As a general truth, communities prosper and flourish, or droop and decline, in just the degree that they practise or neglect to practise the primary duties of justice and humanity. The free-labor system conforms to the divine law of equality, which is written in the hearts and consciences of man, and therefore is always and everywhere beneficent. –  William Henry Seward, Sr.

When I learned of this quote, I did so from a source that chose to only use part of the quote.  In doing so, the sender deliberately cut off the end of the quote.  I believe to take the quote out context.  While very human of the sender, what it taught me is to confirm just how important it is to read any given quote within context.  There are so many mems and quotes and ‘facts’ passed around that similarly taken out of context.  Many of these are used to make good persons sound bad and bad persons sound good.  There is an important lesson in this to be taken about the importance of context.

The actual source of this quote in its entirety is found here:

http://www.nyhistory.com/central/conflict.htm

Few today realize that Seward just barely lost the nomination for presidency to Abraham Lincoln.  Another interesting item to note here is that the speech given in 1858 already discusses the irrepressible conflict between the Democratic Party (the party of slave owners) and the Republicans who sought to free these persons.  It’s striking to me that right from the top of the speech, Mr. Seward sought to distinguish the conduct of the Democratic Party and its lofty title.