I.

PHILADELPHIA, Fifth month 17th, 1838.

To John Swift, Mayor of the City of Philadelphia;

Esteemed Friend:-Last evening, as the Female Anti-Slavery Society were holding a public meeting in the Pennsylvania Hall, situated on Delaware Sixth street, between Mulberry and Sassafras streets, whilst Angelina E. Grimké Weld, of South Carolina, was addressing the meeting, our house was assaulted by a ruthless mob, who broke our windows, alarmed the women, and disturbed the meeting very much, by yelling, stamping, and throwing brickbats and other missiles through the windows.

The audience consisted of more than three thousand persons, a majority of whom were respectable and intelligent women.

In our invitation to thee to attend the opening of our Hall, (dated the 4th day of the Fourth month last,) we mentioned that we should hold public meetings on the 14th, 15th, and 16th of this month. We now beg leave to inform thee that the Female Convention of American Women will meet in the saloon of the Pennsylvania Hall at 10 o'clock this morning; the Free Produce Convention at 2 o'clock, and the Convention of American Women at 4 o'clock, this afternoon; and the Methodist Anti-Slavery Society at 8 o'clock this evening. To-morrow the State Anti-Slavery Society will meet at 8 o'clock, and the Free Produce Convention at 10 o'clock, in the morning; the Convention of American Women will meet at 1 o'clock, and the Free Produce Convention will meet at 4 o'clock, in the afternoon; and the Pennsylvania State Anti-Slavery Society will meet at 8 o'clock in the evening; and we shall continue to meet in our building from time to time, as occasion may require; and we call upon thee as Chief Magistrate of the city, to protect us and our property, in the exercise of our constitutional right peaceably to assemble and discuss any subject of general interest.

Respectfully thine, &c.

Signed by direction of the Board of Managers of the Pennsylvania Hall Association.

(Signed,)

DANIEL NEALL, President of the Board.

(Attest,) WILLIAM DORSEY, Secretary.

P. S. We herewith enclose a written placard,* numbers of which were posted up in various parts of the city. So far as we have seen, all appeared to be in the same hand writing. Our Committee will also furnish thee with the name of one of the ring-leaders of the mob.

D. N.

K.

PHILADELPHIA, Fifth month 18th, 1838. Friend John Swift:-I have just now been informed that my residence, No. 307 Mulberry street, is to be attacked by the mob this night. I therefore call upon the Mayor of the city, the Aldermen and Constables, to protect me and my property.

(Signed,)

Addressed-John Swift, Mayor of the City of Philadelphia.

SAMUEL WEBB.

L.

To the Mayor of the City of Philadelphia:

Sir:-The undersigned, Book and Job Printers, No 7 Carter's alley, having learned from many persons who have mingled among the mobo

* Why did the Committee suppress that placard in their report?

crats during the last two days, that our office will be the first object of attack this evening, have deemed it proper to apprize you of the fact, inasmuch as the city and county are responsible for the property thus destroyed. We ourselves decline any attempt to protect the property, which exceeds three thousand dollars in value.

Sir:-Understanding that an attack by a mob has been threatened upon the office of the Public Ledger, situated at the corner of Dock and Second streets, for this evening, we consider it our duty to inform you of the apprehensions numerous reports of such threats are likely to create, that you may take such measures as may be deemed necessary by you as a conservator of the public peace, to prevent an outrage of the kind.

Very respectfully, your obedient servants,

12 o'clock, M.

SWAIN, ABELL, & SIMMONS.*

Addressed to Col. John Swift, Mayor of Philadelphia, Mayor's Office.

* In the Public Ledger of this city, for July 20, 1838, we find the following letter to the publishers of that paper:

PHILADELPHIA, July 17th, 1838.

Gentlemen': -I received, late this evening, your note in relation to the observations of the Committee on Police, to which you take exceptions, and have laid the letter before the Committee. We regret that any thing in the Report should have appeared to you incorrect, or calculated to exhibit you in a position which you do not occupy.

Anxious to report to Councils every circumstance attending and connected with, not only the destruction of the Pennsylvania Hall, but also with "other consequent disturbances of the peace," the Committee had, in reply to an application to the Mayor for information, received from him your letter in connection with the other two; and were thereby led to believe (erroneously, as it now appears) that the apprehensions which you expressed in it, arose from your being in some measure connected with the Hall, as the authors of the other two letters were known to be. The statement was not intended to convey either praise or censure, this not being considered as embraced within the objects of their appointment: yet as it appears to be incorrect, they regret that they should have fallen into this error.

Ás to the second paragraph, to which you object, the Committee think that the quotation in it from the letter L, sufficiently connects it with that letter. The refusal expressed therein, by the writers of that letter, to protect their property, and the well known entire abandonment of his house, by the writer of the letter K, were supposed to justify the remarks as applicable to those letters. The Committee ever have refrained from expressing an opinion, leaving the matter to Councils. If this silence on their part can be interpreted into censure, the Committee cheerfully admit (from the information contained in your letter, that you were ready to aid in the protection of your property,) that you could not be liable to censure; and although none is expressed, yet the Committee regret that the sentence should have appeared to you ambiguous.

