FOOTNOTE:

“Treason never prospers: what’s the reason?When it prospers, men don’tcallit treason.”

“Treason never prospers: what’s the reason?

When it prospers, men don’tcallit treason.”

Happily for the slave, at this critical instant, there were not wanting men tocallout “Treason!” against this whole procedure, irrespective of its probable success, in that soul-cleaving and victorious voice which carries with it instant conviction.

It is interesting to observe the course of men in peculiar and trying times, and to notice the strong contrasts of character and conduct that such times present.

Mr. Phelps, Mr. Stanton, Mr. Torrey, and Mr. St. Clair were hurrying from meeting to meeting with the Fitchburg resolutions, or driving the quill over quires of paper, urging the instant convocation of the societies for the introduction of the new paper, saying that it was not intended to be in opposition to the old, but only introduced because nine out of ten of the abolitionists in the Statewould nottake the Liberator,—that it would probably be adopted with great unanimityas the organ of the State Society, at the Annual Meeting—and dwelling strongly on the importance of sending up large delegations, instructed to vote in its favor.

Mr. Garrison stood calmly watching the aspect of the times, and when the signs were full, he raised the note of warning—

“WATCHMAN, WHAT OF THE NIGHT?”The annual meeting of the State Anti-Slavery Society will be held in this city on the 23d inst. There are many indications which lead us to regard it as pregnant with momentous consequences to the abolition cause in this section of the country. Perhaps at no period has there been so much cause for just alarm as at the present. Strong foes are without, insidious plotters are within the camp. A conflict is at hand,—if the signs of the times do not deceive us,—which is to be more hotly contested, and which will require more firmness of nerve and greater singleness of purpose, (combined with sleepless vigilance and unswerving integrity,) than any through which we have passed to victory. Once more, therefore, we would speak trumpet-tongued—sound an alarm-bell—light up a beacon-fire—give out a new watch-word—so that there may be a general rallying of our early, intrepid, storm-proof, scarred and veteran coadjutors, at the coming anniversary,—all panoplied as of yore, andprepared to give battle to internal contrivers of mischief, as readily as to external and avowed enemies.The danger which now threatens all that is pure and vital in our cause, is two-fold and complex. From the commencement of our sacred struggle, we have been resisted by every religious sect, and made by turns the foot-ball of every political party. As among all sects and all parties, there are some who will never bow the knee to Baal, but are resolved to followRightandTruththrough flood and fire, come what may—these, by the irresistible affinity of principle, have come into our ranks, repudiating every sectarian distinction, every party badge, and refusing to march under any other banner than that ofHumanity. Bravely have they contended, cheerfully have they suffered, in the cause of their enslaved countrymen; and nobly have they withstood a thousand wily artifices to seduce them from their post. And they will persevere unto the end.“Tempt them with bribes, ’twill be in vain;Try them with fire, you’ll find them true.”

“WATCHMAN, WHAT OF THE NIGHT?”

The annual meeting of the State Anti-Slavery Society will be held in this city on the 23d inst. There are many indications which lead us to regard it as pregnant with momentous consequences to the abolition cause in this section of the country. Perhaps at no period has there been so much cause for just alarm as at the present. Strong foes are without, insidious plotters are within the camp. A conflict is at hand,—if the signs of the times do not deceive us,—which is to be more hotly contested, and which will require more firmness of nerve and greater singleness of purpose, (combined with sleepless vigilance and unswerving integrity,) than any through which we have passed to victory. Once more, therefore, we would speak trumpet-tongued—sound an alarm-bell—light up a beacon-fire—give out a new watch-word—so that there may be a general rallying of our early, intrepid, storm-proof, scarred and veteran coadjutors, at the coming anniversary,—all panoplied as of yore, andprepared to give battle to internal contrivers of mischief, as readily as to external and avowed enemies.

The danger which now threatens all that is pure and vital in our cause, is two-fold and complex. From the commencement of our sacred struggle, we have been resisted by every religious sect, and made by turns the foot-ball of every political party. As among all sects and all parties, there are some who will never bow the knee to Baal, but are resolved to followRightandTruththrough flood and fire, come what may—these, by the irresistible affinity of principle, have come into our ranks, repudiating every sectarian distinction, every party badge, and refusing to march under any other banner than that ofHumanity. Bravely have they contended, cheerfully have they suffered, in the cause of their enslaved countrymen; and nobly have they withstood a thousand wily artifices to seduce them from their post. And they will persevere unto the end.

“Tempt them with bribes, ’twill be in vain;Try them with fire, you’ll find them true.”

“Tempt them with bribes, ’twill be in vain;

Try them with fire, you’ll find them true.”

But all external opposition, in whatever form it may appear, is harmless, compared to internal sedition.—And with pain we avow it, there is a deep scheme laid by individuals, at present somewhat conspicuous, as zealous and active abolitionists, to put the control of the anti-slaverymovements in this Commonwealth into other hands. This scheme, of course, is of clerical origin, and the prominent ringleaders fill the clerical office. One of the most restless was a participant in the famous “Clerical Appeal” conspiracy,—though not one of the immortalFIVE. The design is, by previous management and drilling, to effect such a change in the present faithful and liberal-minded Board of Managers of the State Society, at the annual meeting, as will throw the balance of power into the hands of a far different body of men, for the accomplishment of ulterior measures which are now in embryo.—The next object is, to effect the establishment of a new weekly anti-slavery journal, to be the organ of the State Society, for the purpose, if not avowedly, yet designedly to subvert the Liberator, and thus relieve the abolition cause in this State of the odium of counteracting such a paper. Then——make way for the clergy! For, by “hanging Garrison,” and repudiating the Liberator, they will surely condescend to take the reins of anti-slavery management into their own hands!

The plot, thus far, has been warily managed,—so as, if possible, to “deceive the very elect.” Many, we know, are already ensnared, and some, at least, who neither intend nor suspect mischief. The guise in which it is presented, is one of deep solicitude for the success of our cause. No attempt is made to lower down the standard—O no!—but simply to change the men to whomhas been so long entrusted the management of the enterprize, and put in their place younger men, better men, who will accomplish wonders, and perform their duties more faithfully—that’s all! While, privately, by conversation, letters, circulars, &c. &c. every effort is making to disparage the Liberator, (the paper is too tame for these rampant plotters!) and to calumniate its editor, no hostility to either is to be openly avowed! Far from it; for honesty in this case might not, peradventure, prove to be the best policy.—The shape in which this new project is to be urged, is developed in the resolutions which were adopted at the recent meeting of the Worcester County North Division A. S. Society, at Fitchburgh. Those resolutions were concocted in Essex County, by the joint labors of two clergymen, and passed as above stated,—only four or five hands, we learn, being raised in their favor. The plan is, it seems, to get as many anti-slavery societies committed in favor of these resolutions, before the annual meeting, as possible. Thepoliticalnecessity which is urged for another paper is ridiculous; and we know it is nothing but a hollow pretence.

The trusty friends of our good cause, and all who desire to baffle the machinations of a clerical combination, will need no other notice than this, to induce them to rally at the annual meeting, and watch with jealousy and meet with firmness every attempt, however plausibly made, to effectany material change in the management of the concerns of the State Society. The spirit that would discard such men as Francis Jackson, Ellis Gray Loring, Samuel E. Sewall, Edmund Quincy, and Wendell Phillips, is treacherous to humanity.

