en'), to
protect, under the sacred covenant of the nation, what they called their
rights to property; albeit not willing ourselves to touch the 'accursed
thing.' The history of the country is a witness to our good faith. But
plainly the injunction of the apostle becomes impossible of obedience
when men transform themselves into fiends, and hang up in their railway
cars, as trophies, the ghastly skulls of such of us as have been slain
in defence of the national covenant.[E] By their own acts the
slave-holders have cancelled our obligations as to such permissive
rights under the Constitution. We shall not probably hasten to incur any
more such obligations. They say that slavery is the strength of their
society. Doubtless it is. Then, Samson-like, they have pulled down upon
themselves the pillars of their whole fabric, and they cannot complain
if they and all their rights, immunities, and titles are buried in the
ruins. In other words, they have appealed from the Constitution, or the
law civil, to the sword, or the law military; and they must abide the
result of that appeal. Such is a brief statement of the question of
negro troops, as affecting the slaves of the South and their traitor
masters.

III. THE FREE NEGRO AS A SOLDIER.

There is another phase of the question, less difficult of solution than
the preceding, perhaps, but by no means less important. It is the case
of the free negro, and especially the free negro of the North. Here
again we need not stop to discuss abstract questions of equality, nor
declare our adherence to the philosophy of Miscegenation. We need not
stop to consider the nature, or justice, of the prejudice which prevails
against the negro at the North. It is undeniable that there is such a
prejudice. Accepting the undoubted fact, we see that it shuts nearly
every avenue of honest industry against the man with a black skin,
restricting him to the most menial offices; and that it is fostered in
many ways by the conventions and usages of our society, so as
practically to put him in a worse condition than his bonded brother at
the South--always except as to his God-given right to his liberty and
labor. Experience has shown that even this is not always fully assured
to the negro; and the July riots of New York indicate the uncertain
tenure of his liberty and life, even under the protection of equal laws.
What then? Shall we remand him to the servitude of the South? Shall we
enact for him a sort of