Building An Antislavery Wall

In Building an Antislavery Wall, R. J. M. Blackett examines the efforts of black Americans in England to advance the cause of their own freedom. Speaking to enthusiastic working-class crowds in the cities and lobbying in the salons of the wealthy and aristocratic, black Americans used England as a forum to tell the world of their cruel plight in the United States, to expose what they saw as an oppressive slave society masquerading as the seat of democracy and freedom. It was their goal to create a moral cordon around the United States so that, in the words of Frederick Douglass, “wherever a slaveholder went, he might hear nothing but denunciation of slavery, that he might be looked upon as a man-stealing, cradle-robbing, woman-stripping monster, and that he might see reproof and detestation on every hand.” The American blacks who visited England between 1830 and 1860 came there for various specific reasons—some to raise funds for projects at home, some to receive the education that they had been denied by American colleges, many for refuge from slave-catchers. But every black saw himself, at least to some extent, as an emissary from his enslaved brethren in America, and he was treated as such by British society. Some—Frederick Douglass and Martin R. Delany, for example—were already famous; others, like Henry “Box” Brown and James Watkins, would gain fame through their lecturing while in England. Some of the blacks who came to England were ministers; others were doctors, journalists, and authors of slave narratives. Clearly gifted and articulate individuals, these black Americans stood as living proof of slavery’s unfairness, flesh-and-blood refutations of America’s boasted freedom. Tracing the impact of the black Americans, Blackett concludes that they were very effective spokesmen who significantly advanced the cause of the Atlantic abolitionist movement. British support had monetary as well as symbolic value, and the popularity of the blacks as lecturers gave them a special edge in both fund-raising and proselytizing. At the same time, while organized white abolitionist societies expended much of their energy on sectarian disputes, the blacks sought to bridge these differences in the hope of marshaling the full weight of British opinion in their favor. The blacks played an especially important role, Blackett finds, in discrediting the American Colonization Society—their adamant opposition made it difficult for colonizationists to convince the British that their plan was in the blacks’ best interest. Chronicling the efforts of black Americans to win international support for their struggles at home, Building an Antislavery Wall illuminates an important chapter in the history of American reform and in the emergence of an articulate black leadership in the United States.

In Black Prophets of Justice, David E. Swift examines the interlocking careers and influence of six black clergymen, two of them fugitive slaves, who lived in the antebellum North and protested the racism of the time. Samuel Cornish, Theodore Wright, Charles Ray, Henry Highland Garnet, Amos Beman, and James Pennington had much in common: all were noted for their education and eloquence, all were ministers of the earliest black Presbyterian and Congregational churches, and all were activists toward social change.Preachers as well as activists, these men fought, Swift argues, for the melding of religious life and social protest that informed their own lives. As leaders of the black congregations in the primarily white Presbyterian and Congregational denominations, they bore witness to the power of God and the essential oneness and worth of all human beings. As activists, they embraced a wide variety of issues -- including abolitionism, education, fugitive classes, and the civil and political rights -- that greatly affected the lives of Afro-Americans. As editors of the first black newspapers, they unmasked the racism implicit in the movement to colonize freed slaves outside of the United States and in the segregation of black worshipers in white churches. They organized vigilance committees to help escaped slaves, and they held conventions of free blacks in New York and Connecticut that aimed to win rights for blacks through legislation. By teaching Afro-Americans about the glories of their African past and the achievements of more recent individuals of African descent, these leaders grappled with the pernicious heritage of blacks' self-doubt caused by generations of enslavement and white insistence on black inferiority.While they opened the eyes of some influential whites, these activists effected little change in the attitudes and practices of white Americans in their own time. But their contribution to the advancement of the black cause, argues Swift, was substantial. They fed black aspiration, sharpened black discontent, and harnessed both to the creation of new black institutions. Indeed, they laid the foundation for such twentieth-century movements as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.Black Prophets of Justice is a biography of six widely respected clergymen as well as an important discussion of Afro-American activism in the North before the Civil War. Well-researched and well-written, it will be of interest to American church historians, and to all those concerned with Afro-American history or with the social impact of religion in America.

Although the significance of transatlantic currents of influence on slavery and abolition in the Americas has received substantial scholarly attention, the focus has tended to be largely on the British transatlantic, or on the effects of American racial politics on the emergence of Irish American political identity in the US. The specifics of Ireland’s role as a transnational hub of anti-slavery literary and political activity, and as deeply imbricated in debates around slavery and freedom, are often overlooked. This collection points to the particularity and significance of Ireland’s place in nineteenth-century exchanges around slavery and anti-slavery. Importantly, it foregrounds the context of empire – Ireland was both one of the ‘home’ nations of the UK, on many levels deeply complicit in British imperialism, and a space of emergent anti-colonial radicalism, bourgeois nationalism, and significant literary opportunity for Black abolitionist writers – as a key mediator of the ways in which the conceptual and practical responses to slavery and anti-slavery took shape in the Irish context. Moving beyond the transatlantic model often used to position debates around slavery in the Americas, it incorporates discussion around campaigns to abolish slavery within the empire, opening up the possibility of wider comparative discussions of slavery and anti-slavery around the Indian Ocean and the African continent. It also emphasizes the plurality of positions in play across class, political, racial and national lines, and the ways in which those positions shifted in response to changing social, cultural and economic conditions. This book was originally published as a special issue of Slavery & Abolition: A Journal of Slave and Post-Slave Studies.

