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Gerrit Smith Broadside and Pamphlet Collection

Greene C. Bronson, Esq. : Peterboro, Oct. 18, 1854.

Smith, Gerrit, 1797-1874.

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Call number: Smith 491

PETERBORO, Oct. 18, 1854.

GREENE C. BRONSON, Esq.,

MY DEAR SIR,

So notoriously bad am I - so low have I sunk in the public esteem - that when a man, is to be most effectually stigmatized, he is likened to myself. I see by your late letter to Mr. Delevan, that even you - my early friend - my life-long friend - have fallen into this fashion of making me the example and standard of misconduct; and of bringing fatal odium upon an opponent by publishing him to be as bad, as I am. A few years ago, a very eminent jurist (Mr. J. C. Spencer) sought to peril the electron of the late Secretary of State (Mr. H. S. Randall) by comparing him to myself: and, now, a no less eminent jurist is, by the like means, damaging a rival candidate for Governor. I say so, because you have adopted, and repeated, the declaration, that "Myron Holley Clark entertains similar views to those of Gerrit Smith.."

What are these views, which Mr. Clark is said to hold, in common with myself? They are

1st. The unconstitutionality of the Fugitive Slave Act.
2d. The unconstitutionality of all slavery.
3d. The impossibility of legalizing any slavery - the impossibility of imbuing such a matchless crime and abomination with the spirit of law, and of clothing it with the authority and sacredness of law.

It is, altogether, foreign to the purpose of this letter to speak either well or ill of Mr. Clark. And yet, as I pass on, I feel constrained to say, that you have, probably, done great injustice to your rival. Mr. Clark is a respectable man; and, that he is, is sufficient proof, that the views, here attributed to him, are not his views. Yet awhile, and he, who entertains these views, will be an outcast from American society, instead of a respectable member of it. Great parties have nominated Mr. Clark for Governor. But this could not have been, had he really entertained these views.

I do not forget, that it is on no less authority, than Mr. John Thomas, that you have connected Mr. Clark's name with these odious views. Nevertheless, it seems impossible, that you can really believe, that Mr. Clark holds them. You, doubtless, agree with me, that Mr. Thomas is - at least, to some extent - mistaken; and that, in his conversation with Mr. Clark, he misapprehended, or mistranslated, the words of Mr. Clark. The words of a politician are not, always, easy - nor, indeed, are they, always, intended to be easy - of translation. Tallyrand, you recollect, held, that the legitimate use of words is to hide our meaning. But, I trust, that Mr. Clark does not belong to the Tallyrand school of politicians: and, hence, I ascribe Mr. Thomas' report of his conversation with Mr. Clark to a guiltless blunder, lying somewhere between these good gentlemen - to unfortunate forms of speech on the part of good Mr. Clark, or unfortunate interpretations on the part of good Mr. Thomas.

Whether, however, Mr. Clark does, or does not, avow the views in question, it is certain, that you do not. There needs no further proof than your letter before me, that you make a merit of, and seek advantage in, loathing and deriding these views. You believe in a law for slavery - in a law for that stupendous piracy, which strips its victims of every right, and leaves him a prey to every wrong. And through you believe in a higher law, you, nevertheless, scorn the idea of its nullifying a law for slavery. I do not myself believe in a " higher law." On the contrary, I believe, that the distinction of "higher law" and "lower law" is one of exceedingly evil influence. Law is a unit. It is the same in every land, and in every age; the same on earth, that it is in heaven. You believe with me; that slavery is condemned of heaven, and cannot be a law of heaven. Nevertheless, it is, in your esteem, a law of earth; and a law, which men are as strongly and religiously bound to obey, as they are to obey any law. I am aware, that in all this, you are backed by American jurisprudence, and American Christianity. But have you never suspected, that slavery has twisted the religion and courts of our country quite out of harmony with true jurisprudence and true christianity? And have you never suspected, that the day may come, when it will be a frightful blot on your judicial fame, that, after all the ability, and learning, and impartiality of your legal Opinions, you, nevertheless, had no sufficiently holy, and elevated, and sublime - nay, no sufficiently decent - views of law to restrain you from sinking it into the patron, and protector, and sanctifier of what John Wesley so justly calls: "the sum of all villainies?" Surely, surely, my old friend, "the judicious Hooker" had never spoke so eloquently, so rapturously, so divinely of law, had he believed with you, that law is a dirty and devilish instrument, whereby to make slaves, and catch slaves. Surely, surely, my old friend, a better age will not fail to be shocked at the folly and madness, which, in this age, convert the veriest outlaw into law, and claim for the most sweeping and revolting piracy the reverence clue to law. I add to my inquiries of you, whether you have never suspected, that, notwithstanding it is, now, nearly forty years, since you made a public profession of christianity, it may, yet, turn out, that the christianity is alarmingly deceptive [defective], which allows us to honor what heaven hates, and to oppose the law of God, under the plea of obeying the law of man? The religion of Daniel and of the Apostles trampled wicked enactments under foot, and hastened to "obey God rather than men." Can that be the same religion, which reverses their practice, and exalts the authority of man above the authority of God? Primitive christianity went counter to the world, and its disciples were crucified to the world. Can the modern christianity, which goes with the world, and denounces, as fools and fanatics, those, who consent to lose this life, in order to save a better, be all one with primitive Christianity?

