Rochester[, N.Y.] 19 May 1854.

HON: GERRIT SMITH

MY DEAR SIR,

I am again at my post. I found the packit of your Speech¹Douglass returned from speaking in New York at the annual meetings of the American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society and the American Missionary Association on 10-11 May 1854. The speech to which he refers was probably the one delivered by Gerrit Smith to the House on 6 April 1854 in opposition to the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Douglass published a notice in the 16 May 1854 edition of announcing that Buell & Blanchard, a printing firm in Washington, D.C., would be reproducing the contents of Smith’s speech and selling them to interested parties for $1.50 each. , new ser., 2:82-83 (1 April 1854); New York , 11 May 1854; New York , 11 May 1854; New York , 11 May 1854; New York , 12 May 1854; New York , 18 May 1854; , 19, 26 May 1854; , ser. 1, 2:xxxvi, 479-90. here on my return from Newyork—I am very glad to have them to dispose of. It is the best antiSlavery document for the times Now extant—Is it not too bad that Antislavery men Should do up all the argument on the Slavery Side against you? I was Sick of the dogmatism and canting Superior honesty—indulged in at Newyork—by the Speakers at the late meeting of the Am A. S. Society² The American Anti-Slavery Society held its twentieth anniversary meeting on 10 May 1854 at the headquarters of New York’s Broadway Universalist Society. The convention’s main speaker, Wendell Phillips, called for a “total revolution in the religious and political institutions of the country.” New York , 11 May 1854.—With some of them the best evidence that a man can give of being a knave is to profeSS to believe in the Soundness of your views respecting the Constitution. With the manner of your opposition to the KanSas Nebraska Bill³The much-amended bill to organize the territories of Kansas and Nebraska was originally introduced into Congress by Senator Stephen A. Douglass of Illinois. The measure invoked “popular sovereignty” to allow residents of those territories to decide whether to permit slavery. In the final version, passed on 30 May 1854, the Kansas-Nebraska Act voided the provision of the Missouri Compromise of 1820 that forbade slavery in the old Louisiana Purchase north of 36° 30' and established the doctrine of congressional noninterventention regarding slavery in the territories. P. Orman Ray, The Repeal of the Missouri Compromise: Its Origin and Authorship (Cleveland, 1909), 16, 182-87; David M. Potter, (New York, 1976), 55, 160-77; Michael F. Holt, (New York, 2004), 103-05.—those who know you most and love you best are entirely Satisfied. It would not look degnified, or Consistent to see Gerrit Smith either leading or following what at best Must be pronounced a factious opposition. I hope Cuttings amendment⁴Born in New York City, Francis Brockholst Cutting (1804-70) won election to the Thirty-fifth Congress in 1853 as a Democrat from his birth state. He graduated from the Litchfield Law School in Connecticut and was admitted to the bar in 1827. Cutting practiced law in New York City until he was elected to the state assembly in 1836 and later to Congress. He served only one term in the House of Representatives, during which time he played an active role in the adoption of the 1855 statute that extended citizenship to children of Americans who were born abroad and voted in favor of the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Cutting is perhaps best remembered for his quarrel with John C. Breckinridge, then a Democratic congressman from Kentucky. Cutting successfully moved to refer the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, which had already passed in the Senate, to the Committee of the Whole.
Breckinridge contended that Cutting, who publicly supported the bill, had effectively buried it and suggested that Cutting was two-faced. The verbal exchanges turned insulting and almost led to a duel. After fulfilling his term in office, Cutting returned to the practice of law in New York City. New York , 8 April, 9 December 1854; Montpelier , 2 June 1854; Bangor , 28 June 1870; San Francisco , 28 June 1870; Milwaukee , 22 July 1864; Frank H. Heck, (Lexington, Ky., 1976), 43; (online). will fail, and if we must have the the repeal of the Missouri reStriction⁵A reference to the 36° 30' line in the Missouri Compromise of 1820, which divided the Louisiana Purchase into free and slave territories. Glover Moore, (Lexington, Ky., 1953), 41-47, 59-64, 84-89, 115. let nothing be done to Soften the harShness of the Measure.

My faithful Friend Julia⁶Julia Griffiths. desires best

Love—Always Yours Truly

FREDERICK DOUGLASS.

ALS: Gerrit Smith Papers, NSyU.