5 10 250 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Articles, Letters to the Editors, etc. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource CIRCULAR Description An account of the resource The 'American Free Produce Association' has judged it an object of the first importance, that means should be adopted for furnishing a supply of Dry Goods and Groceries, produced by requited labor, adequate at least to the demands of those who are conscientiously opposed to the use of articles produced by the labor of slaves. In this view its attention has been directed to the establishing of a store, or stores, where free goods shall be held for sale, and facilities afforded for their transmission to distant places; and to its Executive Committee it has entrusted the making of the necessary arrangements. Two plans have been presented to the Committee for forming the capital stock of such an establishment. One, voluntary contribution from individuals. The other a joint stock association. Auxiliary to either, it has been suggested that engagements should be given by individuals, friends of requited labor, to take annually from the establishment certain amounts of goods. This would be at once a measure of the demands to be supplied, and an assurance to the contributors of certain success within the limits of such demand. The impressions of the Committee are, at present, favorable to a joint-stock association formed of as many shares, at twenty dollars each, as the result of its inquiries may indicate to be necessary; but it submits both plans to view in the annexed subscription list, and hopes that the friends of the cause will feel free to subscribe <xsl-text></xsl-text>under both heads <xsl-text></xsl-text>, leaving it for the Executive Committee to select that one which it shall deem best, after all the lists are returned, or the inquiries in them otherwise answered. It also invites a subscription under the other heads, the importance of which, as a mode of economically and successfully attaining the desired end, must be apparent. The individual to whom this Circular is addressed, is requested to submit it to other friends of the cause in his vicinity, and after obtaining as many signatures as he can to the subscription list, to return it to either of the undersigned during the current year. Any suggestions which subscribers may have to offer will be very acceptable to the Committee. On behalf and by order of the Executive Committee of the American Free Produce Association. ABRAHAM L. PENNOCK, <xsl-text></xsl-text>Chairman<xsl-text></xsl-text>. DANIEL L. MILLER, JR., <xsl-text></xsl-text>Secretary<xsl-text></xsl-text>. Philadelphia Tenth mo. 26, 1838. We, the subscribers, engage to contribute by donation or to take in stock, at the option of the Executive Committee of the American Free Produce Association, the sums in money, or number of shares, at twenty dollars each, set opposite to our names in the first and second columns; and to take annually in goods produced by free labor from such store or stores as may be established under the control of that Committee, the amount set opposite to our names in the third and fourth columns. It being understood that we may lessen the amount of our subscriptions for goods, or withdraw it at the expiration of one year from the time of subscribing, notice of such intention having been given to the Committee three months previously. Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived The Liberator Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 11.16.1838 Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Abraham L. Pennock, Daniel L. Miller, Jr. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Poetry Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Coercion! Lines suggested on seeing the first number of "The Non-Slaveholder" (Poem) Description An account of the resource Fresh help! fresh champions in the field Of moral bravery, Truth's panoply to wear and wield 'Gainst Slavery! To stand in virtuous freedom bold, The banner with firm hand to hold, A life-time warfare to proclaim, In freedom's name, Against a system foul, inhuman, And to a bloodless battle summon! But hark! as from a bleating flock, Who fear the moral battle shock, I hear the timid cry arise, Of those who mark, with mournful eyes, Truth nailed against the cross by Hate, And, with vague fear of unseen bait, Afriad where ghosts are none, Or seeking worldly loss to shun. Follow afar, with conscience stricken, That Truth, believed, and yet forsaken. Truth's lovers, struck with pallid terror, Join the Ephesian shout of Error, And cry "COERCION!" Evil is odious in their sight, And yet they dread the moral fight,  Some spectre rises to affright And check exertion. Backward they look with reverent gaze On a conquests won in former days, Past triumphs win their ready praise, As "MORAL SUASION!" Their valiant fathers battled well -- Proudly their sons their virtues tell On each occasion. And, oh, had Satan kindly lain, Prostrate and slain, When those good fathers struck the blow As ye strike now, Who could have blamed the fatal thrust, Coercing him to lie in dust, Or feared, (their faith excused from trial, Temptation having taken wing,) To use luxurious self-denial Separate from the unclean thing. Yet list ye to that chorus cry! With ready ear its meaning try! Subject the word to test discreet, As with the mouth ye taste of meat! It stands you much in stead to ken The temper of the assilants' blade, The one they ever brandish, when  Fresh movements for the truth are