SECTION IV.SECTION IV.
It is notorious that there is a remarkable failure in thisdepartment of political morals among certain parties in theUnited States. The mobbing events of the last few years arecelebrated; the abolition riots in New York and Boston; theburning of the Charlestn Convent; the bank riots at Baltimore;the burning of the mails at Charleston; the hangings by Lynch-lawat Vicksburgh; the burning alive of a man of colour at St. Louis;the subsequent proceedings there towards the students of MarionCollege; and the abolition riots at Cincinnati. Here is a fearfullist!
Tlle first question that arises is, who has done these things?Whose hands have lighted green fagots round a living man? andstrung up a dozen or twenty citizens on the same gallows? andfired and razed houses; and sent a company of trembling nunsflying for their lives at midnight? Here is evidence enough ofignorance,--of desperate, brutal ignorance. Whose ignorance?
In Europe, the instantaneous and natural persuasion of men whohear the tidings is, that the lowest classes in America haverisen against the higher. In Europe, desperate, brutal ignoranceis the deepest curse in the cursed life of the pauper and theserf. In Europe, mobbing is usually the outbreak of exasperatedmisery against laws which oppress, and an aristocracy whichinsults humanity. Europeans, therefore, naturally assume that thegentry of the United States are the sinned against, and the poorthe sinners, in their social disturbances. They draw conclusionsagainst popular government, and suppose it proved that universalsuffrage dissolves society into chaos. They picture to themselvesa rabble of ragged, desperate workmen, with torches in theirhands; while the gentry look on in dismay, or tremble withintheir houses.
It is not so. I was informed, twenty times over, by gentlemen,that the Boston mob of last year was wholly composed ofgentlemen. The only working man in it was the truck-man who savedthe victim. They were the gentlemen of St. Louis who burned theblack man, and banished the students of Marion College. They werethe gentlemen of Cincinnati who denounced the abolitionists, andraised the persecution against them. They were the magistratesand gentry of Vickesburg who hanged way-farers, gamblers, andslaves in a long row. They were the gentlemen of Charleston vhobroke open the Post Office, and violated its sacred function, tothe insult and injury of the whole country.
The case is plain. There are no paupers to rise againstoppressive laws in a country, where the laws are made by all, andwhere pauperism is thereby excluded. There is no degraded class,subject to insults from the highest, which cau be resented onlyby outrage. The assumption is a false one, that ignorance andpoverty, knowledge and wealth, go together. Mobbing for Europeancauses, and in European modes, is absolutely precluded wherepolitical rights are universal, and political power equallydiffused through all classes.
The very few European causes which are in analogy with UniterlStates mobbing, are those riots for opinion, which bear only asubordinate relation to politics; such as the Birmingham riots,and the attempt of the Liverpool merchants to push Clarkson intothe dock. The cases are very similar. The mobs of America arecomposed of high churchmen, (of whatever denomination,) merchantsand planters, and lawyers.
One complete narrative of a riot, for the fidelity of which Ican vouch, will expose the truth of the case better than a listof deeds of horror which happened beyond my sight. It is leastrevolting, too, to treat of a case whose terror lies in itsexistence, more than in its consequences. The actors in the riot,which it was my fortune to understand, were scarcely less guiltythan if they had bathed their hands in blood; but it is easier toexamine, undisturbed by passion, the case of those whose handsare, to the outward eye, clean.
