The Condition, Elevation, Emigration, and Destiny of the Colored People of the United States | Page 3

By nature's law designed; Why
was an independent wish E'er planted in my mind!"

I
CONDITION OF MANY CLASSES IN EUROPE CONSIDERED
That there have been in all ages and in all countries, in every quarter of
the habitable globe, especially among those nations laying the greatest
claim to civilization and enlightenment, classes of people who have
been deprived of equal privileges, political, religious and social, cannot
be denied, and that this deprivation on the part of the ruling classes is
cruel and unjust, is also equally true. Such classes have even been
looked upon as inferior to their oppressors, and have ever been mainly
the domestics and menials of society, doing the low offices and
drudgery of those among whom they lived, moving about and existing
by mere sufferance, having no rights nor privileges but those conceded
by the common consent of their political superiors. These are historical
facts that cannot be controverted, and therefore proclaim in tones more
eloquently than thunder, the listful attention of every oppressed man,
woman, and child under the government of the people of the United
States of America.
In past ages there were many such classes, as the Israelites in Egypt, the

Gladiators in Rome, and similar classes in Greece; and in the present
age, the Gipsies in Italy and Greece, the Cossacs in Russia and Turkey,
the Sclaves and Croats in the Germanic States, and the Welsh and Irish
among the British, to say nothing of various other classes among other
nations.
That there have in all ages, in almost every nation, existed a nation
within a nation--a people who although forming a part and parcel of the
population, yet were from force of circumstances, known by the
peculiar position they occupied, forming in fact, by the deprivation of
political equality with others, no part, and if any, but a restricted part of
the body politic of such nations, is also true.
Such then are the Poles in Russia, the Hungarians in Austria, the Scotch,
Irish, and Welsh in the United Kingdom, and such also are the Jews,
scattered throughout not only the length and breadth of Europe, but
almost the habitable globe, maintaining their national characteristics,
and looking forward in high hopes of seeing the day when they may
return to their former national position of self-government and
independence, let that be in whatever part of the habitable world it may.
This is the lot of these various classes of people in Europe, and it is not
our intention here, to discuss the justice or injustice of the causes that
have contributed to their degradation, but simply to set forth the
undeniable facts, which are as glaring as the rays of a noonday's sun,
thereby to impress them indelibly on the mind of every reader of this
pamphlet.
It is not enough, that these people are deprived of equal privileges by
their rulers, but, the more effectually to succeed, the equality of these
classes must be denied, and their inferiority by nature as distinct races,
actually asserted. This policy is necessary to appease the opposition
that might be interposed in their behalf. Wherever there is arbitrary rule,
there must be necessity, on the part of the dominant classes, superiority
be assumed. To assume superiority, is to deny the equality of others,
and to deny their equality, is to premise their incapacity for
self-government. Let this once be conceded, and there will be little or
no sympathy for the oppressed, the oppressor being left to prescribe

whatever terms at discretion for their government, suits his own
purpose.
Such then is the condition of various classes in Europe; yes, nations, for
centuries within nations, even without the hope of redemption among
those who oppress them. And however unfavorable their condition,
there is none more so than that of the colored people of the United
States.

II
COMPARATIVE CONDITION OF THE COLORED PEOPLE OF
THE UNITED STATES
The United States, untrue to her trust and unfaithful to her professed
principles of republican equality, has also pursued a policy of political
degradation to a large portion of her native born countrymen, and that
class is the Colored People. Denied an equality not only of political but
of natural rights, in common with the rest of our fellow citizens, there
is no species of degradation to which we are not subject.
Reduced to abject slavery is not enough, the very thought of which
should awaken every sensibility of our common nature; but those of
their descendants who are freemen even in the non-slaveholding States,
occupy the very same position politically, religiously, civilly and
socially, (with but few exceptions,) as the bondman occupies in the
slave States.
In those States, the bondman is disfranchised, and for the most part so
are we. He is denied all civil,