THE LIBRARY 

OF 

THE UNIVERSITY 
OF CALIFORNIA 



BEQUEST OF 

Alice R. Hilgard 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKBISOK 




*r- 



MY COUNTRY IS THE WORLD: 
MY COUNTRYMEN ARE ALL MANKIND. 



WILLIAM LLOYD -GARRISON 

1805-1879 



THE STORY OF HIS LIFE 

TOLD BY HIS CHILDREN 



VOLUME III. 1841-1860 




NEW- YORK : THE CENTURY CO. 

1889 



Copyright, 1885 & 1889, by 
WENDELL PHILLIPS GARRISON 

and 
FRANCIS JACKSON GARRISON. 



Add 1 ! 

D 
GIFT 



VALEDICTION. 

THE fears of critics, and our own apprehensions, have hap 
pily been disappointed : the second volume of this work has not 
determined the scale of the succeeding portions. That volume 
was, on the whole, the most important, the most needful to be 
written, whether with reference to the subject of this memoir, 
or to the history of the abolition cause, the political anti-slavery 
organization, and the woman-suffrage movement. A greater 
fulness of detail, a more ample exhibition of the documents, 
was therefore imperative. Here, as before and afterwards, our 
material was the rudder that steered us, and we close our labors 
with the conviction that each period has received a proportion 
ate treatment. Moreover, while not a page has been written 
wilfully to swell the total, neither has anything been omitted 
which we were anxious to insert. 

If we have succeeded in our endeavor to efface ourselves, we 
have produced what may justly be regarded as an Autobiog 
raphy but one guarded from the defects of reminiscence by 
constant employment of and reference to the contemporary 
records in print and in manuscript, and by a thousand disin 
terested illustrations, corrections, and criticisms, from which 
the truth can hardly fail to emerge. This method, deliberately 
adopted for the first two volumes, we had the plainest indica 
tion for pursuing to the end, since not a material error of fact 
has been pointed out in a narrative furnishing abundant grounds 
for controversy, 1 and our candor has everywhere passed unchal 
lenged. For this we are devoutly thankful, having proposed to 

l We have done the best we could to make up a Table of Errata, which 
will be found at the end of the fourth volume, preceding the Index. 



M881027 



IV VALEDICTION. 

ourselves no other aim than a faithful exhibition of our father s 
life and character. " It was truly a sublime life," wrote the late 
Elizur Wright, on receipt of a copy of the first half of the pres 
ent work. " The details you have thrown into and around it 
show the history of the period with an electric light, and cannot 
but bless the future." "For simplicity, straightforwardness, 
openness, and fulness, without any explanation or smoothing 
down, you give the world," wrote the late Mrs. Abby Kelley Fos 
ter, " a biography worthy of its subject." These testimonies, 
which have for us a peculiar value, we shall, we trust, be par 
doned for quoting here. 

After all, the work has a formidable length no one is more 
conscious of this than we who fashioned it. Can we hope that 
anybody, in this busy and superficial age, will read it consecu 
tively, and not merely consult it as a book of reference ? We 
can say of it what Sylvester Judd did of his Margaret, that 
it " was never designed for railroads ; it might, peradventure, 
suit a canal-boat " ; or, again, what Mr. Pepys said of William 
Penn s tract against the Trinity, that "it is a serious sort of 
book" yet without adding, "and not fit for everybody to 
read." Rather are we of opinion that no one can read it with 
out profit, for it is not more the history of a man than of an age. 
It will at least serve as a corrective of that spurious patriotism 
which consists in concealing, or shutting our eyes on, the bar 
barous past of our country, as if contemplation and frank con 
fession of it were not the surest means of promoting the 
national evolution to a yet higher civilization. In short, those 
who study history not for amusement, but for its practical bear 
ing on conduct in the formation of principle, may well linger 
over these pages. 