As a specimen of the billing and cooing which is going on between gentlemen of the sacerdotal robe, in order to bring about a radical alteration in anti-slavery control, read the following extract from a recent letter of the Rev. Dr. Osgood, of Springfield, to Prof. Emerson, of the Theological Seminary at Andover:

“I do not say these things to palliate the conduct of these writers in the anti-slavery papers who have poured suchtorrents of abuseupon the non-conformists among the clergy. I have ever spoken freely about many of these communications, both to friends and opposers. I think there has beena bad spiritmanifested on the side of the abolitionists toward the opposing clergy; or, if you please, those who stand aloof and do nothing. I do most sincerely hope that my brethren wholike you(!) hate slavery, but still remain neuter, (!) will calmly review the whole ground, and sacrifice all minor considerations, and work with us in this cause. I see no insuperable objections. I desire this the more ardently, because the character of the ministry suffers, in the estimation of many good men, by the course they pursue, while the enemies of all righteousness take occasion tothrust a sword into the vitals of religion itself, through the clergy. Mr. Garrison, sir, is not the principal offender in this matter; [very gentle!]—he is made answerable, as a public editor, for the conduct of others. But ☞our brethren[such men as Moses Stuart and Ralph Emerson!]can easily take the sword out of the hand of theseVIOLENT AND PREJUDICED MEN. ☜ ☞ And I trust they will soon do itEFFECTUALLY, by some course ofACTION.The cause would be greatly promoted by their co-operation”!!☜

Wendell Phillips, the same who took the brunt of the battle at Faneuil Hall, upon the day when men met there to wash their hands of Lovejoy’s murder, was among the foremost to detect the subtler form of danger. His letter to the financial committee of the Liberator, which appeared in the next column to the call of the watchman, stripped the opposition of their disguises, with a firm and dexterous hand. It exhibits, in a condensed form, the mind of one who had knowledge of the cause throughout the State, as a lecturer and a manager of the Society, and throughout the land, as an acute and philosophical observer. In politics, a voter,—in theology, a Calvinist,—in church government, a congregationalist,—looking on these things from thesame point of view with those who were laboring for the destruction of Freedom, toleration and fraternal confidence in the cause, he came to diametrically opposite conclusions.—

“Theheart’saye the part aye,That makes us right or wrong.”

“Theheart’saye the part aye,

That makes us right or wrong.”

LETTER OF WENDELL PHILLIPS.Messrs. Jackson, Quincy, and Bassett:Dear Sirs—I wish to express to you the satisfaction which the new arrangements for the Liberator have given me. They will gain for it a wider circulation and more permanent usefulness. I feel not merely for the paper itself—though it would give me pain, I confess, to see the first banner which was unfurled in our cause, which has braved for so many years the battle and the breeze, having lived down its enemies, sink at last from the coldness of its friends. But, apart from this, I regard the success of the Liberator as identical with that of the abolition cause itself. Though so bitterly opposed, it does more to disseminate, develope and confirm our principles, than any other publication whatever. The spirit which produced, still animates it, and with magnetic influence draws from all parts of society every thing like around it. Other measures may suit different circumstances, and other parts of the country; but here, and now, the spirit of the Liberator is the touchstone of true hearts. Almostall the opposition it has met with, various as it seems, springs from one cause. At starting, some who agreed with its principles denounced it as “foul-mouthed and abusive;” next, the occasional expression of some individual opinions of its editor, gained it the name of “irreligious and Jacobin;”—and now some point to its peace views as infidel in their tendency, and a stumbling-block in our way. Under all these disguises have men concealed their motives, sometimes even from themselves.The real cause of this opposition, in my opinion, is the fundamental principle upon which the Liberator has been conducted:—that rights are more valuable than forms; that truth is a better guide than prescription; that no matter how much truth a sect embodies, no matter how useful a profession may be, no matter how much benefit any form of government may confer—still they are all but dust in the balance when weighed against the protection of human rights, the discussion and publication of great truths; that all forms of human device are worse than useless, when they stand in Truth’s way. These are its principles;—frank, fearless single-heartedness, the utmost freedom of thought and speech, its characteristics. If we fail to impress these on each abolition heart, our efforts are paralyzed, and our cause is lost. Pride of settled opinion, love of lifeless forms, undue attachments to sect, are its foes.With the fullest charity for all conscientiousscruples, and dissenting, as I do, from the peace-views of the Liberator, I cannot see how their discussion, conducted in a Christian spirit, and with sincere love of truth, can offend the conscience of any man. Limited to a brief space, as it is, it can have no effect on the general character of the paper. I mean to give all my influence, (and, in this crisis, when the paper so much needs its friends, I wish that influence were greater,) to gain it the confidence, and pour its spirit into the mind of every one I can reach. I shall esteem it a privilege to second your efforts. The danger I most dread is, to have our cause fall under the control of any party, sect, or profession. That way ruin lies. The chiefest bulwark against it, I know of, is the Liberator. Success to it. May it have the cordial support of every abolition heart.Yours, truly,Wendell Phillips.Boston, Jan. 7th, 1839.

LETTER OF WENDELL PHILLIPS.

Messrs. Jackson, Quincy, and Bassett:

Dear Sirs—I wish to express to you the satisfaction which the new arrangements for the Liberator have given me. They will gain for it a wider circulation and more permanent usefulness. I feel not merely for the paper itself—though it would give me pain, I confess, to see the first banner which was unfurled in our cause, which has braved for so many years the battle and the breeze, having lived down its enemies, sink at last from the coldness of its friends. But, apart from this, I regard the success of the Liberator as identical with that of the abolition cause itself. Though so bitterly opposed, it does more to disseminate, develope and confirm our principles, than any other publication whatever. The spirit which produced, still animates it, and with magnetic influence draws from all parts of society every thing like around it. Other measures may suit different circumstances, and other parts of the country; but here, and now, the spirit of the Liberator is the touchstone of true hearts. Almostall the opposition it has met with, various as it seems, springs from one cause. At starting, some who agreed with its principles denounced it as “foul-mouthed and abusive;” next, the occasional expression of some individual opinions of its editor, gained it the name of “irreligious and Jacobin;”—and now some point to its peace views as infidel in their tendency, and a stumbling-block in our way. Under all these disguises have men concealed their motives, sometimes even from themselves.

The real cause of this opposition, in my opinion, is the fundamental principle upon which the Liberator has been conducted:—that rights are more valuable than forms; that truth is a better guide than prescription; that no matter how much truth a sect embodies, no matter how useful a profession may be, no matter how much benefit any form of government may confer—still they are all but dust in the balance when weighed against the protection of human rights, the discussion and publication of great truths; that all forms of human device are worse than useless, when they stand in Truth’s way. These are its principles;—frank, fearless single-heartedness, the utmost freedom of thought and speech, its characteristics. If we fail to impress these on each abolition heart, our efforts are paralyzed, and our cause is lost. Pride of settled opinion, love of lifeless forms, undue attachments to sect, are its foes.

With the fullest charity for all conscientiousscruples, and dissenting, as I do, from the peace-views of the Liberator, I cannot see how their discussion, conducted in a Christian spirit, and with sincere love of truth, can offend the conscience of any man. Limited to a brief space, as it is, it can have no effect on the general character of the paper. I mean to give all my influence, (and, in this crisis, when the paper so much needs its friends, I wish that influence were greater,) to gain it the confidence, and pour its spirit into the mind of every one I can reach. I shall esteem it a privilege to second your efforts. The danger I most dread is, to have our cause fall under the control of any party, sect, or profession. That way ruin lies. The chiefest bulwark against it, I know of, is the Liberator. Success to it. May it have the cordial support of every abolition heart.

