I do not believe
there is a wife who would think it right that _her_ husband
should be sold to a trader to be worked all his life without wages or
a recognition of rights. I do not believe there is a husband who would
consider it right that his wife should be regarded by law the property
of another man. I do not believe there is a father or mother who would
consider it right were they forbidden by law to teach their children
to read. I do not believe there is a brother who would think it right
to have his sister held as property, with no legal defense for her
personal honor, by any man living.
"All this is inherent in slavery. It is not the abuse of slavery, but
its legal nature. And there is not a woman in the United States, where
the question is fairly put to her, who thinks these things are right.
"But though our hearts have bled over this wrong, there have been many
things tending to fetter our hands, to perplex our efforts, and to
silence our voice. We have been told that to speak of it was an
invasion of the rights of states. We have heard of promises and
compacts, and the natural expression of feeling has in many cases been
repressed by an appeal to those honorable sentiments which respect the
keeping of engagements.
"But a time has now come when the subject is arising under quite a
different aspect.
"The question is not now, shall the wrongs of slavery exist as they
have within their own territories, but shall we permit them to be
extended all over the free territories of the United States? Shall the
woes and the miseries of slavery be extended over a region of fair,
free, unoccupied territory nearly equal in extent to the whole of the
free States?
"Nor is this all! This is not the last thing that is expected or
intended.
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