We must again acknowledge our indebtedness to many friends 
for varied assistance, and above all to Samuel May, Oliver 
Johnson, and Elizabeth Pease Nichol for their careful scrutiny 
of manuscript or proofs. To the New York Historical Society 
we are under great obligation for its courteous accommoda 
tion of a file of the Liberator. Nor can we ever be sufficientlv 



VALEDICTION. V 

grateful to our publishers for their trustful participation in our 
enterprise, and their unstinted liberality in the manufacture of 
these admirable specimens of the printer s art, which only the 
highest literary excellence could parallel. But in this particular 
we offer to posterity (like that veracious church front in Ger 
man Biickeburg) exemplum religionis, non structures. 

WENDELL PHILLIPS GARRISON, New York. 
FRANCIS JACKSON GARRISON, Boston. 



THE TENTH ANNIVERSARY OF 

OUR FATHER S DEATH, 

1889. 



LIBERATOR FILES. 



WE subjoin a revised and extended list of the completest public files of 
the Liberator, based upon that already given in the Preface to Volume I. 
(p. ix). Of the private files there named, that of the Misses Weston has 
been given to Yale CoUege, as below. 

MAINE. Brooklyn, Long Island Historical 

Portland, Public Library. Society. 

MASSACHUSETTS. Ithaca, Cornell University Li- 

Boston, Public Library. brary. 

Athenaeum. PENNSYLVANIA. 

Cambridge, Harvard College Li- Philadelphia, Library Company. 

brary. OHIO. 

Maiden, Public Library. Cincinnati, Public Library. 

Worcester, American Antiquarian ILLINOIS. 

Society. Chicago, Newberry Library. 

RHODE ISLAND. KANSAS. 

Providence, Rhode Island Histori- Topeka, Kansas Historical Soci- 

cal Society. ety. 

CONNECTICUT. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA. 

New Haven, Yale College Library. Washington, Library of Congress. 

NEW YORK. ENGLAND. 

New York City, Astor Library. London, British Museum. 



"The future historian of the abolition of American slavery, on being 
furnished with the files of the Liberator, will find nearly all the materials he 
can require to complete his history, on both sides of the question " ( Wm. 
Lloyd Garrison in Lib. 17 : 6). 

"The establishment of that Museum [the department of selections 
labelled " The Refuge of Oppression "], we believe, was a strictly original 
idea with Mr. Garrison. We apprehend that he was the first man who ever 
set up for show the caricatures which were made of himself, and the stones 
and dirt with which he had been pelted, and who kept on hand a gibbet on 
which anybody that pleased might hang him in effigy. . . . The Liber 
ator is one of the few papers which will remain a standard historical 
authority as to the matter of which it treats, and which will be the sub 
stance of our current history. . . . The Liberator will be permanently 
valuable as containing the very Age and Body of the Time, its Form and 
Pressure, as to the controlling element of our destiny, . . . will hold 
its place on the shelves of public libraries as one of the authentic sources 
of the history of this day and generation" (Edmund QuincyJ. 



vi 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 



VOL. III. 

WM. LLOYD GARRISON, at the age of 41 Frontispiece. 

From a daguerreotype taken in Dublin, in October, 1846, now 
in the possession of Mr. Alfred Webb. See p. 176, within. 

JOHN ANDERSON COLLINS, at about the age of 35 to face p. 64 

From a daguerreotype in his possession. 

NATHANIEL PEABODY ROGERS to face p. 120 

From the steel engraving prefixed to his Writings ; the charm 
of it is lacking here. 

HENRY CLARKE WRIGHT, at about the age of 50 to face p. 176 

From a daguerreotype now in the possession of Mr. Alfred 
Webb. 

CHARLES CALISTUS BURLEIGH, at about the age of 35 . . to face p. 226 

From a daguerreotype now in the possession of Mr. Alfred 
Webb. 

CHARLES Fox HOVEY, at about the age of 45 to face p. 284 

From a daguerreotype. 

PICTORIAL HEADINGS OF THE LIBERATOR to face p. 308 

The design of the first (and perhaps of the second also) may with 
some plausibility be assigned to David Claypoole Johnston. 

