advised my counsel to make no defence, "put no obstructions in the way" of my being sent to jail as "he probably will."

Gentlemen, a United States Commissioner has his place on condition that he performs such services as his masters "require." These United States Judges have their seat in consequence of services rendered to the ruling power of America, and for others of like sort yet to be paid to the stealers of men. Other rewards shine before them alluring to new service, - additional salary can pay additional alacrity. But you, Gentlemen, are not office-holders nor seekers of office, not hoping to gain money, or power, or honor, by any wickedness. You are to represent the unsophisticated Conscience of the People,— not the slave-power, but the power of Freedom.

It is to you I shall address my defence! My defence? No, Gentlemen, your defence, the defence of your own Rights, inherent in your national Institutions as Americans, ay, in your Nature as Men. It is a singular good fortune that to you, as judges, I am pleading your own cause. You have more interest at stake than I. For at death my name will perish, while children and children's children, I trust, will gently mingle your memories in that fair tide of human life which never ends.

So much have I said by way of introduction, treating only of the accidents pertaining to this case. I will now come to the Primary Qualities and Substance thereof.

This is a Political Trial. In form, I am charged with violating a certain statute never before applied to actions like mine; never meant to apply to such actions; not legally capable of such application. But in fact, my offence is very different from what the indictment attempts to set forth. The judges know this; the attorney knows it, and "never expected to procure a conviction." It is your cause, even more than mine, that I plead. So it concerns you to understand the whole matter thoroughly, that you may justly judge our common cause. To make the whole case clear, I will land it out into four great parcels of matter, which your mind can command at once, and then come to the details of each, ploughing it all over before your face, furrow by furrow. I shall speak,

I. Of the State of Affairs in America which has led to this prosecution, the Encroachments of a Power hostile to Democratic Institutions.

II. Of the Mode of Operation pursued by this Encroaching Power, in other times and in our own,- of Systematic Corruption of the Judiciary.

III. Of the great Safeguard which has been found serviceable in protecting Democratic Institutions and the Rights of Man they are designed to defend, — of the Trial by Jury.

IV. Of the Circumstances of this special case, UNITED STATES versus THEODORE PARKER.

I shall speak of each in its order, and begin at the head.

I. OF THE STATE OF AFFAIRS IN AMERICA, WHICH HAS LED TO THIS PROSECUTION THE ENCROACHMENTS OF A POWER HOSTILE TO DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTIONS.

In a republic where all emanates from the People, political institutions must have a Basis of Idea in the Nation's Thought, before they can acquire a Basis of Fact in the Force of the Nation. Now in America there are two diverse Ideas recognized as principles of Action the Idea of Freedom and the Idea of Slavery. Allow me to read my analysis and description of each.

The Idea of Freedom first got a national expression on the Fourth of July, 1776. Here it is. I put it in a philosophic form. There are five points to it.

First, All men are endowed by their Creator with certain natural rights, amongst which is the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Second, These rights are unalienable; they can be alienated only by the possessor thereof; the father cannot alienate them for the son, nor the son for the father; nor the husband for the wife, nor the wife for the husband; nor the strong for the weak, nor the weak for the strong; nor the few for the many, nor the many for the few; and so on.

Third, In respect to these, all men are equal; the rich man has not more, and the poor less; the strong man has not more, and the weak man less :—all are exactly equal in these rights, however unequal in their powers.

Fourth, It is the function of government to secure these natural, unalienable, and equal rights to every man.

Fifth, Government derives all its divine right from its conformity with these ideas, all its human sanction from the consent of the governed.

That is the Idea of Freedom. I used to call it "the American Idea;" that was when I was younger than I am to-day. It is derived from human nature; it rests on the immutable Laws of God; it is part of the natural religion of mankind. It demands a government after natural Justice, which is the point common between the conscience of God and the conscience of mankind; it is the point common also between the interests of one man and of all men.