made! To me, I ween, that cry has grown And old familiar tedious tone, Still ringing, dinging in my ears, Since first I grew to manhood's years, I've known it raised, with craven terror, At every new attack of Error-- And not without this deafening roar, Was gained one inch in righteous war. When chaste and lovely Temperance, first Her "few and feeble" champioins mustered. The sages, at the bottle nursed, Struck with dismay, were sadly flustered,  To the pure love of Truth a stranger, Each saw his gainful craft in danger, And, lacking argument for Evil, Yet bent at moral Truth to cavil, In hope of gain - in pure perversion, They raised this bug-bear shout, "COERCION!" And silly Echo caught the cry, Nor suffers yet the sound to die, Filling with the re-echoing sound, Craniums where brains not much abound,  And hollow hearts where sordid pelf, Or that corroding canker, Self, Upon the vital fluid preys, And every generous impulse stays. Since then I've marked, on each occasion, That called for fearless Moral Suasion, In every stage of every fight Where Error was assailed by Right, COERCION was the favorite shout Employed to put the Truth to rout, And lingering sometimes on the tongue Of truthful ones who loathed the wrong, Good men and true in pure mistake As argument the word would speak. And Truth would always kindly bear The attacked which most obstruc [?] When hearts mistaken, yet sincere, The many join in blind applause, Of plausible insidious Error, And view her forim with honest terror! A. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource A. Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived The Non-Slaveholder, reprinted from the American Citizen 2:12, pp. 287-8 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 12.1847 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Articles, Letters to the Editors, etc. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Collins Free Produce Association - it's advantages, &c. (Article) Description An account of the resource The people of Collins, are very much like the people elsewhere, being quite willing that a few of their number should do all the labor and have all the honor of a work of reform until it is nearly consummated, when they are equally willing to share in the triumph if anything is to be gained by it. This remark will apply politically although intended for another purpose. For some years there have been in this vicinity two persons who are not content with the usual duties of the Abolitionist, in the common acceptation of that term. They have chosen to apply their labors in every direction calculated to cripple the energies of the slave power or hasten the overthrow of slavery. Accordingly they have singly and alone applied the abstinence principle to the products of slave-labor. More recently finding some to sympathise with them and a consequent increase in numbers, there has been an organization formed bearing the name of the heading of this article. The members of this organization calculate beforehand about how much sheeting, sugar, calico, &c., they will need respectively, and pay the estimated cost in advance, which is forwarded to New York or the American Free Produce Depot in Philadelphia, accompanied with the account of the kinds and amount of good wanted. They regard slave products the price of blood and oppression. The advantages as already to some extent witnessed are: 1st. A testimony against slavery that will ere long be felt and appreciated, and without which no Abolitionist can be consistent. 2nd. The removal of the sectarian bigotry and prejudice previously exhibited. 3d. A discouragement of the further multiplication of the Non-producers in the world. Aside from the subject of slavery then, there is this decided use: it prevents mercantile monopoly and saves the profits on the goods for the use of the consumer. When this system is perfected, there must of course be more producers and consequently less oppression. It is to be hoped that the contemplated National League will incorporate the free produce principle into its constitution. I would ask, that the readers of the North Star would seriously consider whether they are not losing much of the influence they possess by neglecting the scriptural injunction of "touch not, taste not, handle nor the unclean thing," the present use of which is rendering such aid to slaveholders. L.M. COLLINS CENTER, 11th mo. 1849. Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived The North Star Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 11.23.1849 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Meetings and Events Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COLORED FREE PRODUCE SOCIETY Description An account of the resource The circumstances of a society having been organized some months since in Philadelphia, under the above title, has been mentioned before in this work. The following is the preamble to their Constitution. We should be glad to insert the articles themselves, but have not room to spare at present. This association may be considered auxiliary to the Pennsylvania Free Produce Society, the proceedings of which have been heretofore noticed. "Whereas, the Constitution of the United States expressly declares, that "all men are born free and equal," but in consequence of the superior wealth and influence of the white population, they have deemed themselves justifiable in establishing and pursuing the notorious practice of holding their colored brethren, who are the children of the same Almighty Parent, and possesed of the