et the
woman-hunter capture Ellen Craft, make her a Prostitute at New
Orleans. She is a virtuous wife and mother,--but no matter. Slavery is
king and commands it. Let the 'owner' have his chain."

There is no escaping the consequence of a first Principle. Soon that
little chain lengthened itself out, and coiled itself all round the
court house, and how greedily your judges stooped to go under! This
Anaconda of the Dismal Swamp wound its constricting twists about the
neck of all your courts, and the Judges turned black in the face, and
when questioned of law, they could not pronounce "Habeas Corpus,"
"Trial by Jury," nor utter a syllable for the Bible or the
Massachusetts Constitution, but only wheeze and gurgle and squeak and
gibber out their defences of Slavery! No, Boston could not bewray a
woman wandering towards freedom, without chaining the court house and
its judges, putting the town in a state of siege,--insolent soldiers
striking at the people's neck. Now the attempt is making by this
Honorable Court to put the same chain round Faneuil Hall, so that the
old Cradle of Liberty shall no more rock to manhood the noble sons of
freedom, but only serve as a nest that the spawn of Bondage may
hibernate therein.

I am on trial because I hate Slavery, because I love freedom for the
black man, for the white man, and for all the human Race. I am not
arraigned because I have violated the statute on which the indictment
is framed--no child could think it--but because I am an advocate of
Freedom, because my Word, my Thoughts, my Feelings, my Actions, nay,
all my Life, my very Existence itself, are a protest against Slavery.
Despotism cannot happily advance unless I am silenced. It is very
clear logic which indicts me. Private personal malice, deep, long
cherished, rancorous, has doubtless jagged and notched and poisoned
too the public sword which smites at my neck. Still it is the public
sword of Slavery which is wielded against me. Against ME? Against YOU
quite as much--against your children. For as Boston could not venture
to kidnap a negro woman, without bringing down that avalanche of
consequences connected with the Principle of Slavery,--without chains
on her Judges, falsehood in her officers, blood in her courts, and
drunken soldiers in her streets, and hypocrisy in her man-hunting
ministers,--no more can she put me to silence alone. The thread which
is to sew my lips together, will make your mouths but a silent and
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