I referred to the possible effect upon your judicial fame of your confounding with law enactments for slavery - of your installing into the high and sacred place of law the abomination, that forbids marriage, and forbids the reading of the bible, and forbids all the rights of manhood, and markets men as beasts. There is another respect also, in which, I apprehend, you are, damaging that fame - trifling with it, and sacrificing it, to promote a present and worthless popularity. I allude to your acquiescence in the constitutionality of the Fugitive Slave Act.

Even on the supposition, that the fugitive servant clause of the Constitution refers to slaves, how can you consent to regard as constitutional the Act, which, in so many respects, glaringly and grossly violates the Constitution? But how violent is such supposition! - how utterly unworthy of entertainment by a lawyer! You, doubtless, assent to the rule, laid down by the Supreme Court of the U. S., 2 Cranch 390: "Where rights are infringed, where fundamental principles are overthrown, where the general system of the laws is departed from, the legislative intention must be expressed with irresistible clearness to induce a court of justice to suppose a design to effect such objects?" Now, to claim, that this clause of the Constitution authorizes the plunging of a man into slavery, and the commission of the highest possible crime against his body and his soul, is to claim, most emphatically, that it authorizes the infringing of rights, and the overthrow of fundamental principles, and departure from the general system of the laws. But you will admit, and all will admit, that if this outrage can be found in the clause in question, it, nevertheless, is not expressed, and much less, "expressed with irresistible clearness"

Again - this clause easily admits of an innocent interpretation. It applies, in the natural use of language, to freemen - to persons capable of owing - capable of making contracts. Not only so - it is utterly incapable of application to slaves. For slaves, being, in the eye of law, mere chattels, can no more make contracts, and owe service, than can horses or horse-blocks.

Will you tell me, that the framers of the Constitution intended, that the clause should apply to slaves? But, even did history afford proof of such intention, nevertheless, there are two reasons, why, as a lawyer, you would not dare avail yourself of the proof.

1st. It is not what the framers - but what the adopters - of the Constitution intended. As it is not what the scrivener, who wrote the deed, intended - but what the parties, named in the deed, intended.

2d. Where the letter of a law admits of a clear interpretation, we have, when interpreting it, nothing to do with any thing but its letter.

Although it is not called for by any legitimate argument, I will, nevertheless, say in this connexion, that the historic facts in the case entirely forbid the imputation of a proslavery intention to the clause. The ceaselessly repeated declaration,

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that the fugitive servant clause is "one of the compromises of the Constitution," is the ceaselessly repeated declaration of an utter falsehood - of a sheer and impudent assumption for proslaverv effect. Again - the framers of the Constitution are not to be charged with a proslavery purpose in this clause; in the face of the fact, that, only a few days after the clause was adopted, they resolved, without one dissecting voice, that the word "service" should take the place of the word "servitude" in the Constitution; and for the avowed reason that "service" denotes the condition of freemen, and "servitude" the condition of slaves. Since, then, "service" is the word in the fugitive servant clause, that clause could not, in the eye of the Convention, that framed the Constitution, refer to slavery.

