LETTERS TO MR. JOHN TAYLOR. 269 



ing liberty and slavery, which have reached the ears of the 

 Africans, has arrested the wicked project for the revival of 

 the slave-trade, and the apprehensions excited on the plan- 

 tations and in the cities will probably discourage Southern 

 emigration to Kansas. This terror from the Almighty ap- 

 pears to have thrown back the spirit of slavery upon its 

 own guilty conscience ; and it is obvious, from the power- 

 ful assaults made upon it in Congress, that the slavery 

 men, with a bad cause and a bad conscience, evidently 

 quail before the manly attacks of the men who have God 

 and the right on their side. The confidence is strong that 

 Kansas will yet be a Free State, and that the aggressions 

 of slavery will find a Northern barrier which they cannot 

 pass ; but much remains yet to be done, and I trust that 

 the friends of freedom will not falter in this great conflict. 



Your ideas as to the designs of the South comprehend- 

 ing both continents, I have no doubt are well-founded. 



As to the policy of our new President, we can form no 

 satisfactory opinion, and it would be idle to repeat the spec- 

 ulations of the prints both at home and abroad 



TO MR. JOHN TAYLOR. 



NEW HAVEN, March 26, 1857. 



I HAVE already hinted that we have gained 



nothing in this country by the change of administration. 

 The slave-power has now engrossed every branch of the 

 government, and their plans, evidently matured and skil- 

 fully arranged, are now being developed in an alarming 

 form. Last of all, the Supreme Court of the United 

 States, formerly our palladium, and unpolluted by party 

 influence, has now lent itself as the instrument of extend- 

 ing slavery into regions where it is not, and of riveting its 

 chains where they are already imposed. To you, who are 

 so well informed in all our affairs, and who so well under- 

 stand the working of our political machinery, it is unneces- 



