W[illiam] W[hipper] to Frederick Douglass, May 30, 1858

Letter from William Whipper.

[For Frederick Douglass' Paper.]

COLUMBIA, May 30, 1858.

MR. EDITOR:—Twenty-five years ago, in Pennsylvania, the civil "status" of the "free blacks" was undefined. They were not the, as now, legally and politically overshadowed by the Slave Power. They were imbued with an honest pride of having been the early recipients of the patriotic achievements of a State, that was the first in the Confederacy to strike the fetters from the bondsmen. Their patriotism was inspired with gratitude, and they had embalmed in their affections that long roll of illustrious names that constitute the list of her early benefactors.

They had not learned that the celebrated Act of Emancipation of 1780—the pride and boast of Pennsylvania—had left them to occupy an intermediate state between men and monkeys. It is, however, true, that they legality of their rights to enjoy the elective franchise had been questioned, and, in some cases, denied. They appealed from a corrupt public sentiment, to the throne of public justice, and, as they supposed, to the purity of the judicial ermine. They knew that the sun of Liberty had reflected her salutary rays over every territory that had inherited the common law of England, from the time the illustrious Mansfield had declared from the King's Bench, in the case of the no less illustrious Sommersett, that slavery was incompatible to British law. The appeal was in vain. The Supreme Court decided against them under the old Constitution, and the people under the new.—It did not require a keen vision to discover that they were legally and politically overshadowed by the dark spirit of slavery. Now the names of Wm. T. Fogg and Dred Scott will hereafter be regarded as the ascendant stars in the State and National horizon, that will form the future landmarks that will guide a future Gibson and Taney in marking the boundary of the free black man's rights and privileges.

As one of the "free blacks of Pennsylvania, I claim no exemption from the charge of having imbibed the "apathy of despair." If I were at this moment hopeful with regard to the future condition of our people, under all the surrounding circumstances, opinions, and practices of the rulers in the National and State governments, I would not find fault with others for regarding me as visionary and fanatical, so long as I had failed to demonstrate the probability of our civil and political advancement. Until I had done this, my faith in the future ought to be considered an illusion—a phantom—not a reality.

The Trinitarian powers of earth—the Church, the Government, and public senti-

ment—are against us; and worse than all, we are against ourselves. The oppression from without has not taught us that the first great instinctive principle in human nature, is self-preservation.

Twenty-five years ago, the free blacks in Pennsylvania occupied a civil position favorable to their development. They received without hesitancy charters for institutions, for religious, moral, beneficial, and literary purposes; they voted at the polls, and their oaths were received as testimony in all the Courts in the States. Now their civil position is so very low, that they cannot even receive a PATENT from our county Courts to SELL RUM. Now, during the past twenty years, while this continued process of undermining the rights and privileges of the free blacks has been goin on, they have been rapidly advancing in religious and moral culture, science and mechanism. Have our efforts for enlightenment so offended public sentiment, as to lead them to chastise bus by disfranchisement? Gracious God! what demands are made of the free blacks by the ruling powers in this professedly enlightened and Christian age! Must we retreat back into ignorance, barbarism, superstition and idolatry, in order that we may regain our civil and political freedom? No, never! The sacrifice is too great, base and ignominious for the value of the prize to be attained. If we must choose between "apathy" and degradation, I say, give us the former. I am ready to exclaim that the most profound apathy is a virtue, rather than seek to obtain "civil and political freedom," at the sacrifice of all that is great and noble and of those principles which should guide our pathway in this life, and that which is to come.

W. W.