Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker volume 6.djvu/160

Rh word against that "bill of abominations." Nay, how greedy they are to get victims under it! No wolf loves better to rend a lamb into fragments than these judges to kidnap a Fugitive Slave, and punish any man who dares to speak against it. You know what has happened in Fugitive Slave Bill Courts^ You remember the "miraculous" rescue of Shadrach ; the peaceable snatching of a man from the hands of a cowardly kidnapper was "high treason;" it was "levying war." You remember the "trial" of the rescuers ! Judge Sprague's charge to the Grand Jury, that, if they thought the question was which they ought to obey, the law of man or the law of God, then they must "obey both I" serve God and Mammon, Christ and the devil, in the same act! You remember the "trial," the "ruling" of the Bench, the swearing on the stand, the witness coming back to alter and "enlarge his testimony" and have another gird at the prisoner! You have not forgotten the trials before Judge Kane at Philadelphia, and Judge Qrier at Christiana and Wilkesbarre.

These are natural results of causes well known. You cannot escape a principle. Enslave a negro, will you?—you doom to bondage your own sons and daughters, by your own act.

Do you forget the Union meeting in Faneuil Hall, November 26th, 1850, the Tuesday before Thanksgiving Day? It was called to indorse the Fugitive Slave Bill—a meeting to promote the stealing of men in Boston, of your fellow-worshippers aud my parishoners. Do you remember the Democratic Herods and Whig Pilates, who were made friends that day, melted into one unity of despotism, in order that they might enslave men? They had unity of idea and unity of action, that day. Do you remember the speeches of Mr. Curtis and Mr. Hallett; their yelp against the unalienable rights of men; their howl at God's Higher Law? The worser half of that platform is now the United States Court;—the Fugitive Slave Bill judge, the United States attorney. They got their offices for their political services past and for their character—very fitting reward to very fitting men! A man professes a fondness for kidnapping, hurrahs for it in Faneuil Hall:—give him the United States judgeship; make him United States attorney—fit to fit! When Slavery dispenses offices,