Yours, truly,Wendell Phillips.

Boston, Jan. 7th, 1839.

Troubles, however different in their nature, always seem to have fellowship with each other. At this juncture, while the Anti-Slavery community in Massachusetts were laboring under the pain and astonishment of the recent development, came a Sub-Committee, consisting of Mr. Leavitt and Mr. Stanton, from New York, to say that, as the stated payments due to the National Treasurywere unpaid, the contract became null and void.[4]

The Massachusetts Board could not, as lawyers, or as men of business, admit this to be the case; but, anxious to discharge the obligation, they came to the following resolution, in the presence of the New York Committee.

“Resolved, That the Executive Committee be invited to send their agents into the State, and take any other measures they may deem best, to collect the amount due on the pledge made by this society, and to become due on the first of February, and to remit the whole to the treasury of the Massachusetts Society, under the promise that the same shall beimmediatelyandwhollyremitted to New York; and that in the collection of the same, they be authorised to receive the amount of pledges hitherto made to the Massachusetts Society.”

They hoped, by this, to open a way for the instant redemption of the pledge, through the means of the friendly co-operation of the New York Committee, and trusted that the rash,unbusiness-like and unbrotherly nullification of so necessary an arrangement, would be avoided.

To the surprise of the Massachusetts men, whothencould perceive no sufficient motive for such a course, the New York Committee declined to accept these terms. Were they suffering for the money? Why then did they not take the readiest and the best way to get it?—throughthe Massachusetts Society,—notoverit? Did they love peace and unity? Why then for one moment hesitate? They were invited to send in their agents, and take any other means they might deem best, under the arrangement of the preceding June. What more ought brethren and honest men to desire? What more could be accomplished bytheirplan, of going on as if the Massachusetts Society were not in existence?Onething more it could notfailto accomplish,—the destruction of the Massachusetts Society. Was it possible that the New York brethren hadaimedat that?Wereit so, they could not better have hit the mark than by coming at that painful moment, to envenom a financial embarrassment which, singly, could have been so easily met, by mingling it with the poisoned sources of difficulty that had just been laid bare. They came formoney, at a moment when the state treasury was found empty—the state agents proved treacherous, the state energies bent upon working out a political demonstration in the eyes of the whole country. And because, under all these difficulties, a part of the money had not been paid when it became due, they refused to collect it,withpermission, for the mere pleasure, it seemed, of collecting itwithoutpermission. If they were unwilling to acknowledge, even in form, the existence of the Massachusetts Society, what was the legitimate inference? Did the Committee really agree with the slaveholder, and his soul-guard from the truth,—the associations of the ministry, that the Massachusetts Societyoughtto be destroyed?

Massachusetts men deemed it a virtue to repel these thoughts, which the conduct of the New York Committee could not fail to suggest. They shrunk from the pain of beholding and weighing the evidence of a want of fraternal confidence, and devotion to the cause. They were doomed for this weakness, to feel soon, in their own persons, how much better it is to judge our fellows bytheirdeeds, than by ourownhopes orfears.

[4]For the terms of this contract and the occasion of its necessity, see pages 10 and 47.

Whatwe would think, is not the question here.The affair speaks for itself, and clearest proofs.—Schiller.

Whatwe would think, is not the question here.

The affair speaks for itself, and clearest proofs.—Schiller.

The annual meeting of the Massachusetts Society was the time proposed by the confederated agents and secretaries of the National and Massachusetts Societies, for the full development of their plans. Like children playing at draughts, they had calculated their own game, but not the counteracting moves of their antagonists. Mr. Garrison’s unexpected trumpet-blast, threw them into confusion. They were ignorant of the extent of his knowledge, and, in their consternation, did the exact thing, that innocence would by its nature have necessarily avoided—denied the existence of any plot.

Mr. Garrison had spoken of two clergymen in Essex County. Mr. Torrey and Mr. St. Clair, like Scrub in the comedy, were “sure he wastalking of them,” and went into a labored denial and explanation; all of which, when examined and condensed, demonstrated that a great amount of time and labor, and by means of the agents and the funds of the Massachusetts and National Societies, had been privately expended in sowing the seed of the new paper.

Mr. Phelps, to whom Mr. Garrison had not alluded, identified himself with the plot, in a series of letters, whose remarkable bitterness was charitably imputed by some to the peevishness of recent illness. Others there were, who received these letters as a proclamation to all concerned, that the writer was no longer “Mr. Garrison’s Brother Phelps;” and as an evidence that the threat of the Recorder had effected its purpose.

The Anti-Slavery Office became a scene of deep interest, both to the devoted friend of the cause, and to the close observer of human nature, while the tide of inquiring comers was on the flood. The innocent regularly brought confirmation that the alarm-note of Mr. Garrison was most fortunately timed. They all recollected some incomprehensible circumstance on which the recent developments had shed a flood of light. Some recalled a conversation with “your agent,”some, a remark of “our secretary,” hinting at a change in the Board, or a way by which clerical opponents might be gained over to the cause; “for we must have all these men.” Abundance of sayings came to mind, by which, when first uttered, they had been exceedingly puzzled, and had finally laid aside as jests or incomprehensible:—having the master-key, they could now unlock them all. Notes and letters by the dozen were forth-coming, from Mr. Torrey and others, marked “confidential.” His correspondents now began to feel that silence was crime. An eagerness to give and receive information, marked the innocent. Not so the guilty. They vehemently denied the existence of any plot,—said that Mr. Garrison was unfit to be entrusted with any important post in the cause, that Non-Resistants were not properly abolitionists,—that slavery was the creature of law—that votes made it, and votes only could unmake it—that though the Liberator did in its columns advocate political action, it was inconsistent in so doing, and that they thought a new paper absolutely necessary.

In this position, the day of the annual meeting found the conflicting principles and men. Bigotry and sectarism were pitted against religiousliberty and Christian love,—openness and candor against craft and concealment,—treachery against fidelity,—falsehood against truth, and, (for things that are equal to the same things are equal to one another,) freedom against bondage.

It was the largest anti-slavery gathering ever witnessed in Massachusetts, and a noble sight it was to look upon. It preserved its original heterogeneous character, being composed of old and young, men and women; of every sect, party, condition and color, all filled with the most absorbing interest. Well might every eye be rivetted, and every heart wrapped in earnest attention. It was a turning point in the cause. A strong and mighty wind had come to winnow the wheat from the chaff; the crooked was to be made straight—the hidden was to be revealed:—expectation was wrought up to the top of its bent. The report of the Board of Managers, written by Mr. Garrison, was first read. Men looked wonderingly at one another. “Is this the report that we received such earnest entreaties to come and vote down? we find no fault in it. Are these the opinions of our board of officers, which it is represented to us as so desirable, for opinion’s sake, to change? perhaps we might look farther, and find worse.”

The report was laid aside to afford opportunity for the utterance of the thoughts which were swelling up, to find vent in every mind. The business committee, desirous of affording every facility to debate, opened the way by the introductions of the following resolutions.

Resolved, That the state of the Anti-Slavery cause in this Commonwealth demands the establishment of an ably-conducted, cheap, official organ, to be under the control of the Board of Managers of the State Society, issued weekly to subscribers; to advocate political as well as moral and religious action; to be exclusively confined to the object of the Anti-Slavery cause, and edited by a man or men, who can conscientiously, heartily and consistently advocate all the anti-slavery measures, political as well as moral action; and that the salary of the editor or editors, together with all other necessary expenses thereof, be paid out of the funds of the Society.Resolved, That the Board of Managers are hereby instructed to make arrangements, if practicable, with the proprietors and editor of the Liberator, to make that paper the organ aforesaid, and under the above restriction; or, if that cannot be done, that they take measures, as soon as practicable, to establish an organ, as recommended in the resolutions passed by the Worcester County North Division Anti-Slavery Society, at its late annual meeting in Fitchburg.

