Syracuse University Library
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Gerrit Smith Broadside and Pamphlet Collection

Edward C. Delavan : Peterboro, April 16th, 1852.

Smith, Gerrit, 1797-1874.

Digital Edition.

This digitization project was supported by Regional Bibliographic Databases and Interlibrary Resources Sharing Program funds, awarded by the New York State Library.

Call number: Smith 475

Peterboro, April 16th, 1852

EDWARD C. DELAVAN,

MY DEAR FRIEND,

So the "Maine Law" is defeated in our Legislature! This is sad news!

For at least one year longer then, the immense dramshop manufacture of paupers and madmen must go on in our State. For at least one year longer then, our sober and industrious citizens must suffer the intolerable drains, which are made upon their earnings by the direct and indirect taxes of Intemperance. For at least one year longer then, our property and life must be exposed to the frenzy of rapidly multiplying drunkards. For at least one year longer then, strong drink will make ten thousand of our dwellings the abodes of sorrow, and horror, and blasphemy, and torment. For at least one year longer then, our beloved youth will be quitting the ranks of the sober to swell the ranks of the drunken. For at least one year longer then, our rumsellers will laugh at the moral influence, which, instead of being sustained and enforced by the laws, is resisted and neutralized by them: - for the laws, as they now are, are against, instead of in aid of, the moral influence of the Temperance cause. They are laws to protect the rumseller against society, instead of society against the rumseller.

Said I not truly then, that the defeat of the "Maine Law" in our Legislature is sad news? But, connected with this defeat is that, which is well nigh as afflictive, as the defeat itself. It is, that not a few of the most prominent and influential friends of Temperance, and, among them, even Edward C. Delavan himself - the good and self-sacrificing Edward C. Delavan - the very leader of the Temperance host - contributed to this defeat. Indeed, but for their unhappy attitude toward the "Maine Law", it, not improbably, might have been saved from defeat. The disagreements among themselves of leading Temperance men afforded a very welcome skulking place to some Members of the Legislature - a capital excuse for them not to vote at all, or to vote against the Law. How could you, my dear friend, contribute to the defeat of the Law? The "Maine Law" is the very law, which we need; and this you admit. You and I were educated to ascribe great value to intoxicating drink; and to grieve if the precious substance were, by some calamitous accident, spilt upon the ground. Now, what is necessary is an opposite education: - and it is this for which we need the "Maine Law". This law, by means of its dooming intoxicating drink to destruction, is mighty to educate the people into the idea, that such drink is worthless and abominable. The operation of this law will bring every people; who are so favored, as to witness it for a few years, to feel that intoxicating drink is a vile thing, and a ruinous thing. You and I were educated to dread and hate snakes. It would have been different, however, if, instead of seeing all people kill them, we had seen all people put them into their bosoms. To destroy every snake, that is caught, would, of itself, be sufficient to make all dread and hate snakes. And to destroy intoxicating drink, as fast as it is caught, would, of itself, be sufficient to make all dread and hate intoxicating drink. The destruction of the intoxicating drink is the great distinguishing feature of the "Maine Law": and, although it is the chief ground of the opposition to it, it is, nevertheless, its chief excellence. Without it, the law would be worthless. We are left to grow on better and better terms with rum, if, when the merchant brings it among us for a drink, we may not destroy it as freely as we may the snake, that comes out of his place to alarm and peril us. A bad law would that be, which would not suffer us to destroy, but which should compel us to pat and protect, the wolves, that come among our sheep. But what are wolves compared with rum? Harmless. And what too are snakes compared with rum? Ah wretched parents! many of you know from heart-rending experience

I ask again-how could you, my dear friend, bring yourself to help defeat a law, which,the world is in such perishing need of? The answer is at hand. In common with almost all men - good men, as well as bad-you will have it, that Civil Government is not of God. It would seem, as if this were the last delusion, which christians are willing to have torn from them. I have done many things, which make me odious to christians. But nothing has had this effect so much, as my endeavors to have Civil Government regarded - both theoretically and practically - as of God. To have it thus regarded was the object of those discourses, which, when I was much younger and stronger than I now am, I was in the practice of delivering before large assemblies in groves, and on Sunday. Christians did not thank me for these discourses. So far from it, they made them the occasion for stigmatizing me with "preaching politics", and with being a Sabbath-breaker! an infidel!! and a Demagogue!!! Indeed, my bad reputation, at this day, is owing far less to all other causes put together than to these out-of-door, Sunday discourses in behalf of the position, that Civil Government is of God. -

But, where is my authority for saying, that you do not hold Civil Government to be of God? It is to be found in your objection to the enactment of the "Maine Law". This objection is, that the people are not yet prepared for it; - are not yet ready to welcome it; - are not yet willing to relinquish the drinking usages, and to cease from manufacturing, and buying and selling intoxicating beverages. In other words, they are, as yet, too hard-hearted, too insensible to the claims of God and man, too selfish and too wicked, to bear the "Maine Law." Hence, you would yield to their depraved wishes, and postpone its enactment.