ELIZABETH PEASE, at the age of 44 to face p. 322 

From a daguerreotype now in the possession of Mrs. Henry 
Fell Pease. 

WM. LLOYD GARRISON, at the age of 47 to face p. 358 

From a daguerreotype taken at Rochester in May, 1852, in a 
group with Wendell Phillips, now in the possession of his son 
William. The engraving falls short of the spirited original, 
and is not quite true in expression. 

SAMUEL PHILBRICK, at about the age of 65 to face p. 476 

From a daguerreotype now in the possession of his family, 
vii 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



VOL. III. 

THE BEGINNING OF THE END. 

(1841-1860.) 

PAGES 
CHAPTER I. RE-FORMATION AND REANIMATION (1841; . . 1-42 

Actively accused of infidelity, on both sides of the Atlantic, 
Garrison restates his religious belief, but attends the closing 
sessions of the Chardon-Street Convention. He labors dili 
gently in the field to revive the anti-slavery organization 
with Frederick Douglass at Nantucket, with N. P. Rogers in 
New Hampshire. He begins to entertain disunion views. 
Alienation and hostility of Isaac Knapp. 

CHAPTER IL THE IRISH ADDRESS (1842) 43-80 

A monster anti-slavery Address to Irish- Americans, headed 
by O Connell, leader of the Repeal agitation in Ireland, tests 
the pro-slavery spirit of Irish Catholicism in the United 
States. Garrison comes out openly for the Repeal of the 
Union of North and South, runs up this banner in the Lib 
erator, and launches the debate in the anti-slavery societies. 
He makes a lecturing tour in Western New York, and falls 
desperately ill on his return home. Death of his brother 
James. 

CHAPTER III. THE "COVENANT WITH DEATH" (1843). . .81-95 
After a summer at the water-cure, Garrison makes his home 
in Boston, and renews with vigor the disunion campaign. He 
is followed by the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society in pro 
nouncing the Constitution "a covenant with death and an 
agreement with hell." He is made President of the Ameri 
can Society, of which the direction passes over to Boston, 
ix 



X CONTENTS. 

PAGES 
CHAPTER IV. "No UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS!" (1844) 96-133 

The American Anti-Slavery Society and the New England 
Convention formally adopt Garrison s disunion doctrine, not 
without individual protests and withdrawals. Breach with 
N. P. Rogers. 

CHAPTER V. TEXAS (1845) 134-149 

Garrison joins in the Massachusetts movement of the Con 
science Whigs against the annexation of Texas, but their 
disunionism oozes awaj r after the event. 

CHAPTER VL THIRD MISSION TO ENGLAND (1846) 150-186 
In response to an invitation from the Glasgow Emancipation 
Society, Garrison revisits Great Britain to join in the anti- 
slavery crusade against the Free Church of Scotland, for 
its collusion with American slaveholders. He speaks, with 
Thompson and Douglass, incessantly throughout the United 
Kingdom and Ireland ; attends the World s Temperance 
Convention ; helps form an Anti-Slavery League ; and de 
molishes the pro-slavery Evangelical Alliance. He pays a last 
visit to Clarkson, who shortly dies. 

CHAPTER VII. FIRST WESTERN TOUR (1847) 187-217 

A too laborious lecture engagement with Frederick Douglass 
begins in midsummer in Pennsylvania, and ends, at Cleve 
land, Ohio, with Garrison s prostration with fever, at the im 
minent peril of his life. 

CHAPTER VHI. THE ANTI-SABBATH CONVENTION (1848) 218-243 
In view of active Sabbatarian propagandism, and of the 
constant efforts of the clergy to put obstacles in the way of 
Sunday abolition meetings, Garrison plans with H. C. Wright 
an Anti-Sabbath Convention in Boston, draws up the call, 
and directs the proceedings. He watches the rise of the 
Free Soil Party. Review of the Life of Channing. 

