I know that our laws make a distinction in this matter. I know that the
man who is allowed to freight his vessel with slaves at home, for a
distant market, would be thought worthy of death if he should take a
similar freight on the coast of Africa; but I know, too, that this
distinction is absurd, and at war with the common sense of mankind, and
that God and good men regard it with abhorrence.
"I recollect that it was always a mystery in Newburyport how Mr. Todd
contrived to make profitable voyages to New Orleans and other places,
when other merchants, with as fair an opportunity to make money, and
sending to the same ports at the same time invariably made fewer
successful speculations. The mystery seems to be unravelled. Any man can
gather up riches if he does not care by what means they are obtained."
A copy of the _Genius_, containing this article Garrison sent to the
owner of the ship _Francis_. What followed made it immediately manifest
that the branding irons of the reformer had burned home with scarifying
effect. Mr. Todd's answer to the strictures was a suit at law against
the editors of the _Genius_ for five thousand dollars in damages. But
this was not all. The Grand Jury for Baltimore indicted them for
publishing "a gross and malicious libel against Francis Todd and
Nicholas Brown." This was at the February Term, 1830. On the first day
of March following, Garrison was tried.
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