But my argument to prove, that the fugitive servant clause of the Constitution is not on the side of slavery was unnecessary. The necessity of it was superseded by the fact, that the Constitution forbids slavery. In several of its parts, it forbids it by irresistible implication: and, with emphatic directness does it forbid slavery, when it says: "No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or, property, without due process of law."

I do not forget that it is held, that this provision of the Constitution is a negation on the Federal powers only, and not States also. But both the letter and the history of the provision show; that this interpretation is it bald assumption, and is entirely unauthorized and absurd. Nor do I forget, that it is held, (ridiculously held) that a mere statute for slavery answers the requirement of "due process of law:" Happily in your Opinion (.Hill's Report IV: 146,) you do yourself admit, that to deprive a man of his liberty "cannot be done by mere legislation''. You do yourself, in that Opinion, concur with Lord Coke, that "due process of law" means proceedings, "according to the course of the common law."

You are horrified at the thought, that "Governor Clark," as you call him, would take the antislavery side, should the soil of our State be a hunting ground for slaves, during his Administration. But, I think, you alarm yourself needlessly. Mr. Clark lives in Canandaigua. A year ago, I went there to exert what little influence I could against the diabolical purpose of convicting men of crime for their heaven-approved rescue of "Jerry." I had no word of cheer from Mr. Clark. Indeed, save it handful of obscure worthy persons, there were none to express sympathy with me, or my mission. With that exception, God and my conscience were my only supporters [s] There here dwells in that beautiful village a man of heart and hospitality; and, as poor Cowper said of his brother, he is "a man of learning and of manners too." This much, at least, I can say of his deportment on the occasion referred to - that, whilst others of his rank stood aloof from me, "he was not ashamed of my, chain."

But no more, as to what "Governor Clark" would do, in the case you have supposed. I proceed to ask you - what, in such case, would Governor Bronson do? Would he take upon his soul the responsibility of sinking an innocent fellow man into the hell of slavery? He thinks he would. But, I trust, that, when the hour of trial should come. He would not prove himself to be as wicked, as he, now, thinks he would. I think better of him than he thinks of himself.

There is, already, a large majority of blacks in South Carolina. The reins of government may pass into their hands any day; and their first act of retaliation might be to doom the whites of that State to slavery. Now, what if, during your Administration, some of these new slaves - say, even the most polished and pure of them - should escape into, this State? - would you consent to wield your official powers for their return? Answer me "Yes"; or be honest enough to abandon your proslavery interpretation of the fugitive servant clause. For, manifestly, if that clause applies to any slaves, it applies to future, as well as present, slaves, and to slaves of one color, and one race, as well as another.

Again - suppose the law-making power of this State were to reduce to slavery all of its citizens of the unfortunate name of Bronson (- and, of course, you hold to its perfect legal right to do so-) would you still be faithful to your present interpretation of the fugitive servant clause, and beseech your rescuers in Pennsylvania, or in whatever other State, you may have fled to, to leave you to your merciless pursuers? Say! - would you? Now, do not hesitate. It is but your own medicine, that I offer you. Take it - and make no wry faces; - or never offer it again, to others. Ah, my good friend, you well know, that, were you claimed as a slave in this land, or Algiers, or elsewhere - and that whatever the Constitutions, and Statutes, and Decisions, or other authority, in behalf of, the claim, you would listen to the infinitely more authoritative voice of your rights and your wrongs; of your nature and your needs; and secure your liberty, if you could - and, that too, though at the bloodiest expense to others.

