When a good man lends himself to the advocacy of slavery, he must, at least for a time, feel himself to be any where but at home, amongst his new thoughts, doctrines, and modes of reasoning.
From Gerrit Smith
Truth and mercy require the exertion - never the suppression, of man's noble rights and powers.
I do not subscribe to the doctrine that the people are the slaves and property of their government. I believe that government is for the use of the people, and not the people for the use of the government.
Our concern, however, is with slavery as it is, and not with any theory of it.
God cannot approve of a system of servitude, in which the master is guilty of assuming absolute power - of assuming God's place and relation towards his fellow-men.
I do not object to the construction of rail roads and canals.
I need say no more, to prove that slavery is entirely unlike the servitude in the patriarchal families.
Let the poor man count as his enemy, and his worst enemy, every invader of the right of free discussion.
As this is the first time I have had the floor, it may be well for me now to confess, that I am in the habit of freely imputing errors to my fellow-men.
I am a plain man, and I care and know comparatively little about rhetoric.
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