Are you, then, doing right to sustain the validity of a
law for _others_, which you would vehemently reject for _yourselves_
in the name of outraged justice and humanity?
The incidents I have supposed might happen to yourselves if you were
slaves, are not an imaginary accumulation of horrors. The things I
have described are happening in this country every day. I have
talked with many "fugitives from injustice," and I could not, within
the limits of these pages, even hint at a tithe of the sufferings
and wrongs they have described. I have also talked with several
slaveholders, who had emancipated themselves from the hateful
system. Being at a safe distance from lynching neighbors, they could
venture to tell the truth; and their statements fully confirm all
that I have heard from the lips of slaves. If you read Southern
Laws, you will need very small knowledge of human nature to be
convinced that the practical results must inevitably be utter
barbarism. In view of those _laws_, I have always wondered how
sensible people could be so slow in believing the actual state of
things in slaveholding communities.
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