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" I do not subscribe to the doctrine that the people are the slaves and property of their government. I believe that government is for the use of the people, and not the people for the use of the government. "

Gerrit Smith

Believe

I Believe

Government

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" Let the poor man count as his enemy, and his worst enemy, every invader of the right of free discussion. "

" Our political and constitutional rights, so called, are but the natural and inherent rights of man, asserted, carried out, and secured by modes of human contrivance. "

" I welcomed the organization of the Anti-slavery Society. "

" I am a plain man, and I care and know comparatively little about rhetoric. "

" It, sometimes, suits the slaveholders to claim, that their slavery is an exclusively State concern; and that the North has, therefore, nothing to do with it. "

" The poor North has much to do with slavery. It staggers under its load and smarts under its lash. "

" I trust, that your readers will not construe my words to mean, that I would not have gone to a 3 o'clock in the morning session, for the sake of defeating the Nebraska bill. "

" There is one class of men, whom it especially behoves to be tenacious of the right of free discussion. I mean the poor. "

" It is not to be disguised, that a war has broken out between the North and the South. - Political and commercial men are industriously striving to restore peace: but the peace, which they would effect, is superficial, false, and temporary. "

" The Southern slave would obey God in respect to marriage, and also to the reading and studying of His word. But this, as we have seen, is forbidden him. "

" I prefer, in a word, the republican system, because it comes up more nearly to God's system. "

Gerrit Smith

System

Republican

" God cannot approve of a system of servitude, in which the master is guilty of assuming absolute power - of assuming God's place and relation towards his fellow-men. "

" But I love honesty, and, therefore; do I make great account of facts. "

" I do not object to the construction of rail roads and canals. "

" As this is the first time I have had the floor, it may be well for me now to confess, that I am in the habit of freely imputing errors to my fellow-men. "

Gerrit Smith

Now

First Time

" But, although America cannot be justly charged with violating the rights of Turkey, Turkey nevertheless can be justly charged with violating the rights of America. "

" There is room in our ranks for the old and decrepit, as well as the young and vigorous. "

" My rights all spring front an infinitely nobler source - from favor and grace of God. "

" Our concern, however, is with slavery as it is, and not with any theory of it. "

" It is manifestly vital to the success of the anti-slavery cause, that the authority and influence of proslavery, especially of slaveholding, ministers should be destroyed. "

" The only ground on which a neutral State can claim respect at the hands of belligerents is, that, so far as she is concerned, their rights are protected. "

" I believe that government is for the use of the people, and not the people for the use of the government. "

" I need say no more, to prove that slavery is entirely unlike the servitude in the patriarchal families. "

" Let us tell our legislators in advance, that this is a right, restraints on which, we will not, cannot bear; and that every attempt to restrain it is a palpable wrong on God and man. "