Resolved, That the Board of Managers are hereby instructed to make arrangements, if practicable, with the proprietors and editor of the Liberator, to make that paper the organ aforesaid, and under the above restriction; or, if that cannot be done, that they take measures, as soon as practicable, to establish an organ, as recommended in the resolutions passed by the Worcester County North Division Anti-Slavery Society, at its late annual meeting in Fitchburg.

Mr. St. Clair first spoke. He occupied more than an hour in explaining to the meeting that Mr. Torrey had no hand in the Fitchburg resolutions. Mr. Torrey occupied the remainder of the afternoon in denying the existence of any plot, deprecating the fulsome eulogy of abolitionists, when they spoke of the Liberator;—said that its circulation was so small that there was absolute need of another paper, for the purpose of advertising the meetings, and that abolitionists were determined to have a more effectual medium of communication with the electors of Massachusetts. He said, “Mr. St. Clair, and myself, Mr. Phelps and Mr. Stanton, we four, are the originators of this new paper.”

Mr. Stanton replied “I warn the gentleman to be careful of his pronouns. I defy any one to show a letter or a fragment of a letter, to prove that I have been implicated in the plan; for I have mentioned it in but one, and that to a friend inanother State.” Mr. Torrey said that it was contemplated to obtain the services of some first-rate editor—Elizur Wright, or John G. Whittier. “Ah! comes the arrow out ofthatquiver!” inly responded a few earnest listeners. But the general feeling was, that it was only a swelling word used by Mr. Torrey, for effect, so absurd, soimpossible did it seem that either of those men could be made to stand in Massachusetts upon the clerical platform of hatred to Mr. Garrison. As soon would Wendell Phillips have been suspected of laboring to accommodate pro-slavery prejudice with a less odious editor in Pennsylvania; or Ellis Gray Loring, of supplying the deficiencies of the Emancipator, by a hostile paper in New York. Mr. Torrey urged the forlorn condition of Massachusetts among her sister states,without an organ; and seemed as much impressed with the mortification of being a member of a Society so sadly unfurnished, as were the slavish Jews, when taunted by the surrounding nations with having no king.

Mr. May did not suffer in the view of what so much affected Mr. Torrey. “We have never wanted means of communication with the public,” he said; “when the Massachusetts Society wants anorgan, she sounds a trumpet.” Night was closing round the combatants, and Mr. May moved an indefinite postponement of the whole subject. Mr. Phelps exclaimed against thus “giving the go-by to the most important subject that could come before them.” Mr. May withdrew his motion, and the meeting closed, to meet again in an hour.

Again the throng came together, with added numbers and spirit. Mr. Stanton took the floor, and to the utter astonishment of the meeting, proclaimed that the Liberator had lowered the standard of abolition, that Mr. Garrison was recreant to the cause, and thatthereforea new paper was indispensable.

His words opened the flood-gates of many memories. Instantly rushed through the minds of abolitionists all that had passed since he first stood among them, the trusted and beloved; their guide—their companion—their own familiar friend. Grief and indignation strove for the mastery in their hearts as he went on. “A new paper was therefore indispensable. True, it was said that the columns of the Liberator were filled with political matter—but how is that political matter obtained? It is wrought into my frame in head-aches and side-aches, how that political matter is obtained. If lamps could speak, they could tell that it is by taking your agents from the field to furnish it, after the day’s exhausting labor.—There ought to be an editor to do it. Again; what accompanied this political matter, on the other side of the paper? Discussions calculated to nullify its effect. Expressions of oppositeopinions. It is not that other subjects are introduced into the Liberator—it is thatsuchother subjects are introduced—subjects so injurious to the cause. Mr. President, I would not injure the Liberator or Mr. Garrison. On the subject of peace, perhaps, he is nearer right than I am. But he has lowered the standard of abolition.”

Mr. Garrison and Mr. Stanton had met continually during the season previous to this attack. They had met as aforetime, brotherly, and Mr. Stanton had never, even by a word, prepared his friend for such a proceeding. Conviction was flashed upon the minds of the audience by every sentence he uttered, that the spurious abolition, which, from its being defended by the ministry, had obtained the name of clerical abolition, had, at last made a conquest of a suitablelaymanto carry forward its operations. The minds of men rapidly reverted to the clerical effort of 1837 to break up the Massachusetts Society. Again they saw the effort renewed, to cast out its most efficient members. Again the same old war-cry sounded in their ears—“Let them go out from among us, for they are not of us; and the Massachusetts Society must have a new organ!” How many a grieved heart, that had trustingly relied onStanton to combat this fresh attack on the cause, on thus hearing his proclamation of his own treachery to his comrades, was ready to exclaim,

“Oh had an angel spoke those words to me,I would not have believed no tongue but Hubert’s.”

“Oh had an angel spoke those words to me,

I would not have believed no tongue but Hubert’s.”

All, then, was true; the boast of Mr. St. Clair, that if he were treacherous, then was Stanton and every agent of the Massachusetts Society treacherous too; the declaration of Mr. Torrey—“we four!” No neednow, of a conservator of pronouns: the mask was thrown off.

Mr. Garrison indignantly repelled the charge brought against him. “Am I recreant to the cause? who believes it?” “No! No!” burst forth from the crowded aisles and galleries. “Let me ask him a question;” said Mr. Stanton. “Mr. Garrison! do you or do you not believe it a sin to go to the polls?”

The indignant audience did not cry “shame!”—they were too deeply moved for utterance. They were silent in breathless astonishment. Was thisMassachusetts? Was it at a meeting ofherfree-souled sons and daughters, from a platform of toleration so broad that every human being, laboring for immediate emancipation, mightstand upon it, that a man presented a creed-measure to his brethren, with the threat to brand every brow as unworthy, that overtopped that little span? Was it in prophetic fear of this disgraceful scene that Massachusetts abolitionists had so early renounced the doctrine of racks and thumb-screws—the idea of reproach for opinion? The same indignant thoughts thronged up for utterance in every heart. Quakers, Calvinists, Unitarians;—Whigs, Democrats, and Non-Resistants;—men of every religious opinion and every political theory—this question insulted them all. Might the believer in the religious duty of voting claim authority to summon to the confessional, all whom he chose to mark for exclusion from the cause, and enter into discussion and condemnation of their belief? Then might every other sectary do the same. The Baptist might banish the Friend—the Methodist might proscribe the Independent—the white man reject the man of color—the women vote that men were disqualified—or men assert the same absurdity with respect to women. If the precious time of a thousand friends of the slave, met to devise measures for making every voter an abolitionist, was to be consumed in makingevery abolitionist a voter, men felt that a change in their point of agreement—a change in the constitution and the principles that made the constitution, must be effected. The common pass-word must no longer be “immediate emancipation” alone, but every sectarian or partizan must shout hisown, and draw his weapon upon every abolitionist who heeded it not. Hatred, wrong, and bondage, unmasked their hideous faces to love, right, and freedom, in the question that so roused every soul in that assembly.

