le stood mute), and with vile
epithets, using a heavy cane, again and again assaulted my partner, who
was compelled tamely to submit, for had he raised his hand he would have
been shot, and no redress. I would not have been allowed to attest to
"the deep damnation of his taking off."

The Magna Charter, granted by King John, at Runney Mead, to the Barons
of England, in the twelfth century, followed by the Petition of Right by
Charles I, has been rigidly preserved and consecrated as foundation for
civil liberty. The Continental Congress led the van for the United
States, who oftimes tardy in its conservatism, is disposed to give
audience to merit and finally justice to pertinacity of purpose.

In 1851, Jonas P. Townsend, W. H. Newby, and other colored men with
myself, drew up and published in the "Alto California," the leading
paper of the State, a preamble and resolutions protesting against being
disfranchised and denied the right of oath, and our determination to use
all moral means to secure legal claim to all the rights and privileges
of American citizens.

It being the first pronouncement from the colored people of the State,
who were supposed to be content with their status, the announcement
caused much comment and discussion among the dominant class. For down
deep in the heart of every man is a conception of right. He cannot
extinguish it, or separate it from its comparative. What would I have
others do to me? Pride, interest, adverse contact, all with specious
argument may strive to dissipate the comparison, but the pulsations of a
common humanity, keeping time with the verities of God never ceased to
trouble, and thus the moral pebble thrown on the bosom of the hitherto
placid sea of public opinion, like its physical prototype, creating
undulations which go on and on to beat against the rock and make sandy
shores, so this our earnest but feeble protest contributed its humble
share in the rebuilding of a commonwealth where "a man's a man for all
that."

The committee above named, with G. W. Dennis and James Brown, the same
year formed a company, established and published the "Mirror of the
Times," the first periodical issued in the State for the advocacy of
equal rights for all Americans. It has been followed by a score of
kindred that have assiduously maintained and ably contended for the
rights and privileges claimed by their zealous leader.

State conventions were held in 1854, '55 and '57, resolutions an