A very few years ago, certain citizens in New England began todiscover that the planters of the south were making white slavesin the north, nearly as successfully as they were propagatingblack slavery in the territories of the south and west.Charleston and Boston were affectionate friends in old times, andare so still, notwithstanding the hard words that passed betweenthem in nullification days: that is, the merchants andprofessional men of Boston are fond of Charleston, on account oftheir commercial relations. This attachment has been carried tosuch an extreme as to be almost fatal to the liberties of some ofthe best citizens of the northern city. They found their brothersdismissed from their pastoral charges, their sons expelled fromcolleges, their friends excluded from professorships, andthemselves debarred from literary and social privileges, if theyhappened to entertain and express opinions unfavourable to thepeculiar domestic institution by which Charleston declares it tobe her intention to abide. Such is the plea of those citizens ofBoston who have formed associations for the purpose of opposing,by moral influence, an institution which they feel to beinconsistent with the first principles of morals and politics.For a considerable time before my visit to that part of thecountry, they had encountered petty persecutions of almost everyconceivable kind. There is no law in Massachusetts by which thefree expression of opinion on moral subjects is punishable. Iheard many regret the absence of such law. Everything was donethat could be done to make up for its absence. Books on anysubject, written by persons who avow by association their badopinion of slavery, are not purchased: clergymen are no longerinvited to preach: the proprietors of public rooms will not letthem to members of such associations; and the churches are shutagainst them. Their notices of public meetings are torn in thepulpits, while all notices of other public meetings are read. Thenewspapers pour contempt and wrath upon them in one continuedstream. Bad practices are imputed to them, and their denial isdrowned in clamour. As a single instance of this last; I was toldso universally in the south and west that the abolitionists ofBoston and New York were in the habit of sending incendiarytracts among the slaves, that it never occurred to me to doubtthe fact; though I was struck with surprise at never being ableto find any one who had seen any one who had actually seen one ofthese tracts. Nor did it occur to me that as slaves cannot read,verbal messages would be more to the purpose of all parties, asbeing more effectual and more prudent. Mr. Madison made thecharge, so did Mr. Clay, so did Mr. Calhoun, so did everyslave-holder and merchant with whom I conversed. I choseafterwards to hear the other side of the whole question; and Ifound, to my amazement, that this charge was wholly groundless.No Abolition Society of New York or Massachusetts has ever sentany antislavery paper south of Washington, except the circulars,addressed to public officers in the States, which were burnt atCharleston. The abolitionists of Boston have been denying thischarge ever since it was first made, and offering evidence of itsgroundlessness; yet the calumny is persisted in, and, no doubt,honestly believed, to this hour, throughout the south, whitherthe voice of the condemned, stifled by their fellow-citizens,cannot reach.
Only mortal things, however, can be really suffocated; andthere has never yet been an instance of a murder of opinion.There seemed, in 1835, so much danger of the abolitionists makingthemselves heard, that an emphatic contradiction was got up, itwas hoped in good time.
The abolitionists had been, they believe illegally, denied bythe city authority the use of Faneuil Hall; (called, in memory ofrevolutionary days, the "Cradle of Liberty.") Certainmerchants aud lawyers of Boston held a meeting there, in August,1835, for the purpose of reprobating, the meetings of theabolitionists, and denouncing their measures, while approving oftheir principles. The less that is said of this meeting,--thedeepest of all the disgraces of Boston,--the better. It bears itscharacter in its face. Its avowed object was to put down theexpression of opinion by opprobrium, in the absence of gag laws.Of the fifteen hundred who signed the requisition for thismeeting, there are many, especially among the younger and morethoughtless, who have long repented of the deed. Some signed inanger; some in fear; many in mistake; and of each of these thereare some who would fain, if it were possible, efface theirsignatures with their blood.
It is an invariable fact, and recognized as such, thatmeetings held to supply the deficiency of gag laws are theprelude to the violence which supplies the deficiency ofexecutioners under such laws. Every meeting held to denounceopinion is followed by a mob. This was so well understood in thepresent case that the abolitionists were warned that if they metagain publicly, they would be answerable for the disorders thatmight ensue. The abolitionists pleaded that this was like makingthe rich man answerable for the crime of the thief who robbedhim, on the ground that if the honest man had not been rich, thethief would not have been tempted to rob him. The abolitionistsalso perceived how liberty of opinion and of speech depended ontheir conduct in this crisis; and they resolved to yield to nothreats of illegal violence; but to hold their legal meeting,pursuant to advertisement, for the despatch of their usualbusiness. One remarkable feature of the case was that this heavyresponsibility rested upon women. It was a ladies' meeting thatwas in question. Upon consultation, the ladies agreed that theyshould never have sought the perilous duty of defending libertyof opinion and speech at the last crisis; but, as such a serviceseemed manifestly appointed to them, the women were ready.
On the 21st of October, they met, pursuant to advertisement,at the office of their association, No. 46, Washington Street.Twenty-five reached their room, by going three-quarters of anhour before the appointed time. Five more made their way up withdifficulty through the crowd. A hunclred more uere turned back bythe mob.