Now this government, just in its substance, in its form must be democratic: that is to say, the government of all, by all, and for all. You see what consequences must follow from such an idea, and the attempt to reënact the Law of God into political institutions. There will follow the freedom of the people, respect for every natural right of all men, the rights of their body and of their spirit—the rights of mind and conscience, heart and soul. There must be some restraint—as of children by their parents, as of bad men by good men; but it will be restraint for the joint good of all parties concerned; not restraint for the exclusive benefit of the restrainer. The ultimate consequence of this will be the material and spiritual welfare of all— riches, comfort, noble manhood, all desirable things.

That is the Idea of Freedom. It appears in the Declaration of Independence; it

FREEDOM AND SLAVERY.

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reappears in the Preamble to the American Constitution, which aims "to establish Justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of Liberty." That is a religious idea; and when men pray for the "Reign of Justice" and the "Kingdom of Heaven" to come on earth politically, I suppose they mean that there may be a Commonwealth where every man has his natural rights of mind, body, and estate.

Next is the Idea of Slavery. Here it is. I put it also in a philosophic form. There are three points which I make.

First, There are no natural, unalienable, and equal rights, wherewith men are endowed by their Creator; no natural, unalienable, and equal right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Second, There is a great diversity of powers, and in virtue thereof the strong man may rule and oppress, enslave and ruin the weak, for his interest and against theirs.

Third, There is no natural law of God to forbid the strong to oppress the weak, and enslave and ruin the weak.

That is the Idea of Slavery. It has never got a national expression in America; it has never been laid down as a Principle in any act of the American people, nor in any single State, so far as I know. All profess the opposite; but it is involved in the Measures of both State and Nation. This Idea is founded in the selfishness of man; it is atheistic.

The idea must lead to a corresponding government; that will be unjust in its substance, for it will depend not on natural right, but on personal force; not on the Constitution of the Universe, but on the compact of men. It is the abnegation of God in the universe and of conscience in man. Its form will be despotism, the government of all, by a part, for the sake of a part. It may be a single-headed despotism, or a despotism of many heads; but whether a Cyclops or a Hydra, it is alike "the abomination which maketh desolate." Its ultimate consequence is plain to foresee poverty to a nation, misery, ruin.

These two Ideas are now fairly on foot. They are hostile; they are both mutually invasive and destructive. They are in exact opposition to each other, and the nation which embodies these two is not a figure of equilibrium. As both are active forces in the minds of men, and as each idea tends to become a fact-a universal and exclusive fact, as men with these ideas organize into parties as a means to make their idea into a fact, - it follows that there must not only be strife amongst philosophical men about these antagonistic Principles and Ideas, but a strife of practical men about corresponding Facts and Measures. So the quarrel, if not otherwise ended, will pass from words to what seems more serious; and one will overcome the other.

--

So long as these two Ideas exist in the nation as two political forces, there is no national unity of Idea, of course no unity of action. For there is no centre of gravity common to Freedom and Slavery. They will not compose an equilibrious figure. You may cry "Peace! Peace!" but so long as these two antagonistic Ideas remain, each seeking to organize itself and get exclusive power, there is no peace; there can

be none.

The question before the nation to-day is, Which shall prevail—the Idea and Fact of Freedom, or the Idea and the Fact of Slavery; Freedom, exclusive and universal, or Slavery, exclusive and universal? The question is not merely, Shall the African be bond or free? but, Shall America be a Democracy or a Despotism? For nothing is so remorseless as an idea, and no logic is so strong as the historical development of a national idea by millions of men. A measure is nothing without its Principle. The Idea which allows Slavery in South Carolina will establish it also in New England.

The bondage of a black man in Alexandria imperils every white woman's daughter in Boston. You cannot escape the consequences of a`first Principle more than you can "take the leap of Niagara and stop when half-way down." The Principle which recognizes Slavery in the Constitution of the United States would make all America a Despotism, while the Principle which made John Quincy Adams a free man would extirpate Slavery from Louisiana and Texas. It is plain America cannot long hold these two contradictions in the national consciousness. Equilibrium must come.1

These two ideas are represented by two parties which aim at the ultimate organization of their respective doctrines, the party indicating the special tendency towards Democracy or Despotism. The Party of Freedom is not yet well organized; that of Slavery is in admirable order and discipline. These two parties are continually at war attended with various success.

