Anti-Abolition

October 15, 1852

Under the Refuge of Oppression, there are extracts  from Rev. Dr. Joel Parker, who is simply identified as an “Evangelical” Divine.  “When the slave’s desired freedom has been obtained, his destitution of political rights soon begins to be felt as a hard condition.  Some of our philanthropists had hoped that this difficulty might be removed.  I have myself no confidence in such an anticipation.  But suppose it might be removed, then, though new privileges have been acquired, the acquisition only makes their social inferiority more keenly felt.  To be unfettered in body and intellect, to be cultivated in taste and manners, to be elevated to an equal political influence, and yet to be held in a condition of social inferiority, that must be felt as the ‘unkindest cut of all.’  …the white race must be free to choose such conjugal and other social relations as are most agreeable to their tastes. They will never unite themselves with a caste which is physically and mentally inferior to their own, especially when marked by such a broad and unmistakable distinction as black and white….”

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