They knew that a hand-bill had been circulated on theExchange, and posted on the City Hall, and throughout the city,the day before, which declared that Thompson, the abolitionist,was to address them; and invited the citizens, under promise ofpecuniary reward, to "snake Thompson out, and bring him tothe tar-kettle before dark." The ladies had been warned thatthey would be killed, "as sure as fate," if they showedthemselves on their own premises that day. They thereforeinformed the mayor that they expected to be attacked. The replyof the city marshal was, "You give us a great deal oftrouble."
The committee-room was surrounded, and gazed into by ahowling, shrieking mob of gentlemen, while the twenty-five ladiessat perfectly stil1, awaithlg the striking of the clock. When itstruck, they opened their meeting. They were questioned as towhether Thompson was there in disguise; to which they made noreply.
They began, as usual, with prayer; the mob shouting"Hurra! here comes Judge Lynch!" Before they had done,the partition gave way, and the gentlemen hurled missiles at thelady who was presiding. The secretary having risen, and begun toread her report, rendered inaudible by the uproar, the mayorentered, and insisted upon their going home, to save their lives.The purpose of their meeting was answered: they had assertedtheir principle; and they now passed out, two and two, amidst theexecration of some thousands of gentlemen;--persons who hadsilver shrines to protect. The ladies, to the number of fifty,walked to the house of one of their members, and were presentlystruck to the heart by the news that Garrison was in the hands ofthe mob. Garrison is the chief apostle of abolition in the UnitedStates. He had escorted his wife to the meeting; and, afteroffering to address the ladies, and being refused, out of regardto his safety, had left the room, and, as they supposed, thepremises. He was, however, in the house when the ladies left it.He was hunted for by the mob; dragged from behind some plankswhere he had taken refuge, and conveyed into the street. Here hishat was trampled under-foot, and brick-bats were aimed at hisbare head; a rope was tied round him, and thus he was draggedthrough the streets. His young wife saw all this. Herexclamation was, "I think my husband will be true to his principles.I am sure my husband will not deny his principles."Her confidence was just. Garrison never denies hisprinciples.
He was saved by a stout truckman, who, with hisbludgeon, made his way into the crowd, as if to attack thevictim. He protected the bare head, and pushed on towards astation house, whence the mayor's officers issued, and pulled inGarrison, who was afterwards put into a coach. The mob tried toupset the coach, and throw down the horses; but the driver laidabout him with his whip, and the constables with their staves,and Garrison was safely lodged in jail: for protection; for hehad committed no offence.
Before the mayor ascended the stairs to dismiss the ladies, hehad done a very remarkabld deed;-- he had given permission to twogentlemen to pull down anddestroy the anti-slavery sign, bearingthe inscription, "Anti-Slavery Office,"--which had hungfor two years, as signs do hang before public offices in Boston.The plea of the mayor is, that he hoped the rage of the mob wouldthus be appeased: that is, he gave them leave to break the lawsin one way, lest they should in another. The citizens followed upthis creed of the mayor with one no less remarkable. They electedthese two rioters members of the State legislature, by a largemajority, within ten days.
I passed through the mob some time after it had beguntoassemble. I asked my fellow-passengers in the stage what itmeant. They supposed it was a busy foreign-post day, and thatthis occasioned an assemblage of gentlemen about the post-office.They pointed out to me that there were none but gentlemen. Wewere passing through from Salem, fifteen miles north of Boston,to Providence, Rhode Island; and were therefore uninformed of theevents and expectations of the day. On the morrow, a visitor whoarrived at Providencc from Boston told us the story; and I hadthenceforth an excellent opportunity of hearing all the remarksthat could be made by persons of all ways of thinking andfeeling, on this affair.
It excited much less attention than it deserved; less thanwould be believed possible by those at a distance who think moreseriously of persecution for opinion, and less tenderly ofslavery than a great many of the citizens of Boston. To many inthe city of Boston the story I have told would be news; and toyet more in the country, who know that some trouble was caused byabolition meetings in the city, but who are not aware that theirown will, embodied in the laws, was overborne to gratify themercenary interests of a few, and the political fears of a fewmore.
The first person with whom I conversed about this riot was thepresident of a university. We were perfectly agreed as to thecauses and character of the outrage. This gentleman went over toBoston for a day or two; and when he returned, I saw him again.He said he was happy to tell me that we had been needlesslymaking ourselves uneasy about the affair: that there had been nomob, the persons assembled having been all gentlemen.
