Francis Jackson Garrison, William Lloyd Garrison, 1805-1879; the story of his life told by his children: volume 2

In these sentiments of his old opponent Ex-President Jackson had fully concurred on withdrawing from public¹ life in a farewell address. His successor had, in his first message, pledged himself anew to defeat any measure² having in view the freedom of the District.³ From these summits the policy of repression expanded downwards. The Washington National Intelligencer voluntarily ⁴ padlocked its own lips, agreeing to exclude all discussion of slavery from its columns except as occurring in the Congressional proceedings. The press of the District⁵ generally garbled even these. Elsewhere, editors began injuriously to misreport the speeches at anti-slavery⁶ meetings.⁷ And finally, the churches, not to be behind the politicians in the race of subserviency to the sum of all villanies, each in its own way endeavored to smother the voices raised on behalf of the slave. The mode, for example, adopted by the Presbyterian General Assembly at Philadelphia, in June, was to lay all anti-slavery⁸ papers of every kind on the table without reading and without debate. And so ends the year of the Pastoral Letter and the Clerical Appeal.