Mr. Garrison promptly answered it, so as not to deny his principles, nor yet to take up the gauge of the non-resistance conflict, which Mr. Stanton had thrown down:—“Sin forme!” “I ask you again,” persisted the infatuated questioner, “do you or do you not believe it a sin to go to the polls?” “Sin for me”—was the same imperturbable reply.

This treacherous interrogatory,[5]fit act of afamiliar of the holy office to a heretic, but ineffably disgraceful from the Secretary of the National Anti-Slavery Society to the man on whose motion the National Anti-Slavery Society came into existence, stirred the souls of the abolitionists as if they had seen the slave-driver stand suddenly forth with his scourge and manacles, in visible embodyment of the spiritual tyranny they now felt.

A scene of tempestuous conflict followed, as the whole scope and bearing of the work that had been going on in the Commonwealth under the auspices of the “four,” became apparent. They stood like him who has tampered with the embankments that toil and sacrifice have built between the devouring ocean and a level and fertile land. The indignant feeling of the audience rose to an almost uncontrollable pitch; yet theydidrestrain it; for the winnowing-time had come,and they must take careful note of men’s conductnow, that they might know who to trust hereafter. Painful and unexpected it was to see Scott, Codding and Geo. Allen swept away, as the whirlwind of debate went on. The resolutions before the meeting were respecting a new paper. But the arguments by which they were sustained, demanded not only a new paper, but new principles—a new constitution—a new society—new officers. Was the true and original test of membership—not an acknowledgment of the justice and necessity of immediate emancipation, but a belief in the religious duty of voting at the polls? Then would those arguments require the dissolution of the Massachusetts Society, another set of men as managers of a new one, and the utter destruction of the Liberator. Yet those who brought forward those arguments, and who, if sincere, were bound by them to destroy the worthless instrumentalities of which they complained, uniformly declared, with the same breath, that nothing was further from their intention than to injure the Liberator, or to cast any imputations against the Board of Managers.

Ellis Gray Loring rose in reply. “On the question of theneedof a new paper, I do notwish to speak. A need may exist which I do not perceive. Brethren tell me that there is such a need. I only say that to make such a paper the organ of the Society, and to sustain it at the expense of the Society, over the head of the Liberator would have a tendency to injure the latter. I do not say that gentlemen mean it. They tell us they abjure such a thought. But it is a maxim in law, that the purpose of a man’s acts must be presumed to correspond with their manifest tendency.”

Wendell Phillips argued earnestly against the first resolution. The second was so manifestly a mockery that it was scarcely noticed. The spirit of the meeting rose against the whole intolerant contrivance submitted to its decision. The “four,” when they perceived it, strove, by every parliamentary device, to delay judgment. They strove to divide the resolutions—to refer the matter to a committee—to adjourn the meeting. In vain. The spirit that filled the Marlboro’ Chapel that night, refused to be conjured into a committee-room, or to leave its work unfinished. “Vote it down,” “vote it down,” was the reply to every proposition; till Mr. Loring moved an indefinite postponement, which was almost unanimously carried.

While the fate of the new paper was pending, a doubt was raised by Mr. Phelps and Mr. St.Clair, as to the right of women to a voice in the decision. The question was hardly a debateable one in a society whose constitution welcomed all persons to an equal seat, and whose resolutions had proclaimed that, in the cause of philanthropy, all persons, whether men or women, have the same duties and the same rights. The decision was therefore referred to the President.

It was not for Francis Jackson, whose house had, in 1835, been placed at the disposal of the women, under threats of its destruction, after the mercantile world had decided that they were out of their sphere in the anti-slavery cause—it was not forhimto shrink from a just decision because thereligious worldhad taken up the cry. Now, as then, the women had judged for themselves.Here, also, was a responsibility which they did not choose to delegate; and leaving ministers on one side and merchants on the other, they came, according to their wont, each to serve the cause as conscience and judgment should dictate. They came with their husbands and their brethren, from the cities and from the villages. The anti-slavery halls had been ever to them as an altarbefore which to dedicate their young children to righteousness and freedom. They came with the joyful consciousness that whatever subjects might be adjudged foreign, they, at least, were at home.

“The Chair rules that it is in order for women to vote.”

Not a voice was raised in appeal. The Massachusetts Society dared not, for the slave’s sake—it would not for its own, exile any of its members from its councils.

The report of the Board of Managers was next taken up, and again the friends of the new paper rallied to the attack. Preparatory to action upon it, and as a step towards its condemnation, Mr. St. Clair presented a resolution, affirming it to be theimperious duty of every abolitionist who could conscientiously do so, to go to the polls. The design of this resolution evidently was, to convict the few non-resistants present, of inconsistency as non-resistants or of guilt as abolitionists; and as such the meeting received it. At any other time the resolution would doubtless have passed—the great majority of the Society being voters. But, aroused to vigilant watchfulness of all who wereattempting to drive them blindfold into absurdity and intolerance, they refused to make the slightest change on the resolutions of former years. They had never said more, during their whole eight years’ existence as a Society, than that they would not vote for slavery; and they saw too plainly the motives of this novel demand for a resolution worded affirmatively. Neither had they been so bitterly reproached with the introduction of foreign subjects, without learning that the word “duty” or the word “ought,” in relation to forms of civil or church government, on which abolitionists so widely differ, must necessarily open the discussion of the whole vast subject of human society in all its aspects. It would have been impossible, at this moment, to have procured the passage of any resolution whatever, on which the opposition might build enginery by which to cast reproach upon any faithful abolitionist. So plainly had they exhibited their hearts, even while professing the greatest regard for the Society and all its members, that men’s common sense forbade them to afford any facilities for such a purpose.

Mr. Garrison substituted the following resolution, which, being in agreement with the uniformpractice of the Society, and in strict conformity to its principles and constitution, was almost unanimously adopted.

“Resolved, That those abolitionists who feel themselves called upon, by a sense of duty, to go to the polls, and yet purposely absent themselves from the polls whenever an opportunity is presented to vote for a friend of the slave—or who, when there, follow their party predilections to the abandonment of their abolition principles—are recreant to their high professions, and unworthy of the name they assume.”

The Society thus refused to turn its attention from its original object—to make every slave a freeman, to the new and inferior one, of making every freeman a voter. The members felt that this latter was their more appropriate business, as citizens of Massachusetts.

After the passage of this resolution, the previous arguments of the “four,” for a new paper, were reiterated against the report, by the Rev. Orange Scott, the Rev. Daniel Wise, and the Rev. Hiram Cummings, of the Methodist Church.

There appeared evidences, however, that the Methodistlaitywere not so easily won into thetoils of the clerical Congregationalists. However much they might love their clergy and their sect, they loved the universal cause of liberty and humanity more. The venerable Seth Sprague expressed this, with feeling and noble simplicity, in answer to Mr. Cummings, of whose church he was a member.

“I love to hear my young brother preach the gospel; but when he talks of politics, it will hardly be considered vanity in me to say I know more about that than he. For forty years I have been in the political harness; and many a day, in that time, have I been out to rouse men up to the polls. Sir, I never found any difficulty in it—they are always ready enough to go; but to make them vote right, after they get there—that’sthe rub. And who can do that like my brother Garrison? His paper converted me, politically.

I have had great satisfaction in my old age in going to all the Anti-Slavery meetings within my reach; and as I returned from them, with my heart warmed by the hopes which their union and zeal and harmony had kindled, I thought within myself, I am old now—an old man, and shall not live to see the work of emancipation accomplished. But, on my death-bed, when about to quitthis world, I shall joyfully think of those I leave in it, the abolitionists,—a band of brothers—united as the heart of one, to accomplish this great work.—But I cannot say sonow!—I cannot say so now!” And the venerable man thought it no shame to weep over the love and confidence he had seen so wantonly betrayed; and all the people wept with him.

