EARLY MANHOOD-1851-1857 69 



road to preferment of any kind. Such were the tempta- 

 tions which, in those days, beset every young man who 

 dreamed of accomplishing something in life, and they 

 beset me in my turn; but there came a day when I dealt 

 with them decisively. I had come up across New Haven 

 Green thinking them over, and perhaps paltering rather 

 contemptibly with my conscience ; but arriving at the door 

 of North College, I stopped a moment, ran through the 

 whole subject in an instant, and then and there, on the 

 stairway leading to my room, silently vowed that, come 

 what might, I would never be an apologist for slavery 

 or for its extension, and that what little I could do against 

 both should be done. 



I may add that my conscience was somewhat aided by 

 a piece of casuistry from the most brilliant scholar in 

 the Yale faculty of that time, Professor James Hadley. 

 I had been brought up with a strong conviction of the ne- 

 cessity of obedience to law as the first requirement in 

 any State, and especially in a Republic; but here was the 

 fugitive slave law. What was our duty regarding it? 

 This question having come up in one of our division- 

 room debates, Professor Hadley, presiding, gave a de- 

 cision to the following effect : i l On the statute books of all 

 countries are many laws, obsolete and obsolescent ; to dis- 

 obey an obsolete law is frequently a necessity and never 

 a crime. As to disobedience to an obsolescent law, the 

 question in every man's mind must be as to the degree 

 of its obsolescence. Laws are made obsolescent by change 

 of circumstances, by the growth of convictions which ren- 

 der their execution impossible, and the like. Every man, 

 therefore, must solemnly decide for himself at what pe- 

 riod a law is virtually obsolete. ' ' 



I must confess that the doctrine seems to me now 

 rather dangerous, but at that time I welcomed it as a very 

 serviceable piece of casuistry, and felt that there was in- 

 deed, as Mr. Seward had declared, a "higher law" than 

 the iniquitous enactment which allowed the taking of a 

 peaceful citizen back into slavery, without any of the 



