Remember, gentlemen, you have, by your votes, in this free State of Ohio, so treated a part of her people, these black men and women.
I am not unconscious of the persuasive power exerted by these considerations to drag men along in the current; but I am not at liberty to travel that road.
I may fall here in the Senate chamber, but I will. never make any compromise with any such men.
I am amazed at the facility with which some men follow in the wake of slavery.
Sometimes it leads me even to hesitate whether I am strictly correct in my idea that all men are born to equal rights, for their conduct seems to me to contravene the doctrine.
I am not unaware how unpopular on this floor are the sentiments I am about to advocate.
I have always believed, heretofore, in the doctrines of the Declaration of Independence, that all men are born free and equal; but of late it appears that some men are born slaves, and I regret that they are not black, so all the world might know them.