same feelings with themselves, mental and physical, in the most abject servitude and oppression--trafficking in their flesh, separating parent from child, husband from wife, and brother from sister, without any regard to those social and domestic enjoyments, which they themselves profess to esteem so highly: And, whereas, it is well ascertained, that self-interest will induce individuals to perform acts for which reason and humanity have long been appealed to in vain; and as every individual who uses the produce of slave labor encourages the slave-holder, becomes also a participator in his wickedness, and rivets the chains of the oppressed more firmly: And, whereas, the substituting of the produce of freemen for that of slaves, is a sure method of lessening the value of slave-labor and destroying the gains of the hardened oppressor, and will, therefore, induce him sooner or later, to restore to the oppressed those inalienable rights, of which they have been so cruelly and unjustly deprived: And, moreover, as it particularly becomes us, who are more closely allied to the sons of Africa, to use our influence to change their present degraded condition, and restore them to the rank which nature and nature's God designed they should occupy: Therefore, we, whose names are hereunto subscribed, agree to form ourselves into an association, to be called the "Colored Free Produce Society of Pennsylvania," that we may the more easily obtain and impart such information, connected with this subjct, as may promote the objects above stated: and for the furtherance of these views we adopt for our government the following Constitution." The annexed proceedings of a meeting of the association, are inserted at the request of the officers thereof. A stated meeting of the Colored, Free Produce Society, was held in Philadelphia, on the evening of the 18th of April, 1831. The meeting was honored by the presence of several of our white friends, who are members of a similar institution. The House being organized, business commenced by calling the roll, after which the quarterly contributions were taken up. The minutes of the preceeding meeting were then read by the Secretary; and the minutes of the corresponding committee were read by their Secretary. A report being presented by the corresponding committee, on motion it was read & adopted. A communication was handed in by one of our white friends:--which was also read. The meeting was then addressed, by Mr. Lundy; he stated many important things, for our encouragement; he was followed by another gentleman, with some very salutary remarks. It was, on motion, resolved, That this society appropriate ten dollars, to be added to the premium offered for Rice, raised by free labor. On motion, resolved, that the thanks of this meeting be given to those white friends, who have honored us with their presence and advice. JAMES CORNISH, Secretary. REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE. The committee to whom was referred the preparation of a report, relative to the proceedings of the colored Free Produce Society, respectfully state: That they have had the subject under consideration, and cannot regard it in any other light than that of the deepest interest to us--because it looks forward to the annihilation of a practice, which has long been regarded by some of the most enlightened nations in Europe, as piratical, unjust, and anti-christian, in its operations--because it deprives man of those privileges which are inseparable from his constitutional habits, for no other reason than the unalterable color of his skin. Your committee has the satisfaction to observe, that since the formation of this society, the demand and consumption of the articles of Free Produce have exceeded the most sanguine expectations of its friends; and as an evidence of this, we learn, by a statement of Mr. James L. Pierce, a gentleman who is extensively engaged in the sale of articles of Free Produce, that the sales within the last 18 months have been between five and six thousand dollars.--And so warmly have some of the members of this society entered into the spirit of the undertaking, that from 23 to 50 lbs of free sugar have been purchased at a time for family consumption.--And one of them has commenced the sale of Free Cotton articles, upon a small scale. Your committee would further mention, that they hav had repeated interviews with the members of the white Free Produce Society, from which they have drived much satisfaction and information. Your committee humbly hope that they have fulfilled the duty assigned them--and, therefore beg to be discharged. FREDERICK A. HINTON ROBT. PURVIS. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource James Cornish, Frederick A. Hinton, Robert Purvis Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Genius of Universal Emancipation 2:1, p. 6 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 5.1831 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Meetings and Events Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource COLOURED FEMALE FREE PRODUCE SOCIETY Description An account of the resource We begin to grow proud of our countrywomen. For a long time we could not think only with deep mortification of their unworthy negligence of the piteous call of their suffering fellow creatures. In England societies were forming in almost every corner and section of the country. Here only one existed, to cheer with its usefulness and activity the broad waste of inertness that surrounded it. But the prospect is now growing