Now, whether you do, or do not, judge the people rightly, I cannot positively say. But, sure I am, that your policy of keeping a people under unrighteous laws, until they shall have learned to relish righteous laws, is unphilosophical and absurd - as much so, as to keep a boy on dry land, until he shall have learned to swim. The very best way to teach the boy to swim is to put him into the water: and the very best way to educate a people into the love of righteous laws is to give them such laws.

I will not pause to argue. that the question; whether the people of our State will, or will not, bear just statutes, is, in no wise, to affect our legislation. Christianity teaches, that there must be but one law, not only for the stranger and the home-born; for the master and the servant, but, also, for the righteous and the wicked. The legislature, in all times and countries, must aim to conform its statutes to justice and truth - not to the pleasure of its constituents. I said, that I will not pause to make an argument to this end. I will proceed to say, that all government is of God, and that if it is, it were superfluous to make the argument, which I have just declined making. The government, which the individual is to exercise over himself; and the government, which is to be maintained in the family; and the government, which is to be maintained in the Church; and the government, which is to be maintained in the body politic; are all but so many departments of the Divine Government: - and each one of these departments is, as much as any other; to be influenced, guided, controlled by the Divine principles.

You would promptly unite with me in condemning the man; who, enjoining obedience upon himself in respect to all the other commandments of the decalogue, nevertheless, defers to his itching fingers so far, as deliberately to shut out the eighth commandment from the sphere of self-government. And you would wonder, as much as I would, at that specimen of family government, in which the fifth commandment is deliberately held in abeyance out of respect to a rebellious child. What, too, would you think of the Church, which votes the suspension of the too stringent seventh commandment, until its members shall have weaned themselves from their licentiousness? And what, my good friend, ought you to think of the Civil Government, which takes the ground (, it is so unhappily encouraged to take by influential friends of Temperance,) that it is at liberty to let the dramshops go on with their work of death and hell, if only the people are supposed to wish it? Does such a Government represent God, and act upon His principles?

But, you will say, that the legislator must be governed by the wishes of his constituents. If you mean, that he must in the matter of dividing a Town; or reconstructing a County. I will not stop to contend with you. But, if you mean, that he must in matters of fundamental morality, and where the principles of religion are concerned, then I disagree with you. The doctrine, that the legislator must obey the instructions of his constituents is called democratic. In my esteem, it is atheistic. I claim for democracy no higher right than to select the ruler, and to remove the ruler. If the ruler is offensive to the people, they can remove him - fearfully responsible however, if it is not for just cause, that they remove him. But, during the period, that they permit him to remain in office, he is, if in one sense their servant, in a far more important sense, "the minister of God". And so long as they permit him to rule, he is never to be found ruling in the fear of the people, but, always, "ruling in the fear of God". I am aware, that I am writing unpopularly: - but never mind, if I am but writing truthfully.

