LIBERTY OF SPEECH, OF THE PRESS, AND FREEDOM OF
RELIGION.
Liberty is only desirable so long as it is enjoyed without abuse. It
is the highest evidence of the morality, piety, intelligence and
general well-being of peoples and of individuals, that they require
but little legal restraint. The continual enjoyment of national and
individual liberty is the noblest of distinctions and greatest of
blessings, because such continued enjoyment can only proceed
from the habitual exercise of every virtue. But, whilst to such
peoples and individuals, liberty is a good, it is an unmitigated evil
to the vicious, who use their privileges to injure themselves, and to
annoy and disturb society. Despotism of some sort is just as
necessary for this latter class as for madmen, thieves and
murderers.-- The Northern Abolitionists do not let a day pass
without showing to the world that they are as little fitted to be
trusted with liberty as thieves with keys or children with firearms.
Their daily abuse of liberty of speech and of the press, and of
freedom of religion, are but the means which they habitually
employ for greater mischief and crime. The disgusting proceedings
of their men, women and negroes, in their infidel, agrarian and
licentious conventions, the [illegible] and destructive doctrines
emanating from their press, and their lecture rooms, and the
unfeminine bearing of their women, would justify and require an
immediate and despotic censorship, if it were possible to take away
their liberties without invading those of other people. A
community of Abolitionists could only be governed by a
penitentiary system. They are as unfit for liberty as maniacs,
criminals, or wild beasts. The worst aspect of their case, is, that
they are endangering the liberties of the people. Just such conduct
as theirs induced the despotism of Cromwell and the two
Bonapartes, and of all other usurpers who have destroyed their
country’s liberty. All men prefer despotism to anarchy, the rule of
a single man to the mad riot and misrule of infidels, criminals and
agrarians.—These men complain that liberty of speech has been
violated in the person of Mr. Sumner. This is but the beginning of
the end. They will soon destroy all liberty of speech, if they
employ it only to teach heresy, infidelity, licentiousness, and to stir
up to deeds of violence. Better, far better, that man were without
the gift of speech, than to use it as they do. Better that he could
neither read or write, than have his head and heart perverted, by the
foul and filthy stuff that oozes from the abolition press. Better, that
his religion were prescribed by a priest and enforced by an
inquisition, than that he should become an habitue of Greeley’s
philansteries, of Andrew’s gorgeous saloons of Free Love, of
Mormon dwellings, or of Oneida dens. Better that the cut of his
coat and the number of his buttons were fixed by statute and
enforced by penalties, than that women should defy public opinion
and parade the streets in unfeminine apparel. The liberties of
America are safe so long as they are not abused. They are not
worth preserving when abuse becomes general. If the noxious
heresy of abolition and its kindred isms are not arrested; if a
salutary reaction does not take place, ere long, even good men,
religious men and patriots, would prefer the quiet of despotism, to
the discord, licentiousness, the anarchy and the crime, which those
men practice and invoke. Yet, we neither fear nor tremble for the
future. These wretches are more noisy than numerous. The edifice
of American liberty, the most glorious structure of freedom the
world has ever seen, is not destined to be sapped and undermined
by pismires, nor carried by the assaults of crazy lilliputians. These
creatures will be soon driven from their places, and lashed into
obscurity by an indignant people, whose confidence they have
betrayed and abused.— All the elections at the North for the last
twelve months, show that the storm is gathering that is to sweep
these noxious insects from the hearts of men and the face of day.
Transcribed from the Richmond, Virginia, Enquirer, 3 June 1856 by T. Lloyd Benson.