Page:The American Slave Trade (Spears).djvu/260

 It was not in the blood of the race to perpetuate hypocrisy and injustice forever.

Those of us who are old enough recall with strange feelings the tumultuous controversies of the days of the Buchanan Administration. The pelting of words was incessant, but back of all that and growing steadily more ominous, was the tornado roar of one mighty question, Shall the Right prevail in the United States of America?

Granville Sharp, as the friend of one oppressed negro, had asked that question, standing alone, in other years. Now tens of thousands of the mightiest, most heroic souls of the earth were standing up to answer it, not by words alone but by freely giving their life blood.

Yet let no injustice be done now in recalling that controversy. As long as a people "holds its life in its hand, ready to give it for its honor (though a foolish honor); for its love (though a foolish love); for its business (though a foolish business), there is hope for it." The slave-owners, too, held their lives in their hands. No higher proof of their sincerity is known to man. Nathan Hale, whose statue stands in the City Hall Park of New York, reached out both hands (albeit with sorrow) when he welcomed to the further shore the spirits of those Americans who cheerfully went to their death in the David torpedo-boat, of Charleston harbor. We were to determine not only whether the right should prevail, but to see what was right, and our pool of Siloam was full to the brim of blood.

But when that is said — when the entire sincerity of the masses of those who sought to perpetuate slavery