An eminent lawyer at Boston was one of the next to speak uponit. "O, there was no mob," said he. "I was theremyself, and saw they were all gentlemen. They were all in finebroad-cloth."
"Not the less a mob for that," said I.
"Why, they protected Garrison. He received noharm. They protected Garrison."
"From whom, or whatr?"
"O, they would not really hurt him. They only wanted toshow that they would not have such a person live amongthem."
"Why should not he live among them? Is he guilty underany law?"
"He is an insufferable person to them."
"So may you be to-morrow. If you can catch Garrisonbreaking the laws, punish him under the laws. If youcannot, he has as much right to live where he pleases asyou."
Two law pupils of this gentleman presently entered. Oneapproved of all that had been done, and praised the spirit of thegentlemen of Boston. I asked whether they had not broken the law.Yes. I asked him if he knew what the law was. Yes; but it couldnot be always kept. If a man was caught in a house settingit on fire, the owner might shoot him; and Garrison was such anincendiary. I asked him for proof. He had nothing but hearsay togive. The case, as I told him, came to this. A. says Garrison isan incendiary. B. says he is not. A. proceeds on his own opinionto break the law, lest Garrison should do so.
The other pupil told me of the sorrow of heart with which hesaw the law, the life of the republic, set at naught by those whoshould best understand its nature and value. He saw that the timewas come for the true men of the republic to oppose a bold frontto the insolence of the rich and the powerful, who were bearingdown the liberties of the people for a matter of opinion. Theyoung men, he saw, must brace themselves up against the tyrannyof the monied mob, and defend the law; or the liberties of thecountry were gone. I afterwards found many such among the youngmen of the wealthier classes. If they keep their convictions,they and their city are safe.
No prosecutions followed. I asked a lawyer, an abolitionist,why. He said there would be difficulty in getting a verdict; and,if it was obtained, the punishment would be merely a fine, whichwould be paid on the spot, and the triumph would remain with theaggressors. This seemed to me no good reason.
I asked an eminent judge the same question; and whether therewas not a public prosecutor who might prosecute for breach of thepeace, if the abolitionists would not, for the assault onGarrison. He said it might be done; but he had given his adviceagainst it. Why ? The feeling was so strong against theabolitionists,--the rioters were so respectable in the city,--itwas better to let the whole affair pass over without notice.
Of others, some knew nothing of it, because it was about sucha low set of people; some could not take any interest in whatthey were tired of hearing about; some had not heard anything ofthe matter; some thought the abolitionists were served quiteright; some were sure the gentlemen of Boston would not doanything improper; and some owned that there was such bad tasteand meddlesomeness in the abolitionists, that people of tastekept out of the way of hearing anything about them.
Notwithstanding all this, the body of the people are sound.Many of the young lawyers are resolved to keep on the watch, tomaintain the rights of the abolitionists in the legislature, andin the streets of the city. Many hundreds of the working menagreed to leave their work on the first rumour of riot, get swornin as special constables, and keep the peace against the gentry;acting vigorously against the mob ringleaders, if such should bethe magistrates of Boston themselves. I visited many of thevillages in Massachusetts; and there everything seemed right. Thecountry people are abolitionists, by nature and education, andthey see the iniquity of mob-law. A sagacious gentleman told methat it did him good to hear, in New York, of this mob, becauseit proved the rest of Massachusetts to be in a sound state. It isalways 'Boston versus Massachusetts;' and whenthe city, or the aristocracy there, who think themselves thecity, are very vehemently wrong, it is a plain proof that thecountry poople are eminently right. This may, for the humour ofthe thing, be strongly put; but there is much truth in it.
The philosophy of the case is very easy to understand; andsupremely important to be understood.
The law, in a republic, is the embodiment of the will of thepeople. As long as the republic is in a natural and healthystate, containing no anomaly, and exhibiting, no gross vices, thefunction of the law works easily, and is understood andreverenced. Its punishments bear only upon individuals, who havethe opposition of society to contend with for violating its will,and who are helpless against the righteous visitations of thelaw.
