"By his escape from bondage, he has shown that true manhood, which must grapple to him every honest heart. He may be ignorant, and rude, as he is poor, but he is one of a true nobility. The Fugitive Slaves of the United States are among the heroes of our age." U.S. Senator Charles Sumner, 1850

"A slave, says the Louisana code, 'is in the power of the master to whom he belongs. The master may sell him, dispose of his person, his industry, his labor; he can do nothing, possess nothing, not acquire anything, but which must belong to his master.'" --William E. Channing, 1836

"They cover up the hideousness of slavery. They hide its dark features, and thus put the moral sense of the community asleep, and leave the slave comparatively unpitied, to drink still oppression's bitter cup." --Amos A. Phelps (1834)

"The great need in this day is truth that cuts -- convincing truth -- truth that convicts and convinces the sinner and pulls off the bandages from his eyes." --Catherine Booth

"What does it amount to, if the black man, after having been made free by the letter of your law, is unable to exercise that freedom; and having been freed from the slaveholder's lash, he is to be subject to the slaveholder's shotgun?" -Frederick Douglas, 1876