1. In the individual States of the North, since the Revolution, the Party of Freedom has gained some great victories; it has abolished Personal Slavery in every northern State, and on a deep-laid foundation has built up Democratic Institutions with well proportioned beauty. The Idea of Freedom, so genial to the Anglo-Saxon, so welcome to all of Puritanic birth and breeding, has taken deep root in the consciousness of the great mass of the People at the North. In the severe simplicity of national deduction they will carry it to logical conclusions not yet foreseen by human providence. The free States are progressively democratic.

But in all the Northern States, and more especially in its cities,and here chiefly among the men of exclusive intellectual culture and the votaries of commerce and its riches, there are exceptional men who embrace the Idea of Slavery and belong to its Party. They know no law higher than the transient interest of their politics or their commerce, their ease or ambition. They may not theoretically hate the People, but they so love their own money, their own ease or pleasure, that practically they oppose what promotes the welfare of mankind, and seek their own personal advancement to the injury of the human race. These are Northern men with Southern "Principles." They have their Journals too well known in Boston to

need mention here.

2. In the individual States of the South, the Idea and Party of Slavery has also gained great victories and been uniformly successful; it has extended and strengthened personal slavery, which has now a firmer hold in the minds of the controlling classes of Southern men, the rich and "educated,”— than in 1776, or ever before. The Southern States are progressively despotic.

Still, in all the Southern States there are exceptional men, hostile

1 See this statement in Mr. Parker's Additional Speeches, Addresses, and Occasional Sermons. Boston, 1855, vol. ii. p. 250, et seq.

THE NORTH AND SOUTH.

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to slavery, the intelligent and religious from conviction, others from mere personal interest. These are Southern men with Northern Principles. They are much oppressed at home-kept from political advancement or social respectability, as much as democrats would be at Rome or Naples, - have no journals and little influence.

3. In the Federal Government, the warfare goes on, each party seeking for, mastery over the whole United States - the contest is carried on in Congress, in all the local legislatures; newspapers, speeches, even sermons, resound with the din of battle. See what forces contend and with what results.

The nation lives by its productive industry, whereof there are these five chief departments:- Hunting and Fishing, the appropriation of the spontaneous live products of the land and sea; Agriculture, the use of the productive forces of the earth's surface; Mining, the appropriation of the metallic products of her bosom; Manufactures, thé application of toil and thought to the products of Hunting and Fishing, Mining and Agriculture; Commerce, the exchange of value, distribution of the products of these four departments of industry, directly productive.

Hunting and Fishing, Mining, Manufactures, Commerce, are mainly in the hands of Northern men—the South is almost wholly Agricultural. Her wealth consists of land and slaves. In 1850 the fifteen slave States had not fourteen hundred millions of other property. the South property, with its consequent influence, is in few handsin the North it is wide spread.

In

Now the few controlling men of the South, the holders of land and slaves, have Unity of pecuniary Interest—the support of Slavery as a local measure,- for it is the source of their material wealth, and also a consequent Unity of political Idea, the support of Slavery as a universal Principle, for it is the source likewise of their political power. Accordingly the South presents against the North an even and well-disciplined front of veteran soldiers, is always hostile to Freedom, and as her "best educated" men devote much time to politics, making it the profession of their whole lives, it is plain they become formidable antagonists.

But the North has a great variety of conflicting interests, a great amount of intellectual activity, where education and its consequent habits of reading and thinking are so wide spread, and therefore a great variety of opinion. Accordingly there is not the same Unity of pecuniary Interest and of political Idea, which distinguishes the South. Besides, in the North the ablest and best educated men do not devote their time to the thankless and stormy calling of politics; Virginia cares for nothing but Negroes and Politics, her loins and her brains gender but this twofold product: Massachusetts and New