The opposition still wished to continue the discussion, though noon was long past, and their words were but repetition upon repetition. Dr. Follen said, “I think discussion should now cease, upon the same principle that bids the miller stop the wheel, when there is no more grain in the hopper.”

The whole unmodified report was accepted—Ayes 183—Noes 24. A better proof than its adoption could not be offered, that the great body of the Massachusetts Society separated that day, with the determination of carrying the work vigorously forward, through means of the elective franchise. They separated, with the triumphant consciousness of a three-days’ battle,

“Won for their ancient freedom, pure and holy!—For the deliverance of a groaning earth!For the wronged captive, bleeding, crushed, and lowly,Their voice went forth.”

“Won for their ancient freedom, pure and holy!—

For the deliverance of a groaning earth!

For the wronged captive, bleeding, crushed, and lowly,

Their voice went forth.”

It was a painful trial they had passed; painful as when brother meets the visor’d face of brother in civil war. They had hoped that this cup might pass, but they had not refused to drink it; and their eyes were opened, and the bitterness of their grief taken away.

The same Board of Managers having been selected, the acceptance of the report and the rejection of the new paper, were sufficient indications of the course they were expected by the Society to pursue. They therefore suggested to their agents, Mr. St. Clair and Mr. Wise, that, as there existed in the Commonwealth a difference of opinion in regard to the contemplated periodical, and there having been no prospectus or specimen number issued by which it could be judged, it would be proper to use no efforts while engaged in their agency, to further its introduction or extend its circulation.

But those agents were already too deeply involved to heed the suggestion. The paper was already started, as an individual enterprize, in their names, with those of Mr. Phelps, Mr. Scott and others, to the number of twenty-seven, as a publishing committee, Mr. Stanton acting as editor. Various and discordant were the reasons given forpersevering in the undertaking, after the demonstration of the Annual Meeting, that its necessity was not of that imperative nature that had been represented.

Mr. Stanton stated that it was a satellite of the Liberator, and that he could have wished it had been named “the Liberator Junior.” Mr. John E. Fuller, on the contrary, when men who had never professed to be abolitionists hesitated to take it, gave them to understand that it was “to put down Garrison.” Mr. Wise described it as an “anti non-resistance paper,” and Mr. St. Clair as “a plan of Mr. Garrison’s own, warmly advocated by the wealthy and influential Dr. Farnsworth.”

They went on to procure subscribers in connection with their lectures, and at the expense of the Massachusetts Society. Mr. Scott and Mr. Stanton were no less active in the same way, at the expense of the National Society.

The paper was named “The Massachusetts Abolitionist;” and when the array of its twenty-seven god-fathers appeared, Mr. Garrison directed public attention to them, as the nucleus of a hostile society in Massachusetts. This they individually denied; but the nature of the case, aswell as their course as individuals, prevented their denial from obtaining credence. Colonization—American Union—Clerical Appeal—those embodyings of the spirit of the reluctant age with which abolitionists were in conflict,—had all been baffled. But the spirit yet lived, subtler from added experience, and this was the new tabernacle it had built. All these movements had, at their first appearance, comprised some of the faithful, but deceived. Great forbearance was therefore to be exercised, and great efforts made to unmask the deceit.

This could only be effected by calling the attention of abolitionists to the personal conduct of the men; as the paper itself was purposely kept free from any thing which could enlighten the friends at a distance as to the enmity of its conductors to the Massachusetts Society. Their scheme could not, at first, be fairly judged by those who did not witness its less public manifestations. It was like the fabled mermaid, seated where it could delude the unwary mariner;—above the water, fair and human—beneath, terminating in scaly and horrible deformity. Those could not fairly judge it, who did not know that its principal supporters, at the very moment thatthey disclaimed hostility to the Massachusetts Society, were laboring at county meetings to disjoin the Counties from the State organization, and to divert funds from its treasury; while, at the same time, they labored to produce the most unfavorable impression from the fact that its pledge to the central treasury yet remained unpaid.

The Massachusetts Society was like a ship struggling with a heavy sea. No sooner was one wave surmounted, than another threatened its destruction. The next came in the shape of an answer from the New York Committee to the invitation to collect the money due, by whatever means they chose, provided that they should but acknowledge the existence of the Massachusetts Society. It contained a refusal on the part of the Committee to abide by the contract (the final limitation of which had not yet arrived,) and declared their intention to proceed as if neither contract nor Massachusetts Society were in existence. Such a step would be so fatal to harmonious and efficient action—so destructive to the Massachusetts Society,—so disgraceful to the New York Committee, that, in the hope that a last strenuous effort might prevail against it, a special deputation was instantly sent to New York, to confer with the brethren, face to face.

Arguments, remonstrance, entreaty, were alike in vain. One of the Committee thought that “New York should assume the entire control of the Anti-Slavery funds, paying to Massachusetts such an allowance as should be necessary for carrying on the cause in that State, which sum would not, he supposed, be large.” All the New York brethren remained firm in their determination;—neither modification—mitigation—nor even what the merchant often grants his bankrupt creditor,—extension,—could be obtained.

The Massachusetts brethren felt it necessary to allude to the new paper, and its injurious effects on the treasury and the cause. The reply of the New York brethren was, “We are neutral.”

Fatal rock! to which the blind, the feeble, and the faltering cling, as the tide of controversy rises which is to overwhelm them, but on which the unfaithful merelypretendto find anchorage!

The Massachusetts brethren turned to their homes in sorrow and surprise at the determination they had been unable to move. Only one course remained for the preservation of their Society. Its injury, if not its destruction, would be the necessary consequence of hesitating to adopt it, and they announced their intention of publicremonstrance against the conduct of the Ex. Committee, and a reference of the whole case to their common constituents—the abolitionists of Massachusetts. Grief, they must, at all events, have felt: butastonishmentat the result of their conference would have been spared, had they been informed that it was, on one side, but a mere form, the whole affair having been decided, a week previous, by the issue of a circular, of which the following is an extract, signed by Messrs. Stanton, Tappan, Leavitt, Birney, and the most prominent of the New York Board.

“The amount which the Massachusetts Board had “guaranteed” to pay to this Society by the first of February just passed, was $7,500. Of that sum, but $3,920 have been received, leaving $3,680 due to this Society. From recent consultations had with the Massachusetts Board, we are fully authorized in saying, that the Board will not be able to pay this sum, much less the additional sum of $2,500 to fall due on the first of May next; nor do we believe it will be received from the abolitionists of Massachusetts,unless the Executive Committee of the American Society send their own agents into the field to raise it. To the adoption of this latter course they feel impelled by a sense of the duties they owe the slave. They feel constrained to abandon this“arrangement” for the following, among other reasons:1. It works badly for this Society. Much the greater part of the $3,920 received from Massachusetts, has been raised at the expense of this Society, as the following statement shows. It was collected as follows:(1.) By individuals and societies, andsent directly to the Treasury of this Society,and, in the collection of which, theMassachusetts Society took no part,$471 12(2.) By the “Cent-a-week” Societies,through the labors of N. Southard, whois employed and paid by the AmericanSociety,271 05(3.) By the direct labors of Messrs.O. Scott, Ichabod Codding, and H. B.Stanton, who was employed and paid bythe American Society,812 42(4.) By Isaac Winslow and H. B.Stanton, at New Bedford, for circulatingThome and Kimball’s journal,750 00(5.) Received of the Treasurer of theMassachusetts Society, $1,616 24; $500of which was collected by Messrs. Stanton,Tillson, and Thomson,—the formeremployed by the American Society;—and$500 of which were paid by the BostonFemale Anti-Slavery Society, on conditionthat Mr. Stanton would deliver anaddress before them, and solicit pledges,which he did.Total, $3,920 83Thus, of the $3,920 received from Massachusetts, since this arrangement was entered into, only about $1,000 at the utmost, have been raised by the Massachusetts Society. Nearly all the residue has been raised by the American Society. We ask any candid man, if this is “carrying out the plan,” as contemplated by the resolution of the Annual Meeting? And is it not suicidal for this Society to pursue such a “plan” any longer?”