Yours, very respectfully,

JOHN S. WARNER, Chairman P. C.

From the following communication, it appears that the veracious police committee made another mistake. If out of three letters they have made mistakes in relation to two, of how much value are the statements made by such a committee !

To Daniel Neall, Esq.

In the Public Ledger of July 20th, we find it stated by John S. Warner, chairman of the Police Committee, that the writers of the letter marked "L" in the appendix to their "report," (meaning the undersigned,) "were known to be in some measure connected with the Hall." We should have felt it an honor to be "connected in some measure" with you in that noble building; but we are sorry to say that the fact is not as stated by John S. Warner. Neither as individuals, nor as a firm, were we connected with the Hall in any other way than by giving it our best wishes as a building dedicated to Free Discussion. You may make what use you please of this communication.

Respectfully, yours,

MERRIHEW & GUNN.

66

No. VI.

We invite attention to the following able and unanswerable review of the Report in Councils" on the late riot in this city. It is from the Cincinnati Daily Gazette, the leading Whig paper of the Great West; and from the pen of its learned and influential editor, CHARLES HAMMOND, Esq. It is not the production of an abolitionist, or of one personally interested in the Pennsylvania Hall, but of a disinterested citizen of another state, a profound and intelligent lawyer, examining the Report on its merits, and apart from the exciting influences of this locality,-the impartial and deliberate judgment of an honest and high-minded man, whose integrity was never impeached.

(From the Cincinnati Daily Gazette.)

The Committee appointed in May last, "to investigate and report to the Councils the circumstances attending and connected with the destruction of Pennsylvania Hall," made their report, of date July 2d. Nothing has been elicited to vary the character of that outrage as already presented to the public. Its daring enormity, and the humiliating imbecility of the police are left in full exposure. The willingness of the citizens to countenance the mob is distinctly asserted, and put forth as an apology for the police. And even an apology is attempted for the citizens themselves. Taking the report as a whole, it is a document of mischievous tendency. It is to be regretted that the inquiry was commenced. Indeed, it seemed at its origin to be a forlorn effort-a hopeless attempt to do something in a desperate case, that might efface a portion of the degradation attached to it.

It is lamentable that we should find, in this report, a resort to the vicious, shallow, nay, wICKED EXCUSE FOR THE MOB, that has become so common in the country. The provocation is industriously and prominently set out. And the Committee so present this provocation as to more than half impress it upon the reader, that it deserves from him a serious consideration. Here is their own language:

"However deeply the Committee may deprecate and censure the existence of that feeling [excitement]; however impossible it may be for them in any manner to justify or excuse it, they owe it to the cause of truth to declare that this excitement, (heretofore unparalleled in our city,) was occasioned by the determination of the owners of that building, and of their friends, to persevere in openly promulgating in it doctrines repulsive to the moral sense of a large majority of our community, and to persist in this course against the advice of friends, heedless of the dangers which they were encountering, or reckless of its consequences to the peace and order of the city."

The proposition assumed in this paragraph is alike derelict of just morals and sound policy. It is a violation of nature's great charter of free action and free discussion, within the pale of municipal law, for one man to foment himself into excitement against his fellow man, upon account of doctrines maintained, or opinions advanced, which are forbidden by no law. The engendering of such excitement is a hot-bed growth of most noxious character. Whence can one individual derive a right to sit in judgment upon his neighbor's conversation, to condemn it, and work himself into a passion in respect to it, if that conversation affects no private interest and violates no law? That a man becomes excited, because another man promulgates doctrines disagreeable to him, proves only that the excited party is saturate of presumptuous self-sufficiency. If under the influence of this excitement he becomes furious and lawless in his conduct, and arrogantly tramples upon the

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197

undoubted rights of those against whom he is exasperated, do just morals permit that his excitement, in itself highly reprehensible, shall be alleged as an apology for its consequent outrage? It is but to state the proposition to secure for it utter condemnation. Yet this Philadelphia committee seriously urge this excitement as an apology for the persons who indulged it to the shame and disgrace of the city. That this is a departure from just morals, would seem too clear for controversy.

The impolicy of suggesting an unwarranted excitement as an apology for a flagitious wrong, one would suppose would be palpable to every reflecting mind. It spreads out a mantle to be thrown over every excess, in which vulgar malice and daring profligacy may be excited to engage. Every where, it is most impolitic to countenance such an impression. In a large city, bearing directly upon a case of mob violence, and coming from a numerous portion of a public body charged with preserving the peace and securing the safety of the city, it is peculiarly and especially impolitic.

