sed go free, and break every yoke." He said Paul sent back the
fugitive slave Onesimus to his master Philemon; I rejoined, "Paul said,
'I send him back, not as a servant, but above a servant, a brother
beloved; receive him as myself.'" He quoted the Constitution of the
United States, the article commanding that fugitive slaves should be
delivered back to their masters; in reply I quoted from Deuteronomy the
"Higher Law," "Thou shalt _not_ deliver unto his master the servant
which is escaped from his master unto thee." He quoted from the great
speech of the magnificent Webster in the Senate, March 7, 1850, in which
he urged all good citizens to obey the Fugitive Slave Law "with
alacrity." Waxing hot, I quoted from Beecher:

As to those provisions which concern aid to fugitive slaves, may God
do so to us, yea and more also, if we do not spurn them as we would
any other mandate of Satan! If in God's providence fugitives ask
bread or shelter, raiment or conveyance at my hands, my own children
shall lack bread ere they; my own flesh shall sting with cold ere
they shall lack raiment. And whatsoever defense I would put forth
for mine own children, that shall these poor, despised, persecuted
creatures have at my hands and on the road. The man that would do
otherwise, that would obey this law to the peril of his soul and the
loss of his manhood, were he brother, son, or father, shall never
pollute my hand with grasp of hideous friendship, nor cast his
swarthy shadow athwart my threshold!

The lieutenant finally cited the examples of "those glorious southern
patriots who led the rebellion against England during the first American
Confederacy," Washington, Patrick Henry, Madison, Jefferson, "every one
a slaveholder," he proudly exclaimed. I happened to be cognizant of
their views, and responded with some vehemence: "But Washington's hands
were tied so that he could not free slaves till his death. He said it
was among his first wishes to see some plan adopted for putting an end
to slavery. Patrick Henry declared, 'I will not, I cannot justify it.'
Madison expressed strongly his unwillingness to admit in the national
Constitution 'the idea that can hold property in man.'" In a rather
loud voice I quoted Jefferson, who, in view of our inconsistency in
violating the "self-evident truth" that "all men are created equal,"
solemnly affirmed, "_I tremble for my country, when I remember that