If there be any anomaly among the institutions of a republic,the function of the law is certain to be disturbed, sooner orlater: and that disturbance is usually the symptom by theexhibition of which the anomaly is first detected, and thencured. It was so with free-masonry. It will be so with slavery;and with every institution inconsistent with the fundamentalprinciples of democracy. The process is easily traceable. Theworldly interests of the minority,--of perhaps a singleclass,--are bound up with the anomaly:--of the minority, because,if the majority had been interested in any anti-republicaninstitution, the republic would not have existed. The minoritymay go on for a length of time in apparent harmony with theexpressed will of the many,--the law. But the time comes whentheir anomaly clashes with the law. For instance, the merchantsof the north trade in products which are, as they believe,created out of a denial that all men are born free and equal, andthat the just powers of rulers are derived from the consent ofthe governed; while the contrary principles are the root whichproduces the law. Which is to be given up, when both cannot beheld? If the pecuniary interest of merchants is incompatible withfreedom of speech in fellow-citizens, which is to suffer?--Thewill of the majority, the law-maker, is to decide. But it takessome time to awaken the will of the majority; and till it awakes,the interest of the faction is active, and overbears the law. Theretribution is certain; the result is safe. But the evilsmeanwhile are so tremendous, that no exertion should be spared toopen the eyes of the majority to the insults offered to its will.There is no fear that the majority will ultimately succumb to theminority,--the harmonious law to the discordant anomaly: but itis a fearful thing, meantime, that the brave should be oppressedby the mercenary, and oppressed in proportion to their bravery;that the masters of black slaves in the south should be allowedto make white slaves in the north; that power and wealth shouldbe used to blind the people to the nature and dignity of the law,and to seduce them into a preference of brute force. These evilsare so tremendous as to make it the duty of every citizen tobring every lawbreaker, high or low, to punishment; to strike outof the election list every man who tampers with the will of themajority; to teach every child what the law is, and why it mustbe maintained; to keep his eye on the rostrum, the bench, thebar, the pulpit, the press, the lyceum, the school, that nofallacy, no compromise with an anomaly, no surrender of principlebe allowed to pass unexposed and unstigmatized.
One compound fallacy is allowed daily to pass unexposcd andunstigmatized. "You make no allowance," said a friendwho was strangely bewildered by it,--"you make no allowancefor the great number of excellent people who view the anomaly andthe law as you do, but who keep quiet, because they sincerelybelieve that by speaking and acting they should endanger theUnion." This explains the conduct of a crowd of"excellent people," neither merchants, nor the friendsof slaveholders, nor approving slavery, or mobbing, orpersecution for opinion; but who revile or satirize theabolitionists, and, for the rest, hold their tongues. But is itpossible that such do not see that if slavery be wrong, and if itbe indeed bound up with the Union, the Union must fall? Is itpossible that they do not see that if the question be reallythis,--that if the laws of God and the arrangements of man areincompatible, man's arrangements must give way?--I regard it as afalse and mischievous assumption that slavery is bound up withthe Union: but if I believed the dictum, I should not be for"putting off the evil day." Every day which passes overthe unredressed wrongs of any class which a republic holds in herbosom; every day which brings persecution on those who act outthe principles which all profess; every day which adds a sanctionto brute force, and impairs the sacredness of law; every daywhich prolongs impunity to the oppressor and discouragement tothe oppressed, is a more evil day shall that which should usherin the work of renovation.
But the dictum is not true. This bitter satire upon theconstitution, and upon all who have complacently lived under it,is not true. The Union is not incompatible with freedom ofspeech. The Union does not forbid men to act according to theirconvictions. The Union has never depended for its existence onhypocrisy, insult, and injury; and it never will.
Let citizens but take heed individually to respect the law,and see that others do,--that no neighbour transgresses it, thatno statesman despises it unrebuked, that no child grows upignorant or careless of it; and the Union is as secure as theground they tread upon. If this be not done, everything is inperil, for the season; not only the Union, but property, home,life and integrity.
From Harriet Martineau, Society in America, VolumeI, Part I, Chapter III, Section III - "Allegiance toLaw." London: Saunders and Otley, 1837, pp. 162-181.
Forward to Society in America, Ch.III, Section V, - "Sectional Prejudice."
Back to Society in America, ChapterIII, Section III- "Apathy in Citizenship."
Back to Society in America - Table ofContents
Back to the Dead Sociologists'Society Index