1. It works badly for this Society. Much the greater part of the $3,920 received from Massachusetts, has been raised at the expense of this Society, as the following statement shows. It was collected as follows:

Thus, of the $3,920 received from Massachusetts, since this arrangement was entered into, only about $1,000 at the utmost, have been raised by the Massachusetts Society. Nearly all the residue has been raised by the American Society. We ask any candid man, if this is “carrying out the plan,” as contemplated by the resolution of the Annual Meeting? And is it not suicidal for this Society to pursue such a “plan” any longer?”

Ah, what a rent was here, in the love—the trusting reverence with which Massachusetts abolitionists had persisted, against their better judgments, in looking to New York! What a document to cast before her faithful men,—this new style of account-current, in which what theyhadpaid, was equally placed to their discredit with what they had not paid! What a reproach to her high-souled women, who had unreservedly dedicated themselves to the cause![6]What a shock to behold the anti-slavery enterprize presented in this degrading view to the gaze of the world! TheAmerican A. S. Society, placed, by this act of its committee, in the attitude of glorying in the collectorship of coppers!—theParentSociety, (as it had ever been affectionately and deferentially called,) busied like Saturn, in devouring its progeny!

This act created a necessity for a procedure still more vigorous than had been contemplated. The integrity and usefulness and good name of the National Society must, if possible, be rescued from the jeopardy in which this course of the committee had placed them. More than the existence of the Massachusetts Society was at stake—thecausewas endangered by the conduct of the committee at this moment. It was painful to meet them on thelowground of dollars and cents; but they had taken the fieldthere, and there they must, of consequence, be met and rebuked.

The Massachusetts Board, therefore, not only issued an address to the Abolitionists of the State, as they had given notice of their purpose to do, calling on them to assume the conduct of the affair, but they, at the same time, gave solemn warning of the perilous crisis, and appointed the quarterly State meeting, as a suitable time for its consideration.

More confirmation greeted the Massachusetts brethren on their return, of the fact that their agents were undermining the ground on which the Society stood.

Mr. St. Clair had concerted with the Rev. S. Hopkins Emery, and two or three other clergymen, comprising one third of the Bristol county board of officers, and, in the absence of the rest, they passed resolutions hostile to the Massachusetts Society, making that county auxiliary to the plans of the New York Committee, and nominatinghimselfas acountyagent. He had forwarded his resignation of his commission as an agent of theStateboard,—Mr. Wise shortly afterwards followed his example, and both were thereupon appointed agents of the N. York Committee, in which capacity they continued to labor in alienating the counties, and circulating the new paper.

Boards of Managers and the people they aimto manage, not unfrequently differ, in the anti-slavery cause, as in all other causes; and therefore it was that the Massachusetts Board, feeling no love of management or rule, were in the habit, on every extraordinary case, of referring its decision to their constituents, as the onlyway of presenting to each one the opportunity to discharge his individual duty to the Society, and as the best method of obtaining the manifold advantages of discussion.

The town and parish societies, in various parts of the State, began to meet for the consideration of this matter, which was felt to be one involving more than a single glance could unriddle.

Those members of the Boston Female Society, who had the interests of the slave most at heart, communicated with their officers, for the purpose of calling a meeting. Their request was not complied with. Again they applied, to the number of forty-five, which number was deemed a sufficient assurance that a meeting was seriously required by the members. Notwithstanding the remonstrances of two of the counsellors, the President, Vice President, Secretary, and Treasurer, the identical individuals who, in 1837, refused to sustain the cause against the incursions of spiritual wickedness, still refused to notify a meeting.

Everymoment stands at the juncture of two eternities, and is therefore of solemn consequence; but the importance of making use of this, was more than ordinarily apparent.

The women of Lynn were standing alone and unsupported at the post of danger;—the Massachusetts Society in peril, never more needed or better deserved support;—a hope existed that George Thompson might again be induced to visit America by a timely and earnest effort to second the invitation of the Young Men’s Convention, with the necessary funds;—Henry Clay, from his place in the Senate, was calling upon his fair countrywomen “todesistfrom anti-slavery efforts;”—this was the moment taken by the officers of the Boston Female Anti-Slavery Society to labor harder to make it desist, than they had ever before done to induce it to go forward. They visited the members personally, assuring them that it wasunconstitutionalto call a special meeting[7]—that the board saw no necessity for one, and finally entreated them to take their names from the requisition. As one among other reasons why they should do so, the President said that she apprehended there was a design on thepart of some, to recall George Thompson, and, as he left the countryin debt, his return would, from that circumstance, be a prejudice to the cause, and she was therefore anxious to prevent a meeting!!

By labors like this, a meeting was hindered at the time; but as one wrong step ever demands another to sustain it, preparation was made for the Society’s impending quarterly meeting, whichcould not be prevented, by the use of a sectarian gathering-word, which did not fail to rally all the unworthy members:—“Come and help us to put down the Unitarians.” Not one in fifty of the members were of that denomination, and the few who were, had ever been remarkable for the joy and good faith with which they met all who differed from them in opinion, and the heartiness with which they condemned the sins against freedom committed by their own sect. Mr. Phelps, now the pastor of the Free Church, was also affording his aid to unjustifiable sectarism, and, by a meeting thus drawn together, was a majority obtained who left undone all that the interests of the slave most loudly demanded should be done. A majority, in behalf of whom the President declared at that meeting that “as to the difficulty between the Massachusetts Society and theExecutive Committee, the ladies did not understand it—they had not come prepared to go into it,—it would take too much time—why should we enter into the quarrels that were going on?” Yet, after that very meeting, the President, and Secretary, as a committee on the fair for raising funds, issued an address,without the knowledgebutin the nameof the whole Society, in which they argued the necessity that existed that all the women of Massachusetts should send their funds to New-York, because the Massachusetts Society had failed to meet its stated payments!! This circular was committed to one of the agents of the new paper, to be distributed in the country, with instructions to keep it private in the cityfrom those in whose name it was issued.

The minority of the Society, who were neither ignorant nor unprepared, and who neither grudged their time northemselves wholly, when the Anti-Slavery cause called for the sacrifice, were much pained to find that into this little sluice, opened at the time of the clerical appeal, had rushed the cold and bitter waters of indifference, and sectarism and chicanery, in a flood that threatened to sink the little vessel that had, in earlier days, done good service to the cause. But they knew their place as a minority, and prepared to fulfil thatduty in another capacity, that they were prevented from discharging in this. The Massachusetts Society,—the parent and pioneer of all the rest, must not suffer for its fidelity, because the officers of the Boston Female Society had done wrong.

