Boston mob Governor McDuffie, pitched the key of the Southern
concert in his message to the legislature descriptive of anti-slavery
publications, and denunciatory of the anti-slavery agitation. The
Abolitionists were, to his mind, "enemies of the human race," and the
movement for immediate emancipation ought to be made a felony punishable
"by death without benefit of clergy." He boldly denied that slavery was
a political evil, and vaunted it instead as "_the corner stone of our
republican edifice_." The legislature upon the receipt of this
extraordinary message proceeded to demand of the free States the
suppression, by effective legislation, of anti-slavery societies and
their incendiary publications. The burden of this demand was directly
caught up by North Carolina, Alabama, Virginia, and Georgia. But there
were some things which even a pro-slavery North could not do to oblige
the South. Neither party, much as both desired it, dared to undertake
the violation by law of the great right of free speech and of the
freedom of the press. Not so, however, was it with sundry party leaders,
notably the governors of New York and Massachusetts, who were for trying
the strong arm of the law as an instrument for suppressing Abolitionism.
Edward Everett was so affected by the increasing Southern excitement and
his fears for the safety of the dear Union that he must needs deliver
himself in his annual message upon the Abolition agitation. He was of
the opinion that the Abolitionists were guilty of an offence against
Massachusetts which might be "prosecuted as a misdemeanor at common
law." He evidently did not consider that in the then present state of
political parties and of public opinion any repressive legislation upon
the subject could be got through the legislature, and hence the immense
utility of the old machinery of the common law, as an instrument for
putting down the agitation. But in order to get this machinery into
operation, careful preparation was necessary. Proof must not be wanting
as to the dangerous and unpatriotic character and tendency of the
movement to be repressed. There should be the most authoritative
utterance upon this point to warrant the effective intervention of the
Courts and Grand Juries of the commonwealth in the prosecution of the
Abolitionists, as disturbers of the peace. Ergo the Governor's
deliverance in his annual message against them. Now, if the legislature
could be brought to deliver itself in