After all, this question of enslaving men resolves itself into a question of simple honesty. All, that a man needs, in order to abjure all right to enslave his fellow men, is but to be simply honest. He may not see this. to he so - and, therefore, he may not accuse himself of dishonesty. Nevertheless, it is so. To be simply honest! This, indeed, is all we need, in any of the duties, or circumstances, of life. It is all, that christianity requires of us. For, when she has said: "Therefore all things whatsoever ye would, that men should do to you, do ye even so to them;" she, straightway, adds: "for this is the law and the prophets"- or, in other words, for this is the whole of christianity. Am I guilty, here, of ignoring repentance, faith in Christ, and, well nigh, the whole circle of christian truth and duties? Oh no! I would humbly, and gratefully, and lovingly, recognize them all. But I recognize them to be no more than means to an end - and this end is simple honesty. I need to believe in Christ, in order to be honest. I need to believe in a crucified Redeemer, that so, when a crucifying duty is required of me - such as standing by the poor hunted slave, when the great ones of earth are against him - I may enabled to be honest, and to discharge the duty.

I might stop here, as I have, now, finished my reply to that part of your letter, which refers to myself. But there are other parts of your letter, no less objectionable than this - and you must, therefore, excuse me for pointing them out to you.

Your doctrine, that "our heavenly Father works by slow processes, both in the moral and material world" is, in my judgment, so far as respects the moral world, entirely false, and exceedingly pernicious: - and, I add, that I am very far from being satisfied with Mr. Delavan's answer to it. He but makes bad worse. He errs in subscribing to your doctrine; and he follows up his error with the greater one of denying, that God is, in the moral world, an example for man.

I admit, that moral reformations are slow. But they are not so, because God would have them so - but because the hardness of men's hearts makes them so. His words are: To-day, if ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts." "Now is the accepted time: behold now is the day of salvation." "Whatever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might." God is for instantaneous reformations; and His processes are all to this end. But men resist these processes; and the only reason, why they are practically slow, is because they have to overcome human resistance. Mr. Bronson should not convey, neither should Mr. Delavan assent to the idea, that God is responsible for the practical slowness of His processes, in the moral world. Whenever it is made known to me that I must not drink intoxicating liquors. I shall most please God, and most conforms to His processes, by immediately ceasing to drink them. So, too, whenever it is made known to you, that it is the duty of Government to shut up the dramshop - that great manufactory of paupers and madmen - that chief source of peril to property and life - you will most please God, and most conform to His processes, by refusing forthwith (,and, that too, whether one man, or one million of men, go with you,) to vote for any person for Governor, or Legislator, who shrinks from using the powers of Government to this end. I close under this head, with the remark, that were it a part of God's plan, that teen should gradually surrender their sins, He would not be entitled to our love and honor; - He would not be God.

You regret, that, the friends of Temperance connected their cause with the Whig party. So do I. But not for the reason you do. You regret it, because the Whig party is a political party. I - not because it is a political party - but because, like your own, it is a wicked party. To justify my calling the Whig and Democratic parties wicked, I need say nothing more against them, than that they are the great props of American slavery, For the simple reason, that the South will belong to them on no other condition; every one of our national parties, be it political or ecclesiastical, must be proslavery. Northern Whigs are claiming, that, because they are so well nigh universally opposed to the Nebraska Bill, the Whig party has become an anti-slavery party. Their claim is nonsensical. If they remain, a twelve month longer, in connexion with Southern Whigs, they will sink down into slavery, as low as ever - nay, lower than ever. Northern Whigs clamored against the passage of the Fugitive Slave Act: but soon acquiesced in it, for the sake of maintaining their union with Southern Whigs. Northern Whigs clamored against the passage of the Nebraska Bill: but they will acquiesce in that also, if they shall determine to keep up the nationality of the Whig party. Notwithstanding all the present signs to the contrary, our nation will, nevertheless, ere the next Presidential Election, be more hopelessly proslavery than ever, unless, in the meantime, the nationality of the Whig and Democratic parties shall be broken up. If party objects are so dear to Northern Whigs and Northern Democrats - if they are so infatuated in pursuit of them - that not even the passage of the Fugitive Slave Bill, nor of the Nebraska Bill, can wean them from their party union with Southern Whigs and Southern Democrats - pray, what of hope remains to us from any other outrage on freedom and the country, on God and mankind? - pray, what crime against these precious interests is there, in all the range of

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conception, and in all the storehouse of future events, of sufficient power to induce these deluded and reckless men to forego their party objects?