There is another matter worthy of remark, in the paragraph quoted. Is it true that the doctrines advocated in the Hall were 66 repulsive to the moral sense of a large majority of the community" of Philadelphia city? The Committee so assert, and the quietness with which the citizens at large witnessed the workings of the mob, gives countenance to the assertion. The question whether the doctrines promulgated and advocated, were violative of a just moral sense, may be waived for a moment. It is enough that the moral sense of the citizens of Philadelphia was justly and deeply outraged, by the congregation of strangers among them, to promulgate doctrines repulsive to that moral sense. And such being the fact, who can controvert the conclusion that an impulsive and speedy movement, in arrest of such inculcations, may be tacitly acquiesced in. It is an occasion for legal blindness and domestic silence, though not for official apologies. If such was the case in Philadelphia; if the Committee felt strong and clear assurance that the suppressed discussions were, in their very nature, morally repulsive to well regulated minds, there could certainly be no propriety in the vehement outpourings of reprobation in which the Committee indulge against the measures taken to stay their further progress. The natural argument runs thus. Whatever conduct is repulsive and abhorrent to the moral sense, necessarily arouses indignant sensations in the mind, and with this just indignation arises a strong natural impulse to put down the mischief. To effect this, some excess may be winked at.--With this train of reasoning the Committee work out an APOLOGY FOR THE MOB. But then immediately they shy off, as if startled at the foundation on which they have placed themselves.This proceeding of the Committee shows that they felt the awkwardness of their position, in essaying to build up error upon error, grounding the whole upon the utterly untenable assumption, that the moral sense of the city was offended, justly, necessarily outraged, at the discussions in the demolished Hall.

There can be no worse offensive presumption, no arrogance more intolerable than that which assumes, in this country, to set up, for itself, a moral sense that may revolt at opinions and discussions, acceptable to large masses of the entire community. Men may be offended at doctrines which impugn party, sectarian, and peculiar tenets, but the offence is against no universal moral preception. The slaveholder does not pretend that his moral sense is offended against the abolitionists. His excitement is roused because his private interest is assailed. Nor do the men of the South hold it fit to feel furious at the familiarities of association between the sexes of different colors. Individuals make their colored mistresses, openly, members of their domestic establishments, and seek among white persons matrimonial

alliances for their colored offspring. No moral sense feels outraged at this. And a strong illustration is at hand, in the fact that the individual that now occupies the second office in the government, was selected for and chosen to that high station, with a full knowledge, on the part of the whole community, that he had married as a wife his own slave, and openly sustained his connubial relation with her. That he had educated his daughters, of mixed blood, in the best fashion of the country, and had secured for them white men as husbands! To this individual a very large numerical vote was given in Philadelphia, to place him where he now is. Where, then, was that moral sense which the Committee allege was justly outraged, by the discussions of the Hall? Surely that was a fit occasion for its sensibilities to take the alarm. And yet they were all quiescent:-a fact warranting the conclusion, that it was not an impulse of a legitimate moral sense, that set the mob in motion against the abolition Hall. On the contrary, every step of that movement is marked by feelings, in which a just moral sense could have no participation. The actors were excited by vulgar brutality, that indulges a rooted malice against the black man's elevation in society: the lookers on were chained into inactivity by the avarice of trade. COTTON AND SUGAR BEREFT THEM OF MORAL SENSE, AND SUBSTITUTED COLD AND HEARTLESS CALCULATIONS OF SOUTHERN MARKETS AND SOUTHERN VISITERS. In our mercantile cities, the general tone of feeling towards the negro is much lower than the slaveholder of character tolerates in himself. Its main spring is the "truck and traffic of sordid avarice." The poet's exclamation is of strict application:

"Trade, wealth, and fashion, call him still to bleed,

And holy men quote Scripture for the deed."

In asserting that the moral sense of Philadelphia revolted at the discussions in the Pennsylvania Hall, the Committee have widely mistaken the true state of the case. I am persuaded that, in making this assertion, they were not free from an admonishing consciousness, that it was of very questionable correctness.

In addition to the reprobation expressed by the committee against the owners of the Hall for persevering in the discussion, another cause of complaint is put forth against them; they were not willing to risk their own persons in defence of their preperty, and they have declined becoming accusers before the committee. Here is an instance of the different mediums through which men view the same facts, under different circumstances. Had the owners of the Hall marshalled themselves in battle array for its defence, that fact might well have been complained of as a provoking intermeddling with the operations of the police, adding by the personal presence of the alleged wrong-doers, additional provocation to that excited by the offence of the discussions. Good sense could not fail to see that such might be a very probable concomitant of active opposition, on the part of those against whom the anger of the mob was directed. It was consequently both discreet and prudent for the owners to withdraw themselves from all confliction with the assailants. If then they were properly absent, there can be no propriety in censuring them for that absence.

The other fact, that the owners shrunk from becoming accusers before the Committee, and declined any connexion with the investigation, is very easily accounted for, though it is natural enough that the Committee should not comprehend the motive that actuated them. The report shows that the Committee very soon disclosed a purpose, and a prepossession to maintain it, adverse to the owners and managers of the Hall; that purpose was to aggravate whatever could be adduced prejudicial to the owners of the Hall,