brighter. There are luminous spots rising over the gloomy horison. The thought of our country's Dixon and Greenfield rises like a beacon of hope amidst its darkness, and the many manifestations of an increasing interest in the fate of those who have been so long suffered hopelessly to perish beneath the curse of slavery, seem to offer a consolatory promise that a happier day is yet in store for them. It is especially pleasing to us that so many of our coloured sisters have united in entering the field of Emancipation. If we have hitherto said but little respecting their Association, it was not because we have beheld its formation and progress with indifference; for the remembrance of it seldom crosses our thought without bringing with it a feeling of exultation. Their promptness and numbers are a reproach to the inactive carelessness of so many of their white sisters: and we sincerely hope they will persevere undiscouraged in the noble course they have commenced. To hear of their activity and usefulness will always be a high pleasure to us, and we wish that their excellent examples may not be lost either upon their sisters of a fairer hue, of those of their own colour in other places. We rejoice also on their own accounts at the step they have taken; it is one that is calculated to raise them both in their own respect, and that of others, and in itself to contribute to the elevation of their characters. We learn that some of our friends of the Free Cotton Association have at different times met with them, and that a number of their members have attended the meetings of that society. These manifestations of reciprocal good feeling afford us much pleasure, and both societies have our warmest wishes for their prosperity and advancement in usefulness. Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Genius of Universal Emancipation 2:4, p. 57 Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource August 1831 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Articles, Letters to the Editors, etc. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Come and Look Through My Telescope (Article) Description An account of the resource "COME AND LOOK THROUGH MY TELESCOPE." Galileo . Frederick Douglass' Paper of the 19th, has in it, to me, the usual amount of articles of interest and instruction the editorial of W.J. Watkins not the least among the number. I have borrowed his figure, and am willing to look through Galileo's telescope. The first thing I see is a party of warmhearted abolitionists of Great Britain that have contributed funds for the benefit of free colored persons of the United States; of this fund, after passing through the hands of a distinguished friend of that proscribed class, a part is placed in the hands of a Philadelphian, very much their friend too (Samuel Rhodes) better known to some of the contributors to that fund that to G.T. Downing, and who has till now been regarded as devoted to their best interests. Now some one steps up and puts a piece of smoky glass before the telescope, and now everything looks deformed. I turn it towards Miss Miner and her school; she looks like a full blooded colonizationist, her scholars grown up and gone to preach the Gospel in Africa or elsewhere and S.R. Giving her countenance in all this. (Afflicting sight.) I turn it upon G.T. D., and he looks very unfriendly upon Oliver Johnson, William L. Garrison, and some others of the same school, and they all look forbidding then away with your smoky glass your "jaundice eye." Now with clearer field glass, I turn it towards the South there is Legree laughing in his sleeve as he gathers up a pile of money from his table. Why that sarcastic smile upon his countenance? He has just finished reading Wendell Phillip's lecture on Slavery, and is saying to himself that Phillips is more than half right those Northern abolitionists have, for these twenty-five years been trying to touch off their Quaker gun with one hand, and for twenty-five years, with the other have they been adding to this pile of money I reckon they believe us mighty stupid to pay more regard to their counsel than to their cash . By turning the telescope a little further up it reveals the channel through which that pile of money has reached him it has come from that ultra abolition State Massachusetts the land where "No Union with Slaveholders" was born that is not political or ecclesiastical union but where Commercial Union with them, the most precious of all to them, is maintained with almost religious exactness. Turn it a little further, and there is brought into view a long train of anti-slavery cotton spinners and store-keepers doing their part towards completing the connection between Legree and his remote customers, and pocketing their share of the spoils. I now turn it toward Rochester , Syracuse, and some other places where anti-slavery zeal glows the warmest, and what do I find? Some of the sources from which has spring that mighty river of patronage so indispensable to the Slaveholder and now annually worth near 140 millions of dollars. I listen to the eloquence of the one lecturer to the pathos of another to the tale of woe more strange than fiction then take up my telescope and see the bloodstained cotton upon their backs. I see the throngs of listeners, melted down with pity for the down-trodden victim of oppression weeping away the tear of sympathy, and yet, to all appearance, unconcernedly, partaking of tropical productions that have been wrung from the trembling limbs of the very objects of their compassion. But my