Nigger Worship and Its Consequences [New York Herald, March 7, 1861]
(www.historians.org)https://www.historians.org/teaching-and-learning/teaching-resources-for-historians/sixteen-months-to-sumter/newspaper-index/new-york-herald/nigger-worship-and-its-consequencesFrom its inception to the present time the question has undergone three phases. In the first instance it was a moral one; provoked by discussion and prejudice in England; in the next it was a social one, induced by the Northern States finding slave labor unprofitable, and, therefore, wishing to abolish it; and, in the third, it was a politico-religious one, which we may call "nigger worship." In this last phase we find it now. It has become a pulpit theme, and diverted the stream of religion from its course heavenward to the stormy sea of politics. We have a prominent example of it in the case of Ward Beecher. It has ruined churches, ruined parties, and now it is ruining the whole country. Anti-slavery fanaticism has stamped its character upon our Northern literature, and led away the minds of those who had not philosophy enough to withstand its subtle influence, which, for the thirty years of the forty it has been in agitation, has been gradually undermining the constitution of the republic and the best interests and liberties of our people.
