untry; not on account of a
three-penny tax on tea, but because fetters of living iron are
fastened on the limbs of millions of our countrymen, and our most
sacred rights are trampled in the dust. As citizens of the State,
we appeal to the State in vain for protection and redress. As
citizens of the United States, we are treated as outlaws in one
half of the country, and the national government consents to our
destruction. We are denied the right of locomotion, freedom of speech,
the right of petition, the liberty of the press, the right peaceably
to assemble together to protest against oppression and plead for
liberty--at least in thirteen States of the Union. If we venture, as
avowed and unflinching abolitionists, to travel South of Mason and
Dixon's line, we do so at the peril of our lives. If we would escape
torture and death, on visiting any of the slave States, we must
stifle our conscientious convictions, bear no testimony against
cruelty and tyranny, suppress the struggling emotions of humanity,
divest ourselves of all letters and papers of an anti-slavery
character, and do homage to the slaveholding power--or run the risk
of a cruel martyrdom! These are appalling and undeniable facts.

Three millions of the American people are crushed under the American
Union! They are held as slaves--trafficked as merchandise--registered
as goods and chattels! The government gives them no protection--the
government is their enemy--the government keeps them in chains!
There they lie bleeding--we are prostrate by their side--in
their sorrows and sufferings we participate--their stripes are
inflicted on our bodies, their shackles are fastened on our limbs,
their cause is ours! The Union which grinds them to the dust
rests upon us, and with them we will struggle to overthrow it!
The Constitution, which subjects them to hopeless bondage, is one
that we cannot swear to support! Our motto is, "NO UNION WITH
SLAVEHOLDERS," either religious or political. They are the fiercest
enemies of mankind, and the bitterest foes of God! We separate from
them not in anger, not in malice, not for a selfish purpose, not to
do them an injury, not to cease warning, exhorting, reproving them
for their crimes, not to leave the perishing bondman to his fate--O
no! But to clear our skirts of innocent blood--to give the oppressor
no countenance--to signify our abhorrence of injustice and
cruelty--to testify against an ungodly compact--to cease striking