You yourselves can scarcely point out any
case that has come before any northern tribunal in which the law has not
been enforced to the very letter. You ought to know these facts, and you
do know them. You all know that when a law is passed anywhere to bind
any people, who feel, in conscience, or for any other reason, opposed
to its execution, it is not in human nature to enforce it with the same
certainty as a law that meets with the approbation of the great mass of
the citizens. Every rational man understands this, and every candid man
will admit it. Therefore it is that I do not violently impeach you for
your unfaithfulness in the execution of many of your laws. You have in
South Carolina a law by which you take free citizens of Massachusetts
or any other maritime State, who visit the city of Charleston, and lock
them up in jail under the penalty, if they cannot pay the jail-fees, of
eternal slavery staring them in the face--a monstrous law, revolting
to the best feelings of humanity and violently in conflict with
the Constitution of the United States. I do not say this by way of
recrimination; for the excitement pervading the country is now so great
that I do not wish to add a single coal to the flame; but nevertheless I
wish the whole truth to appear.
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