Page:The collected works of Theodore Parker volume 7.djvu/293

Rh deeds?" Oh, yes, the best in the world,—the example of Washington. He also "saved the Union." "So men blaspheme."

Let me tell you a little of that great man. Shortly after the passage of the law of 1703, a favourite female slave of Washington's wife ran away from the President of the new republic, and went into New Hampshire. She lived at Portsmouth. Washington wrote to Mr. Whipple, a United States' marshal, I think, or, at any rate, an officer of the United States, saying that he should like to have the woman sent back to him, if it could be done without tumult, and without shocking the principles and the feelings of the people. He added that the slave was a favourite of his wife. Mr. Whipple wrote back, and said, "It cannot be done without tumult, nor without shocking the principles and feelings of the people." Washington said no more! The woman died at a great age, a few years ago, at Portsmouth. That was the example of Washington,—a man who at his death freed his slaves! Would to God he had done it before! But they that come at the eleventh hour shall never be cast out from my charity. See what is the consequence of this measure! See what has been the condition of Boston for the past week! Read the mingled truth and lies in the newspapers; look at men's faces in the street; listen to their talk; see the court-house in chains; see one hundred, policemen on guard, and three companies of military picketed in Faneuil Hall; behold the people shut out from the courts—I will not say of justice! See the officers of Massachusetts made slave hunters—against the law; constitutional rights struck down—against the law; sheriffs refusing to serve writs—against the law; see the great civil rights our fathers gained five hundred years ago, the trial by jury, by our "peers," by the "law of the land," all cloven down; the writ of "personal replevin" made null—no sheriff daring to execute a law made to suit such a case as this, made but eight years ago! Where is your high sheriff? Where is your governor? See the judges of Massachusetts bend beneath that chain; see them bow down, one by one, and kneel, and creep, and cringe, and crouch, and crawl, under the chain! Note the symbol! That was the chain on