Meeting of Colored Citizens

Syracuse Daily Standard September 24, 1850

According to appointment in the Citizens assembled in the Fayette Street church on Friday evening, at an early hour, and organized by the appointment of James Baker, as Chairman, and S. king, Secretary.

The following Resolutions were offered by different members and discussed manfully and fearlessly, to the great delight of those present when on motion, they were laid over for further discussion at a meeting to be held on Wednesday evening of next week, at the same hour and place.

Resolved that the government of the United States affords us no protection. Therefore,

Resolved, that it is our duty to protect ourselves at the expense of life if need be.

Resolved, that we hold this truth to be self evident, that a man's right to himself is God given and the protection of that is the first law of nature--therefore he is justifiable in r....to any means, even if it be the taking of the life of him who seeks to deprive us of what in dearer than life, viz: liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Resolved, that in view of the passage of the slave catching bill by the representatives of this boasted land of Liberty, that we the colored citizens of Syracuse, will join hand in hand and will take the scalp of any government hound, that dares follow, on our track as we are resolved to be free, if it is not until after death.

Resolved, that we will go into committee of the whole on the state of our liberties and hereby warn our postmasters and other government officers against any approach towards robbing our cottages of our wives and helpless infants for we will slay them as we would other legalized land pirates and we will call our friends about us to aid us in maintaining our rights, for we regard the moral force of "the law," as Samson did the withes with which Delilah bound him.

Resolved that hereafter we will wear daggers in our belts as a mark of the respect we feel for the passage of the recent slave catching bill.


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