With such a party, as we have here seen your party and Whig party to be, of course no friend of Temperance, and no other person has the right connect himself - be the good, which he seeks from such connexion, ever so great. Furthermore, no person, connected with such party - a party, which, among its other sins, holds, that it is lawful to enslave men - is entitled to our vote. I believe that Mr. Clark is a worthy man; and that he means to be a true friend of Temperance. Nevertheless, so long, as he remains in the Whig party. I have no right to vote for him. I have no right to hope, that he will in the main, go against that party, whilst he is in it: and I have no right to clothe him with an influence, which will go to swell the influence of his wicked party. If, on the one hand, to vote for Mr. Clark is to vote for Temperance; nevertheless, on the other, to vote for him is to vote for the Whig party. Moreover, if for the object of remaining in the Whig party, he is willing to sacrifice the slave, what assurance can he give, that he may, not yet, be tempted to sacrifice the cause of Temperance for the same object? If Mr. Clark denies, that he has sacrificed the slave, then he has, yet, to learn, that there is no more effectual way to sacrifice the slave than to remain in a great political party, which holds that his enslavement is lawful.

So far from regarding it as wrong to connect the cause of Temperance with a political party, nothing, in my eyes, could be more proper than to connect it with a righteous political party - with a party aiming to realize the idea of a just Civil Government - a Government, that, impartially, protects all classes of its subjects. The cause of Temperance needs political action; and should seek it, at the hands of those, whose political action is prompted by an honest and wise regard for all the interests lying within the legitimate purview of Civil Government.

I see by your letter, that if Temperance must be carried into politics, you would prefer a Temperance political party - a party looking to nothing else than Temperance. But a one-idea political party is entirely indefensible. The scope of every political party should be as wide, as the scope of Civil Government; and its objects identical with the objects of Civil Government. To neglect, in our vote, every other class of persons but one, or every other interest but one, is to be grossly unjust in our vote. Our vote is to have regard to the interests of all classes, and to the whole duty of Civil Government.

I infer, too, that you would not have your own party go for the prohibition of the traffic in intoxicating drinks. Your piety would be less shocked by having your party suffer the dramshop to continue its manufacture of drunkards, and blasphemers, and incendiaries, and murderers, than by having it fail to keep its religious character in harmony with those "slow processes," which you impute to "our heavenly Father." In short, you would have your party permit any amount of sin and sorrow, rather than have it violate its religious orthodoxy - its "slow processes" - theology.

Before reading your letter, I had supposed, that you, in common with other politicians, draw a line between politics and religion, and are very careful to keep all your politics on one side of the line, and all your religion on the other. But I am, no longer, at liberty to suppose this - now, that I see your chief solicitude for your political party is to have its "processes" all one with the Divine "processes," I am glad to see you carry your religion into politics. They totally mistake (,and more than nine tenths of our professing Christians are involved in this mistake,) who think their religion too good for their politics. No man's religion is better than his politics. His religion is pure, whose politics are pure; whilst his religion is rascally, whose politics are rascally. It is, indeed, cheering, to see you intent on making your political party a holy one. It is cheering, not merely because it argues the holiness of your religion, but because it arrays your great influence against the guilty and ruinous fallacy, that a man can have one character in religion, and another to politics; one state of heart in the Church, and an opposite one in the Caucus.

But I have made my letter too long, and I must stop. Much as I should be gratified to have you reply to it, I, nevertheless, cannot hope that you will. Occasionally, in the course of my life, when I have seen the influence of a great man very perniciously misdirected, I have ventured to write him a public letter. But, in no such instance, have I been favored with a reply: and, I presume, I shall not be in the present instance. It may be, that my reputed insanity will indispose you to reply to me - an insanity dating back to the long time ago, when I stood up, among only a little handful of persons, against the drinking of intoxicating liquors. Or it may be, that you will be indisposed by your lack of the grace of condescension toward one, who is contented with the obscurity of private life. Or it may be, that your indisposition to reply to me will proceed from some other cause. With Mr. Guthrie, with Mr. Delavan, and with other gentlemen of their position, and popularity, and powers, you are ever ready to pursue an argument: - but, I take it for granted, that you will keep silence toward

Your old friend,

GERRITT SMITH.