John Speer’s raucous denouncement of pro-slavery laws nearly 150 years ago is ringing through Lawrence again, this time from the basement of the Lawrence Arts Center.

There, in the print studio, leaders of the Hobbs Park Memorial Committee spent Tuesday morning reprinting page 3 of Speer’s Kansas Weekly Tribune of Sept. 15, 1855.

About 1,000 copies of the newsprint sheets — each denouncing the “enslavement” and “veriest despotism” brought on 147 years ago by “tyrants” in the Kansas Legislature — will be distributed free as part of the eighth annual Civil War Days on the Western Frontier. The two-week event, Aug. 16-24, will commemorate the community’s role in framing battles over slavery.

The sheets will offer an early reminder of how Lawrence’s founders rose up against pro-slavery supporters in nearby Lecompton and helped lead Kansas to become a free state, said Jim McCrary, committee co-director.

They also put the value of dissent in black and white.

“We hear about the founders of Lawrence, but to put it in context, this would be similar to somebody standing at the Dole (Institute) on Sunday, with a mask on, screaming, ‘Impeach Bush!’ — or maybe something even worse,” said McCrary, as he gathered reprints. “It gives you a sense of the radicalism of John Speer. Speaking out against slavery was a felony. His life was in danger. They threw his press in the river. They tore his house down.”

But his ideas endured.

And the words, which became known as “Speer’s Defy,” will live on through reprints commissioned by the committee. The first run of 1,000 is designed to come as close as possible to Speer’s original work.

The committee obtained an electronic copy of the newspaper page from the Kansas State Historical Society in Topeka, then sent the image to a Michigan company to produce a magnesium plate.

Back in Lawrence, the arts center’s Tim O’Brien used the plate to run off flimsy copies — one by one — on a 1960s-era Vandercook cylinder press. They will be distributed during open house events from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Aug. 16 and 17 at the Hobbs Park Memorial, 10th and Delaware streets, near where the Speer homestead once stood.

In the coming months, O’Brien will print an additional 100 or so copies on acid-free, archival paper for collectors. The committee will charge for those copies, and use the money to help finance future exhibits at the memorial.