their preaching to Methodism, &c., but not to Christianity. We want
a better ministry, men who will preach in the name of God and not man.
There are powerful temptations presented to the minister and the editor to
let these sins alone. If the minister feels like preaching a little on land re-
form, as he is convinced land monopoly is oppressive and wrong, wherein
there sits a large landholder, [a member of] the church, and it won’t do, it
may drive him away and he then might lose his precious soul!!
Mr. Douglass then made a few remarks in regard to the national party.
He said until we have a party established independent of all support of
slaveholders—a party that will render itself distasteful to the south, we can
never effect much. The two old parties are like two large serpents throwing
their bodies across this whole land, their tails twisting about in the north
while their heads are in the south together, and they looking most placidly
in each other’s eyes. The south rules the north. You may talk here in the
north about nominating a candidate for the presidency, but you have no
voice, you are proscribed by the south and have to vote for the man the
south tells you to. You may talk about your choice of candidates, but you
are like little boys playing upon the pond.
You would acknowledge this to me if we were in the woods together.
Do you mean to continue to be the vassals of the Slave power? There
are interests at the North dearer to us than any which can be attained by a
co-operation with the parties. We are met by the assertion that we must have
a disruption of this confederacy before Slavery can be overthrown. Mr.
Douglass avowed that this formerly was his opinion, and he had withdrawn
from all action under or support of the constitution, denouncing it as the
deadly foe of time, denouncing it as the deadly foe of humanity. He had
once said in view of the evils of Slavery that he would welcome the bolt
whether it came from the North or the South, from Heaven or Hell, which
should shiver the Union into fragments. But he has since examined the
question here carefully and now believes the constitution to be an Anti-
Slavery instrument and that it should be so construed and enforced. His
reasons for the change in opinion in part are that though he always knew
that taken in its plain reading, it did not uphold Slavery, yet he had got the
impression we were to look beneath the surface and to find an occult
meaning. There are several passages which look like sustaining Slavery.
He had not then read law, and knew little of the debates on the adoption of
the Constitution or the history of the times. When he came to examine the
rules and principles by which such instruments should be construed, his
opinions changed. We are taught by tradition that what is said in the
constitution was the intent of the so called pro-slavery portions. When we
look at it through the pro-slavery action of the Government it bears a still
worse appearance.
The proper rules in construing the constitution are: 1st. In all cases an
instrument which is ambiguous in its terms should be construed favorably
to freedom and natural right. Any lawyer will tell you that. It has been
adjudged by the Supreme Court that an evil intent in any written document
must be expressed with irresistible clearness.
2nd. Another rule is where two interpretations, an innocent and a
guilty, can be given, the innocent should always be taken, and,
3rd. Where it is sought to sustain any thing against the rights of man we
are to be confined to the strict letter of the instrument authorizing it. Thus
construed he maintains there is no pro-slavery in the constitution. Under
the opposite belief persons supposing we must have Slavery or anarchy,
choose to continue to support the former. But there is no such alternative
presented by the case. The speaker holds that one of the great purposes of
the adoption of the constitution was to secure the overthrow of slavery. In
proof of this look at the intent expressed in the preamble. “We the people
of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish
justice, &c., and to secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our
posterity, do ordain and establish this constitution.” Hear it, old men and
young, and especially the young who are coming up to construe and sustain
it. Humanity may range throughout the universe, for proof in her favor, but
crime must have the letter on its side and that above to abide by. This was
once shown rather ludicrously in the Legislature of Connecticut. A law was
passed there that negroes should not be allowed to travel after nine at night
unless they carried a lantern. It was resolved to cast a light upon their dark
countenances. Accordingly the colored people bought lanterns and carried
them but without candles in them. When hauled up for trial it was proved
they were taken up with lanterns in their hands but no candles. The proof
was satisfactory they had complied with the letter of the law and they were
acquitted, as such a law must necessarily be construed strictly. Another law
was passed that negroes should carry lanterns with candles in them. This
they complied with but without lighting them and were again hauled up and
acquitted.
The law was amended so as to require them to carry lanterns with
lighted candles in them, and anon the negroes were found parading with
lighted candles in dark lanterns, and being again acquitted the Legislature
gave in and let the matter drop.
It is evidently our interest to make Legislators find it difficult to enact
villainy into law. If then, the constitution may be used to sustain natural
right and against slavery, what we need is a party which will deal out equal
and exact justice to all men. Here is a work for those to do who pray for just
rulers, and it is hoped that such a party will be established by the people. It
is necessary to place vital questions before the people—While we cling to
the old parties we can do nothing against Slavery.
We want a party that will make its politics a transcript of its religion.
We feel for Hungary and for Ireland, but how can we as a nation exert
an influence favorable to freedom in the old world, while we are oppressors
at home? Since I last addressed you I have seen the effects of American
Slavery in other countries. The Irish cannot complain of the oppression of
the British Crown, or speak of the land where they would gladly go without
having it hurled at them, it is the land of oppression. They enslave the
blacks, and he that would enslave one man would another. He may look at
it but he sees no protection for him, he may be seized under it, and in the
midst of the light of the religion of this day and hurled into the hell of
slavery. The old world knows this, it delights the despots of Europe.
The speaker then made some remarks in regard to the light in which the
great O’Connell8Daniel O'Connell. looked upon this land of blood and slaves. [He] said that
O’Connell was true to liberty every where, hated oppression in all lands,
and dealt his bolts wherever the oppressor was seen to rear his head, and
then proceed[ed] to remark that he would to God that the great Hungarian
had been as true, and faithful to human liberty as O’Connell; but that
Kossuth9Louis Kossuth. had injured his cause. We want our land to be something more
than a by word, and a hissing. Let us up to the work. The truth must
accomplish it. Let us proclaim this truth to the state and to the Court which
have established Oppression for Liberty. Don ’t think you can do nothing[;]
you are armed with power to move the millions.