They were, besides, a verylargeandefficientminority, numbering among them the women who had first originated and mainly sustained, for four successive years, the plan of raising funds by means of an annual fair, and they did not permit themselves to be hindered on this occasion, any more than in former years, by thesmallnessof the pivot on which the duty of the moment turned. They knew that, for a season, it wouldappeartrifling;—they also knew that it reallywasthe type and representative of a principle,—one of the many indications now observable of that stage in the progress of reform, when minds a little enlarged by its principles, begin to resist, in alarm, the philosophical necessity of a further widening process, and, to avoid it, return to their original state.

But to resume the Chronological order of events.

The tenth wave seemed about to break upon the Massachusetts Society. The Board of Managers looked around them upon the circumstancesof their case, for indications of the will of Providence. They were ready and desirous to cast down the painful staff of office. Better men, they wished, might be found to sustain it—but each looked on the other and said, “Where can his fellow be found, for clear-sighted devotion and faithfulness.”

Once more they decided to mount the breach together, for the cause’s sake. Had it been only for themselves, they would have scorned to stand one instant, in the humiliating posture in which the conduct of the New York Committee had placed them. But it was for the slave—for their brethren throughout the State, who had confided in them; and they doubted not that those brethren would throng up to the rescue. This mutual confidence was not misplaced. The members of the Society came together in great numbers, with the determination of paying up all arrearages, and, if possible, staying the destructive collision of feeling which they saw going on.

The New York Committee were not absent. Thither came Birney, and Torrey, and Stanton, and Tappan, and St. Clair, and Phelps, and Scott; and face to face they met Garrison, and Loring, and Phillips, and Chapman, and Follen, and French, and Brimblecom, in the presenceof all the people. Men from the counties were there, to tell how those whoshouldbe acting as financial agents, were laboring to complete the division which had, more than any thing else, occasioned the deficiency in the funds. Men from the towns were there, to hand over their purses with the declaration that to their delay the deficiency should, in part, be charged, and not to their Board of officers. The indignant members from New Bedford were there, who had forwarded eight hundred and fifty dollars for the slave, and had seen it used for the purpose of casting reproach on the Massachusetts Society. And there, too, was Lynn, and Andover, and Plymouth, and Reading, and Abington, and the representatives of fifty other towns, where the Anti-Slavery enterprize had first struck root and borne the most abundant fruits—all earnestly bent upon conciliation—upon healing the breach, and upon sustaining the Massachusetts Society.

In the course of discussion, many things before unknown appeared. The New York Committee excused themselves by the plea of necessity. They were dunned daily themselves, and they had been compelled to this course to get the money. “Had they got it?” asked Wendell Phillips,“had not all the sources been stopped by this proceeding, against which they had been warned? Why could they not have co-operated—why could they not still co-operate harmoniously with the State Board? why should their agents,Mr. Stanton, one of themselves, among the number, make terms with theCountyBoards, which they had denied to theStateBoard? Mr. Stanton could, it appeared, co-operate with Mr. Torrey, in Essex, raising funds for the county treasury, and receiving only a part of them again for the National Treasury—why could he not extend co-operation, on better terms, to us in Boston?” The fact appeared that money had been forwarded to New York by the hand of agents on account of the pledge, which had never been credited accordingly. Men saw that there had been no delay or hesitancy in “taking the Massachusetts Board by the throat, and crying, Pay what thou owest,” and they inquired why their own attempts to liquidate the debt, had not been noticed.[8]The live-long day the discussion went on, the perplexity in which men’s minds had been involved becoming clearer and clearer, till after as completean investigation of the case as could be made, and the most determined opposition on the part of the New York Committee and those engaged in the new paper, the meeting sustained the course of the Massachusetts Society, by the passage of the following resolution: ayes 142—noes 23.

Resolved, That the course pursued by the Board of Managers of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, in relation to the difficulty now existing between that Board and the Executive Committee of the Parent Society, meets our hearty approval.

Wendell Phillips now renewed the offer of harmonious co-operation.

Resolved, That we are ready harmoniously to co-operate with the Executive Committee of the American Anti-Slavery Society, in the collection of funds within this Commonwealth, provided they will act with us under the arrangement of June last.

Hereupon the long-denied and painfully-concealed hostility to the Massachusetts Society burst forth, and the attempts to cast out Mr. Garrison, or to sink the Society with him, wererenewed. Mr. Tappan saw no reason why the Committee should expect to receive the money at all, unless by taking the matter entirely out of the hands of the Massachusetts Society. The Managers could offer no better guarantee than at first.

“Wecan—wedooffer a better guarantee,” replied Wendell Phillips. “We are in a far better condition to meet this pledge, than before. The political campaign in the Fourth District is at an end, and will no longer absorb the funds, or the energies of the agents. We are stronger as a Board; we have a new General Agent; we are awake, throughout the State, to the emergency.”

Mr. Stanton seemed to suppose that membership in the Massachusetts Society implied an obligation never to change one’s views on other subjects; for he read extracts from the Liberator, proving that Mr. Garrison had changed his opinions as to the principles of civil government, since the first establishment of that paper. Rev. George Allen burst into vehement invective. “I am ready,” said he, pointing to Mr. Garrison, “to attack the wolf in his very den, with the bleeding relics of his mangled victims yetbetween his teeth.” Mr. Birney, to the utter astonishment of the meeting, descended to the proscriptive ground first assumed by Mr. Stanton, and intimated that no non-resistant could consistently or honorably remain a member of the Anti-Slavery Society.

Men’s minds went back to the days of the clerical appeal, when Birney, then an editor in Ohio, had been tried and found wanting. That deficiency, so long veiled with silent and brotherly care by those whom he yielded up to the enemy, now defied concealment. He proclaimed his sympathy and knowledge with that of the N. Y. Committee, in the recent plottings. “WE felt the need of this new paper in Massachusetts.”

A sudden light burst upon the meeting. All this whole long day’s labored ringing of changes upon “dollars”—“contract”—“non-fulfilment”—“null and void”—all the foregone course of the Committee,—it was only a pretence, then, for keeping hostile agents in the State to work the Society’s destruction, under pretence of obtaining money! This debt of a few thousand dollars—men now saw why the wound it had made should be so dangerous. It was like the scratch of a poisoned weapon—slight, but possibly mortal.

Rodney French, of New Bedford, informed the meeting of the manner in which the funds of abolitionists had been necessarily absorbed; those of the clear-sighted, in sustaining the cause against the insidious attacks it had been undergoing—those of the blinded, in unsuspectingly co-operating with the disguised enemy. “Had this paper been presented in its true colors,” said he, “no funds would have been swallowed up by it in our county of Bristol. But men have been deceived, and they are now finding it out. Let me beseech our National Committee to change the ground they have taken. I do entreat them to meet us like brothers, and accede to this resolution. It is an olive-branch. The money will easily be raised by this harmonious co-operation—confidence will be preserved, and the slave in his chains will rejoice.” Abby Kelly, the delegate from Millbury, followed in the same strain. “Let us even make ourselves beggars,” she said, “for the slave, who is denied the poor privilege of begging!” and she pledged herself to pay fifty dollars of the amount necessary to be raised, and her town of Millbury three times that sum. John A. Collins, the General Agent of the Massachusetts Society, stepped upon the platform, with securities to the amountof seven hundred dollars, in his hands, and begged Mr. Birney, who had risen to speak, to give way for a moment, that he might announce them to the meeting. Mr. Birney waved him aside—“We do not want your pledges!” and proceeded to reply to Rodney French.—“If the gentleman supposes that I will be the bearer of such a proposition as the one contained in this resolution, to my colleagues at New York, let me tell him that he has altogether mistaken my character.”

Back to Index Next