"But the two sides are always plainly apparent in every form of the struggle, and every man inevitably shows his colors. We are all Butternuts or Bluecoats. A modem Protestant clergyman, for instance, who boils down his Bible to distill from it the one black drop of slavery, and who excuses the most horrible crimes by the sending back of Onesimus and the cursing of Ham, joins hands with the Romish Grand Inquisitor Torquemada, and burns human freedom at the stake. The scientific scholar, who from the forma- tion of Tom's shin-bone proves that Dick may whip Tom's wife and sell his children, fights in the ranks with the cruel skill that used the thumb-screw and the boots to frighten the mind from freedom. And an American convention which solemnly resolves, with one in Pennsylvania lately, that to confer the right of suffrage upon any person but a white man is a crime against the Constitution and a degradation of the white race, helps Philip II. of Spain to crush the Netherlands, fights with the redcoats at Saratoga, tears the Declaration of Independence, and fires at the flag of the United States a more shameful shot than that at Sumter."
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Comedians from the United StatesEssayists from the United StatesSatirists from the United StatesEditors from the United StatesJournalists from Rhode Island
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George William Curtis
George William Curtis (24 February 1824 – 31 August 1892) was an American writer, reformer, public speaker, and political activist. He was an abolitionist and supporter of civil rights for African Americans and Native Americans. He also advocated women's suffrage, civil service reform, and public education.
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