telescope reveals bright spots as well as dark ones it shows me the free laborer of the South, willing to supply the abolitionists of the North with free grown productions, and able to do it (including cotton) far beyond the present demand for articles of that character. I can see the business channel, under the care of prudent, conscientious men, through which this anti -slavery cotton can reach anti - slavery people. I can see the Free Produce warehouse in Philadelphia, and the free cotton manufactory not far away form that city the thousands of earnest philanthropists scattered over the country who are able to do much toward turning the tide of patronage from the slaveholder into a more legitimate channel, and last but not least, I can see the conviction deepening in the minds of those philanthropists, that what they do with clean hands is doubly, nay, trebly done. Now, if G.T.D. would like to make use of my telescope to peep at S.R. with, or to know upon what principles it is constructed, I would recommend to him the reading of the Citizen of the World, edited by Elihu Burritt, and which succeeds the periodical to which R.R. alludes. "Come and look through my telescope," says Consistency. HENRY MILLS. MOUKTON, Vt., 1 mo. 29, 1855. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Henry Mills Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived Frederick Douglass' Paper Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 2.9.1855 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Articles, Letters to the Editors, etc. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Communication. Free Sugar and Molasses Description An account of the resource (COMMUNICATION.) FREE SUGAR AND MOLASSES. The patrons of the Liberator, who are accustomed to think and write, are respectfully requested to consider what would be the probable consequences to the West India sugar plantations, if every town in New-England could show one or more establishments like that mentioned below. We have been informed that in the neighborhood of Jaffery, N.H., there are now erecting works for preparing on a large scale, <xsl-text></xsl-text>sugar and molasses from potatoes, <xsl-text></xsl-text>which are worth on the spot 17 cents per bushel. It is calculated that after paying for the potatoes and the expense, a nett profit of 20 <xsl-text></xsl-text>cents per bushel will be made. <xsl-text></xsl-text>A bushel will yield 7 lbs. of Sugar. For further particulars, see Silliman's Journal, the last number issued, where the process for making Sugar of potatoes is detailed. Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived The Liberator Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 3.31.1832 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Articles, Letters to the Editors, etc. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Communications, TROIT, June 29, 1848. Description An account of the resource <ul> <li style="list-style-type: none;"> <ul style="text-align: left;"></ul> </li> </ul> Communications. TROIT, June 29, 1848. FREDERICK DOUGLASS: My dear Sir,--I am on my return from a visit to my brother-in-law, James G. Birney. His health has been much impaired for several years, and it was not probable that I should ever see him, unless I should visit him. I found him residing at Lower Saginau. It is now in the heart of a wilderness; but in a dozen years it will be a town of no little importance. The commerce of the noble Saginau and of its partially navigable tributaries, will make it such. These streams drain a country of very great fertility, and abounding in good pine timber. Many lumbermen in the State of New York, have purchased land of me. They would have done far better, had they made their lumbering establishments at Lower Saginau. But I take up my pen to testify, in a few words, to the good character of the colored people of this city. They number one thousand, and are as a class, industrious, frugal, temperate, upright and intelligent. I have spent a Sabbath with them. In the morning, I attended their Methodist, and in the afternoon, their Baptist church. Mr. Gardner is the pastor of the former, and Mr. Davis of the latter. Mr. Davis is a neat, beautiful, and able writer. He formerly lived in Buffalo. He is a native of Maine. I find several acquaintances among the colored people of this city - namely, Robert Banks, George R. Symes, Lewis Haydon, and Henry Bibb and his wife. Banks and Symes were members of the colored school, which was sustained for several years in my little village. They are very worthy men. Mr. Bibb is preparing to go to England this Fall. His special employment there will be to advocate the disuse of the products of slave labor. His worthy wife will probably accompany him. Among the most estimable colored men of this city is Mr. George Baptist. I owe him much for his kind and useful attention to me. The colored people of this city justify themselves for congregating here, instead of scattering in the interior, on the ground that they can thereby better protect themselves from men-stealers, and can thereby better protect from men-stealers the almost daily arriving fugitives from the Southern prison-house. A large share of the colored people of this city are fugitive slaves. What a land is this, in which the poor and the weak are obliged to congregate themselves together in order to keep at bay the rich and the strong, who would steal them! You will perhaps say, "What a constitution cursed this land!" I would rather say, "What a people cursed this land!" Such a people, even though their Constitution had been dropped down from Heaven, would interpret it in behalf of justifying the oppression and devouring the poor. They have already in the Bible a Heaven-sent Constitution; and thus wickedly and blasphemously do they interpret it. With great regard, Your friend and brother, GERRIT SMITH. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Gerrit Smith Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived The North Star Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 7.7.1848 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Articles, Letters to the Editors, etc. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Communications: Free Productions Description An account of the resource COMMUNICATIONS. Excellent—excellent. FREE PRODUCTIONS. <xsl-text></xsl-text>To the Editor of the Liberator <xsl-text></xsl-text>. SIR— I am a plain hardworking farmer, who like to live as well as I can for my means. Now you must know that my wife and grown up daughters have got a notion out of some tract they have been reading, that we ought not to eat rice, nor sugar, nor anything that is raised by the labor of slaves. Sometime ago, my daughter Jane brought me the Liberator, and shewed me a string of questions as long as a rope of onions. 'There, father,' says she, looking quite pleased, 'when all these questions are answered, I am sure you will think just as we do, and will not be willing to use any more of the slave articles.' 'Well, well, child, wait till the answers come, and if there is anything in them to bring people round to your way of thinking, like enough I may join, if we can get the free things as cheap; but it stands to reason there is no use in just two or three beginning.' I saw she did not look satisfied, and, a day or two afterwards, I found that John and I were the only ones at table eating sugar, for they had contrived, somehow or other, to coax all the little ones into the plot. And not a sign of a rice pudding has whitened our board since that pamphlet came into the house. 'Why, wife,' said I 'what does all this mean?' Now my wife is a very reasonable woman, and no way apt to be freakish, and I saw she looked worried. 'My dear,' said she, 'I have thought a good deal about this, and I can't see but what the people here encourage the keeping just as many slaves, as it takes to raise what we use, and therefore it seems to me that no one, who thinks slavery wrong, ought to encourage it by eating the produce of it.' 'Why, wife,' said I, 'I think it is just as wrong to keep slaves, as you do, and I would starve to death, before I would have one; but it will do no good for just one family to make themselves uncomfortable only to be laughed at; but to humor you and the girls, I'll buy some free sugar, as you call it, for your eating, but as to getting sugar for all the hired folks, it's what I can't afford, and they must use molasses for their sweetening, slave or free.' So, the next time I went to town with my wagon, I had a great many notions to get for the family. 'Mind, father,' said the girls, 'that you get free labor articles.' Well, sir, I brought home a bag of East India sugar, a barrel of flour, half a bag of coffee, and 14 lbs. of the whitest New-York flour I could find, for my wife is pretty particular to have her cake, for company, look white. 'I hope they are all free,' said my eldest girl. 'Free, child? I suppose so, it's good Porto Rico coffee.' 'Why, that is slave coffee,' said she, 'from one of the West India Islands.' So, sir, that's the good of geography in my family; and as my boy, that's going to college, says, it needs a good deal of learning to know justly about everything, whether it is slave or free; more learning than I care to have; I got the coffee because it was the cheapest.' 'Why, yes,' said one of my pert daughters, 'it will be the cheapest, for only you and the hired men will drink it. What flour is it?' 'Good Baltimore flour.' 'Why, father, then it's from one of the slave states.' 'Pooh! pooh!' said I, 'I'm not going to give half a dollar a barrel more for flour, just for a whim.' 'My dear,' said my wife, 'we need not spend any more for the flour, it is only to put a little more indian, or a few more potatoes, into the bread, and in this way, we may make the wheat last enough longer to make up for the difference in the price, and so we may manage about many other things.' So they had always some such come off, when I was for reasoning with them. Then they are always talking about their substitutes, as they call them, for the slave articles; but I don't want such nonsense, when I can afford to feed my family with comfortable food. I will give you the history of one of these substitutes. It has always been my wife's fashion, when we have a boiled dinner, to make a good mess of rice broth, which always looked white enough to do anybody's heart good, and it is good wholesome food, and a proper piece of economy for a large family, like mine. Well, the other day, when I was seeing to my barn, one of the girls came and said she wanted some of the coarse ground corn. I did not think to ask what it was for, but at dinner time I found they had made it into what they called broth, and there was the whole set of little ones feeding on it. I scolded out, plain enough, to see my children eating swine's victuals so. I should not care to write just what I said, as you might not care to print it. I don't suppose the children understood what I said, but the broth was somehow connected, in their minds, with the pitiful