Parker Pillsbury—one of the most important and least examined antislavery activists of the nineteenth century—was a man of intense contradictions. Was he a disruptive eccentric who lashed out at authority (proclaiming Lincoln the worst president in the nation's history) or a sensitive visionary committed to social justice? In the first full-length biography of this remarkable American, Stacey M. Robertson depicts a man who became a leading voice in the antebellum period. Crisscrossing the North for twenty-five years, Pillsbury denounced slavery to all who would listen. In his travels, he often endured the violent rage of mob opposition, but he also received the passionate support of fellow advocates. Robertson's vivid portrayal of this itinerant agitator revises standard views of the antislavery movement by highlighting the interplay between activists such as Pillsbury and the national leadership, which they often challenged. She also reveals how Pillsbury—one of the nation's first male feminists—struggled to reject the notion of male dominance in his political philosophy, public activism, and personal relationships.The biography of a man devoted to justice and equality, this book places his motivations and experiences in the context of nineteenth-century social reform but never strays far from Pillsbury himself. His voice—irascible and fiery, whimsical and compassionate—offers a vivid reminder that history is the story of individual lives.

The first full-length study of Frederick Douglass' visit to Scotland in 1846Frederick Douglass (1818-95) was not the only fugitive from American slavery to visit Scotland before the Civil War, but he was the best known and his impact was far-reaching. This book shows that addressing crowded halls from Ayr to Aberdeen, he gained the confidence, mastered the skills and fashioned the distinctive voice that transformed him as a campaigner. It tells how Douglass challenged the Free Church over its ties with the Southern plantocracy; how he exploited his knowledge of Walter Scott and Robert Burns to brilliant effect; and how he asserted control over his own image at a time when racial science and blackface minstrel shows were beginning to shape his audiences' perceptions. He arrived as a subordinate envoy of white abolitionists, legally still enslaved. He returned home as a free man ready to embark on a new stage of his career, as editor and proprietor of his own newspaper and a leader in his own right.Key Features:First full-length study of Frederick Douglass' visit to Scotland in 1846Reveals fresh information about, and deepens our understanding of, a major 19th-century intellectual at a crucial stage in his political and professional developmentSubjects Douglass' speeches and letters to close readings and situates them in the immediate context of their delivery and compositionDemonstrates the extent to which Douglass was closely acquainted with Scottish literature, history and current affairsEnhances our knowledge of Douglass as a performer, his ability to read audiences, and how he moved and influenced them

Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award 2014 With this volume, Davis presents the age of emancipation as a model for reform and as probably the greatest landmark of willed moral progress in human history. Bringing to a close his staggeringly ambitious, prizewinning trilogy on slavery in Western culture Davis offers original and penetrating insights into what slavery and emancipation meant to Americans. He explores how the Haitian Revolution respectively terrified and inspired white and black Americans, hovering over the antislavery debates like a bloodstained ghost. He offers a surprising analysis of the complex and misunderstood significance the project to move freed slaves back to Africa. He vividly portrays the dehumanizing impact of slavery, as well as the generally unrecognized importance of freed slaves to abolition. Most of all, Davis presents the age of emancipation as a model for reform and as probably the greatest landmark of willed moral progress in human history.

The abolitionists of the 1830s-1850s risked physical harm and social alienation as a result of their refusal to ignore what they considered a national sin, contrary to the ideals upon which America was founded. Derived from the moral accountability called for by the Great Awakening and the Quaker religion, the abolitionist movement demanded not just the gradual dismantling of the system or a mandated political end to slavery, but an end to prejudice in the hearts of the American people. Primary documents, illustrations and biographical sketches of notable figures illuminate the conflicted struggle to end slavery in America. Some called them fanatics; others called them liberators and saints. Immeasurable though their ultimate impact may have been, the abolitionists of the 1830s-1850s risked physical harm and social alienation as a result of their refusal to ignore what they considered a national sin, contrary to the ideals upon which America was founded. Derived from the moral accountability called for by the Great Awakening and the Quaker religion, the abolitionist movement demanded not just the gradual dismantling of the system or a mandated political end to slavery, but an end to prejudice in the hearts of the American people. Claudine Farrell's concluding essay draws parallels between the abolitionists' struggles and the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s-1970s, demonstrating the significant amount of ground being gained in a still-unfinished war. Five narrative chapters explore the abolitionist movement's religious beginnings, the conflict between moral justice and union preservation, and the revolts, divisions and conflicts leading up to the Civil War. Biographical portraits of such notable figures as Frederick Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison, and the Grimke sisters supplement the discussion, and selections from some of the most influential documents in American history—including the Emancipation Proclamation, the US Constitution, and The Writings of Thomas Jefferson—provide actual historical evidence of the events. Twelve illustrations, a chronology, index and extensive annotated bibliography make this an ideal starting point for students looking to understand the battle for and against slavery in America.