On the record
The people of Indiana had no right to take advantage of their own wrong, or to sacrifice the welfare of four million blacks on the altar of Northern consistency.
Source
gutenberg.orgGeorge Julian: “The people of Indiana had no right to take advantage of their own wrong, or to sacrifice the welfare of four million…”
Editor's note · Context
Julian argues against sacrificing the rights of African Americans for the sake of Northern political consistency.
Share
More from George Julian
And the misfortune of this legislation is heightened by the probability of its continuance; for it is not easy to uproot a body of laws once accepted by a people, however mischievous in their character.
The system of public plunder inaugurated by Jackson was in full blast, and an organized effort to reform it was the real need of the hour; but here was the weak point of the Whigs.
It is not a mistake merely, but a great misfortune, that our laws touching so delicate and vital a question as the ownership and transfer of mineral lands were not so framed as to avert these frightful evils.
Such a state of affairs is worse than pestilence or famine; but the evil of uncertain titles puts on new and very aggravated forms in our gold-bearing regions.
Other voices in this conversation