stories they had heard of the slaves, and my little Nancy looked up in my face and said, 'Father, I wish all the poor little slave children had such a nice dinner,' I declare, sir, I never had the whole set of half-starved, miserable slaves brought so before my mind before, and it made me feel all over, I can't tell how, a sort of choky; and I thought then, I could have lived on bread and water, all the rest of my days, to do them good. The little creature kept watching me, as if she understood just how I felt, and called out, before the whole table, hired men and all, 'Father is crying about the poor black people.' I can't tell what happened next, nor how I came by it, but I had eaten up half a bowl of broth before I knew what I was about, and, I can tell you, it is really better eating than the rice broth, for there is more taste in it. I did not care to say so, because it might have seemed like encouraging my family in their notions, for there is no way that will keep folks thinking and talking about the slaves, so much as the having them brought so to our minds at every meal. There's one of my men that I've watched ever since that day I was so overtaken, and I see he always passes the sweetening along, very sly, without pouring out a drop. I can't say but what I've liked the poor fellow the better, because it looks so pitiful in him, but I know it is all nonsense, as it can't possibly do any good to the slaves; and besides, it is none of our business to meddle with what does not belong to us. But to go back to the point I set out with, about those questions; my folks won't be satisfied till they are answered. Upon recollection, I believe the girls said one of them had been answered, much to their minds; and that, I suppose, is what is carrying John over to their side. He is now just between hay and grass, willing to give the preference to the free articles, when he can get them, but not willing to give up the others. But when a full answer to the whole comes out, I expect the tables to be turned, for I can't think there will be anything to uphold them in such delusion, seeing they have never got much out of your paper to favor their doctrine; only I wonder that you put the questions in at all, for a question without an answer seems pretty much like a cart without a horse. But I suppose, in some things, an editor's business is like a farmer's— you can't always spend time to look after things just us you want them, but must take them as they come to hand; and that you are waiting till a real good horse comes along, to put to your cart, and you are right to be particular. But this, sir is what my college boy calls <xsl-text></xsl-text>figuring <xsl-text></xsl-text>language, and as I never got so far as that, in my arithmetic book, I had better write plain English, and say, that I suppose you are waiting for real good answers to those questions. After all, I sometimes can't help having a little misgiving that my wife and the girls <xsl-text></xsl-text>may <xsl-text></xsl-text>be right, but I shan't be ashamed; I'm for the truth any how, and I suppose I can understand a plain, fair argument; only, sir, I can tell you, it must be pretty smart reasoning, and none of your oh! and your ah! and your note of admiration arguments for me. I say again, it must be pretty smart reasoning that will convince me that all the folks in these Northern States have been acting, all this time, like a set of thief-helpers; but let the truth come out, and if it should prove so, we should have a stirring time among us. I remain, sir, your humble servant, ADAM ARATOR. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the resource Adam Arator Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived The Liberator Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 5.7.1831 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Articles, Letters to the Editors, etc. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Communications. Description An account of the resource COMMUNICATIONS. LAMPETER, (Pa.) 2nd mo. 1st, 1834. <xsl-text></xsl-text>Esteemed Friend W.L. Garrison:<xsl-text></xsl-text> I have been a reader of the Liberator for the last fourteen months, and have perused its pages with much interest; and in the last number which came to hand, issued January 4, I noticed an article headed 'THE PRODUCTS OF SLAVE LABOR,' signed C.F. which contains sentiments with which I do not unite. He says— 'It is often eloquently urged upon us that we should not so much as touch any thing suspected of contamination with the accursed system; and in abhorrence of the sin of slavery, there is danger lest we rashly adopt a course of conduct, calculated rather to retard than forward the cause so dear to us. Unless it can be shown that the practical bearing of the course of total abstinence proposed, is a mean of the abolition of slavery, I cannot think myself called to abstain. I have already given my reasons for not believing the use of slave products to be morally wrong, and having gone thus far—the question of the <xsl-text></xsl-text>probable <xsl-text></xsl-text>results of abstinence upon the community is a difficulty which meets one at the threshold.' I shall endeavor to show the practical bearing that <xsl-text></xsl-text>total <xsl-text></xsl-text>abstinence, especially if it were <xsl-text></xsl-text>universal <xsl-text></xsl-text>abstinence, would have on the system of slavery. First, They depend, at the South, upon slave labor for existence, We of the north, east and west, make those labors profitable, by using the