I hope, my dear friend, that you may, ere long, so change your views of Civil Government, that you will not be content to have it aim to be the exponent of the public mind and the servant of the public will: but, that you will insist on its being the representative of God, and will exact at its hands a rectitude as absolute and as perfect, as that, which you exact at the hands of every individual. This exempting Civil Government from the obligation of the Divine principles - this drawing a line between religion and Civil Government - and, as a natural consequence, between religion and the body politic - between, indeed, religion and every man, when acting in his political capacity - is what has brought this nation to the very verge of ruin. But for this guilty mistake, we should not have seen our National Government setting up slavery in the District of Columbia, and providing for the coastwise trade in slaves, and turning the whole nation into a hunting ground for human prey, and commanding "all good citizens" to join in the diabolical hunt. But for this guilty mistake, we should not have seen Doctors of Divinity justifying this hunt: and, but for it, we should not have seen, as we have within a few days, a Resolution passing triumphantly through one of the Houses of Congress, by the terms of which they, who voted for it, degraded themselves so far (, if, indeed, such beings can be degraded,) as to pledge themselves "individually" to maintain this hunt. But for this guilty mistake, we should not have seen the people acquiesce in this most atrocious, horrible, and infamous legislation. Alas, how debauched are they by this acquiescence! So debauched, as, in all probability, to refuse to vote, at the coming Election, for any candidate for the chief magistracy, who shall not have given his explicit, specific, written pledge to stand by and protect the accursed hunters and enslavers of innocent men, women, and children! And will not this superlatively wicked vote, which they are about to cast, fill up the measure of the iniquity of this nation, and make it ripe for destruction? This nation might well exclaim, in the words of David: "There is but a step between me and death!" God forbid, that this step should be taken, at the coming Election! I said, that this nation is brought to the very verge of ruin. A nation is not ruined by famine or pestilence: but by its crimes against God and man. Now, considering the peculiar favor, which God hath shown to us, and that " He hath not dealt so with any nation", where is there, where ever was there, a nation so black, as this is, with such crimes? "Shall not I visit for these things, saith the Lord? - and shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this?"

And, now, what if Congress should be brought to repentance, and should set about repealing the Fugitive Slave Law (, which is, indeed, no law, for it lacks reason, truth, justice, and every element of law,) with the view of enacting, in its stead, such a law, as God's law: "Thou shalt not deliver unto his master the servant, which is escaped from his master unto thee" - would the Delavans hold Congress back by the admonition, that the people are not yet prepared for

a righteous law on this subject? Why should they not? If, for such a reason, they may hold back a State Legislature from enacting a law of justice and mercy on the subject of Temperance, why may they not, for such a reason, hold back the National Legislature from enacting a law of justice and mercy on the subject of slavery?

William Lloyd Garrison and his party are denounced for their rejection of Civil Government. I honor them for their honesty and consistency. They believe Civil Government to be of the Devil, and they frankly say so, and treat it accordingly. Would that all, who refuse to identify Civil Government with the Divine Government, and to require, that purity and holiness shall characterize it, as fully and emphatically as any other department of the Divine Government, and who thereby virtually hold that Civil Government is of the Devil - would, I say, that all such were sufficiently honest and consistent to stand entirely aloof from Civil Government. Then it would be left to those, who, sincerely and practically believing it to be of God, and not of the Devil, would use it for God and not for the Devil.

In saying, as I have virtually done, that the Legislature is bound to give righteous laws to the people, whether the people do, or do not, desire them, I am far from saying, that it should never submit a question to the ballot-bog. I believe it would be well, were the Legislature in the practice of submitting important questions, and especially those of a deep moral import, to the people. The more directly, and definitely, and frequently, the people pass on such

questions, the better. By means of the widely extended and thorough discussions, which must necessarily precede their vote, not only the people, but the Legislature, will be enlightened. But, whatever may be their vote, and however great respect the legislator is bound to show it in the process of making up his judgment and determining his duty, his supreme inquiry, nevertheless, is to be into the Divine will; and the results of this inquiry are to be conclusive. " Vox populi vox Dei" is never to be his motto. And he is never to study to please men; but is always to study to please God.

I will close my letter by inquiring what you and I can do to gain for ourselves and to extend to others more knowledge of the true office and obligation of Civil Government. Have you ever read William Goodell's two volumes entitled °The Christianity of Democracy?" They are by far the most valuable books on Civil Government, that I have ever read. I am distributing some copies of them. I wish you would do likewise. Your high opinion of William Goodell is not forgotten by me. He is poor in this world's goods; and, because of his honest, bold, and radical utterances, he is numbered with fanatics, and despised. No man, so often as he, is brought to my mind by the verse "Now there was found in it (the city) a poor wise man; and he by his wisdom delivered the city: - yet no man remembered that same poor man." Mr. Goodell's Post Office is Bristoll Centre, Ontario Co. N. Y.

Had we such a man, as William Goodell, for President, we should then have a President of infinitely more true wisdom than is to be found in all the Casses and Websters and Fillmores put together. Poor men! their light is but darkness. Their combination with oppressors - their character - makes it impossible for them to come to the light. "For every one, that doeth evil, bateth the light, neither cometh to the light. But he, that doeth truth, cometh to the light."

GERRIT SMITH.