Rensselaer Gazette, Volume 3, Number 40, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 January 1860 — An Appeal to Christians Throughout the World. [ARTICLE]

An Appeal to Christians Throughout the World.

I Ths following appeal, written by Frances ! Ellen Watkins, a young colored girl, has . been banded us for .publication:—Cm. Ga- ' zelte. In consequence of a iaw passed by the Legislature of Arkansas., compelling the free colored people either to leave the. State or to be enslaved, we, a number.of exiles driven out by this inhuman statute, who reached Ohio on the 3d of January 18t>0, feeling a deep sence of the wrong done us, make the Appeal to the .Christian world. We appeal to you as Children of a common Father, and believers in a crucified Redeemer. To-day we are exiles; driven from the homes of our childhood, the scenes of our youth, and the burial places of our friends. We are exiles, not that our hands are stained with guilt, or our lives accused of crime. •Our fault, in a land of Bibles and Churches, of baptisms and prayers, is, that in our veins flows the blood of an outcast race; a race opposed by power, and proscribed by prejudice; a race cradled in wrong, and nurtured in oppression.

In the very depth of winter, we have left a genial climate of sunny skies, to be homeless strangers in the icy North. Some of the exiles have left children, who were very dear; but to stay with them, was to involve ourselves in a life-time of slavery. Some left deer companions: they were enslaved, and We had no other alternative than slavery or exile. We were weak; our oppressors were strong. were a feeble, scattered, people; they, being powerful, placed before ( us slavery or banishment. We chose the latter. Poverty, trials, and all the cares in- [ cident to a life of freedom, are better, far better than slavery. From this terrible injustice, we appeal to j the moral sentiment of the world. We , turn to the free North; but even here oppression tracks our steps. Indiana shuts her doors upon us. Illinois denies us admission . to her prairie homes. Oregon refuses us an | abiding place for the soles of our weaiy feet. And even Minnesota has our exclusion under consideration. In Ohio we found kind hearts; hospitality opened her doors: generous hands reached out a warm and hearty welcome. For this, rn iy the God of the fatherless ever defied and bless them. And now, Christians, we appeal to you, as heirs of the same heritage, and chileren of the same Father, to protest against this gross and inhuman outrage, which has been committed beneath the wing of the AmerieanSpagle, and in the shadow of the American Church. We ask you by the love, the 4 pity, and the mercy, in the religion of Jesus Christ, that you will raise your voices and protest against this sin. Editors of newspapers, formers of public opinion, conductors of intelligence and thought; we entreat you to insert this appeal in your papers and unite your voices against this outrage which disgraces our land, and holds it up to shame before the nations of the earth. We entreat you to move a wave of influence, which will widen and spread all the earth; and roll back and wash away th is stain. Christian-mothers, by our plundered cradles and child bereft hearts, we appeal to you, and ask your protest. Christian fathers, by all the sacred associations that cluster around the name, father, we appeal to you, to swell the tide of indignation, against our shameful wrongs. We appeal to the Church of Christ among all nations, kindreds, tongues and people, to protest against the inhumanity that has driven us from our homes and our kindred. Members of all political parties, we ask your protest, in the name of a common humanity, against this cruel act of despotism. Christian Ministers, we appeal to you, in the name of Him, who came “to preach good tidings to the meek, to bind up the brokenhearted; to proclaim liberty to the captive; and the opening of the prison to them that are bound,” to lay before your congregations, the injustice done us; and the wickedness of a system that tramples upon the feeble, and crushes out the rights of the helpless. And we appeal to ’he God of the fatherless, ..nd the Judge of the widow, that He will remember His vord, • Ina; much as ye have done it to ot.e of the least ot these, ye have done it unto me;” that he will move the hearts of 11 is children everywhere to unite their testimony against this unequaled iniquity that writes “property ” on man ; that chattelizes the immortal mind; and makes merchandize of the deathless soul. We appeal to Hirn who does not permit a sparrow to fall to the ground unnoticed, to plead the cause of the poor and needy, and set him at rest from him that puffeth at him.