"The anti-slavery movement which brings in petitions from various parts of the country, asking Congress to abolish slavery in the District of Columbia, originates with a few persons who have been in the habit of making charitable religious institutions subservient to political purposes, and who have even controlled some of those charitable associations.
"Many of the clergymen who have been the instruments of the agitators have been such from no bad motive. Some of them, discovering the purpose of the agitators, discovering that their labors were calculated to make the condition of the slave worse, and to create animosity between the people of the North and the South, have paused in their course and desisted from the further application of a mistaken philanthropy."
Even if it be admitted that, as early as the year 1836, the strongest elements in New England were united against the South, it is by no means true that they were then unanimous in selecting slavery as the most advantageous ground of battle. A cry of distress arose from Great Britain at the way some of the distributors of her secret service money were being treated; a paragraph from an English newspaper, the _Leeds Mercury_, read on the floor of the House of Representatives by Mr. King, of Georgia, in corroboration of what Mr. Hill had said, will serve as an illustration: "Letters of the most distressing nature have been received from Mr. George Thompson, the zealous and devoted missionary of slave emancipation, who has gone from this country to the United States, and who writes from Boston. He says that 'the North (that is, New England, where slavery does not exist) has universally sympathized with the South in opposition to the abolitionists; that the North has let fall the mask; that the merchants and mechanics, priests and politicians have alike stood forth the defenders of Southern despots and the furious denouncers of Northern philanthropy'; that all parties of politics, especially the supporters of the two rival candidates for the Presidential office (Van Buren and Webster) vie with each other in denouncing the abolitionists; and that even religious men shun them, except when the abolitionists can fairly gain a hearing from them. With regard to himself he speaks as follows: 'Rewards are offered for my abduction and assassination; and, in every direction, I meet with those who believe they would be doing God and their country service by depriving me of life. I have appeared in public, and some of my escapes from the hands of my foes have been truly providential. On Friday last I narrowly escaped losing my life in Concord, New Hampshire.' 'Boston, September 11.--This morning a short gallows was found standing opposite the door of my house, 23 Bay street, in this city, now occupied by Garrison. Two halters hung from the beam, with the words above them: By Order of Judge Lynch!'"