products of them. For instance:—How would the editors of the Liberator support their paper, if every one would withdraw their patronage? Do not their patrons support them? Would not that, or any other paper, cease, if they had no other support but that of the editors and publishers? if no one would 'so much as <xsl-text></xsl-text>touch<xsl-text></xsl-text>' or <xsl-text></xsl-text>look <xsl-text></xsl-text>at them? Again, how or what would the retailers do, if there were no consumers? And what would the wholesale merchant do, if there were no retailers? And what would the planters do, if there were no merchants, retailers or consumers, to uphold them in their 'accursed system'? Would not the slaveholders have to abandon their man-stealing and robbing? and this, too, for better reasons, and in consequence of more pacific and christian conduct, than it would be to 'hold a knife at their throats.' Nor is it stronger or weaker than <xsl-text></xsl-text>'moral persuasion.' <xsl-text></xsl-text>Let C.F. answer it. Does C.F. think that it is immoral to steal, rob and murder, in order to procure articles to subsist on? And are we not sharers in the crime, if we receive and share in them, knowing them to be such? If I handle the plunder, and another holds the bag, and the third carries it to C's house, and all four use it; does C. act morally, or immorally, in partaking of it, seeing 'the receiver is as bad as the thief'? And perhaps the thief maintains his family by his pilfering and robbing! Yet, if I withdraw my support, it will 'directly tend to deprive them of bread, and increase the distress they already experience as a consequent of' stealing, &c. Would he think this good reasoning? Yet it is a fair comparison with the course C. appears to favor. I can see no essential difference between highway robbery, which the laws of our country do not justify, and robbing a man of his liberty and property, who is held guiltless by the laws of the slave States; the <xsl-text></xsl-text>principle <xsl-text></xsl-text>is the same; the only difference is in the degree if it will at all bear a comparison. The latter is a thousand fold more wicked and unjust; for what would a man take in exchange for his liberty? Now, if we do not perceive it expedient to cease from supporting a system which cannot be perpetuated but by violence and fraud, it must be because we are so habituated to it, and educated in the <xsl-text></xsl-text>use <xsl-text></xsl-text>of its products; and this habit and education so far become <xsl-text></xsl-text>'second nature' <xsl-text></xsl-text>to us, that our moral senses have become blunted in the perception of its wrongs and enormities. 'Beside, why should we connect with anti-slavery principles—so plain and defensible in themselves—a measure of doubtful expediency, and one about which there is a division of opinion in the community? So far as this measure is not necessarily connected with our views as to the abolition of slavery, so far it is an injury rather than a benefit, because it connects an extraneous principle to one which should be brought before the American people, untrammaled and unprejudiced.' Now I think that abstinence is not a measure separate and distinct from anti-slavery principles, as C.F. supposes; but one with it, and belonging to it. He likewise says, it is 'a measure of doubtful expediency.' Now, if we who profess anti-slavery principles doubt the expediency of our not availing ourselves of the use of articles taken by violence, and fraud, and blood-shed, and handed down to us through several transfers, and for which we can show no better title than the master (so styled) can for his slaves—so may he doubt the expediency of his sacrificing his claims. Now, to be consistent, we ought to cease even our <xsl-text></xsl-text>'moral persuasion' <xsl-text></xsl-text>with the slave-holders, for their title is as good as ours; they did not steal the slaves first; they bought them, they will tell you, or, rather, the system <xsl-text></xsl-text>'was entailed <xsl-text></xsl-text>upon them by their fathers.' Might not the slaveholders reason in the same way, with the same propriety that he has done? There is this difference; they are the first perpetrators—we are their agents; and how can they continue in their system of robbery without our agency? Besides, is there any measure, about which there is no division of opinion? If not, then all measures are rendered abortive, seeing there are doubts and divisions concerning them all. Let C.F. not be deceived by the adversary of all good; for, remember, we are not to do evil that good may come, in partaking of their sins, lest we also partake of their plagues. If they perish, will not the guilt rest upon the heads of the oppressors? The editor favors the opinion that his correspondent 'is a <xsl-text></xsl-text>total abstinence <xsl-text></xsl-text>man in disguise.' If so, I think he does not regard the truth as a man should, professing such just and christian principles. I shall have to express a different opinion of him; I believe he is not an abstinence man, though personally unknown to me, for his 'weapons' do not favor those of a <xsl-text></xsl-text>total abstinence <xsl-text></xsl-text>man; but of a contrary principle. Therefore, let him seriously consider it, and answer for the benefit of <xsl-text></xsl-text>himself <xsl-text></xsl-text>'and others.' ABSTINENCE. Source A related resource from which the described resource is derived The Liberator Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource 3.1.1834