CHAPTER IX. FATHER MATHEW (1849) 244-271 

Father Mathew, having visited Boston on his temperance 
mission to the United States, is invited by the Massachusetts 
Anti-Slavery Society to renew his testimony against slavery 
(as a signer of the Irish Address of 1842) at a celebration 
of British West India Emancipation. Garrison drafts and 
presents the invitation, but is met with shuffling and refusal. 
He exposes this behavior in the Liberator, and makes Father 
Mathew s Southern tour both easy and difficult. Death of 
Charles Follen Garrison. Garrison vindicates free discussion 
of the Bible in the Liberator. 



CONTENTS. xi 

PAGES 
CHAPTER X. THE EYNDERS MOB (1850) 272-312 

The New York Herald incites popular violence against the 
anniversary meeting of the American Anti-Slavery Society 
in that city. Garrison presides, and speaks with the utmost 
composure in the midst of a mob led by a local bully, with 
the connivance of the city authorities. Second visit of 
George Thompson to America. 

CHAPTER XI. GEORGE THOMPSON, M. P. (1851) 313-338 

Thompson renews his old triumphs in the Eastern and Mid 
dle States, and takes a leading part in the celebration of the 
twentieth anniversary of the founding of the Liberator, at 
which a gold watch is presented to Garrison. 

CHAPTER XII. KOSSUTH (1852) 339-377 

The Hungarian refugee comes to the United States seek 
ing national aid for his country. Fully informed in advance 
of the existence of slavery and the dominance of the Slave 
Power, he affects neutrality and natters the South. Garri 
son, on behalf of the American Anti-Slavery Society, ex 
poses him in an elaborate Letter. Uncle Tom s Cabin 7 
appears. 

CHAPTER XIIL THE BIBLE CONVENTION (1853) 378-401 

Garrison revisits the West, and attends a large number of 
conventions ; in particular, that at Hartford, Conn., to dis 
cuss the authority of the Scriptures, called by Andrew Jack 
son Davis, and mobbed by divinity students. His reputation 
among sectarians on both sides of the Atlantic suffers a still 
further decline. Friendly correspondence as to his heresy 
with Harriet Beecher Stowe. 

CHAPTER XIV. THE NEBRASKA BILL (1854) 402-414 

The abrogation of the Missouri Compromise produces a 
powerful reaction at the North, by which the abolitionists 
profit in respect of greater freedom of speech. Garrison 
emphasizes his doctrine of disunion by publicly burning the 
Constitution on the Fourth of July. 

CHAPTER XV. THE PERSONAL LIBERTY LAW (1855). .415-433 
Massachusetts, at the instigation of the abolitionists, makes 
its Personal Liberty Law more stringent in obstruction of the 
Fugitive Slave Law. Celebration of the twentieth anniver 
sary of the mobbing of Garrison in Boston by " men of 
property and standing." 



xii CONTENTS. 

PAGES 

CHAPTER XVI. FREMONT (1856) 434-447 

The pro-slavery atrocities in Kansas do not cause Garrison 
to regard the border-ruffian otherwise than as a fellow-man, 
or to view the newly formed Eepublican Party as an aboli 
tion organization. But, as between Fremont and Buchanan 
or Fillmore, he wishes success to the Republican candidate 
for President. 

CHAPTER XVn. THE DISUNION CONVENTION (1857). .448-464 
The Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society celebrates its 
twenty-fifth anniversary. Garrison takes part in a Dis 
union Convention held at Worcester under the auspices of 
T. W. Higginson and other residents of that city. Another 
and more representative convention at Cleveland is pro 
jected, but is abandoned in view of the financial panic. The 
Dred Scott decision of the U. S. Supreme Court intervenes. 

CHAPTER XVIII. THE IRREPRESSIBLE CONFLICT (1858) 

465-475 

Both Seward and Lincoln overtake Garrison s declaration (as 
far back as 1840) of the irreconcilability of freedom and 
slavery. Conviction seizes upon many abolitionists that the 
conflict will end only in blood. Garrison deprecates the idea, 
and washes his hands of all responsibility for such a ter 
mination. 

CHAPTER XIX. JOHN BROWN (1859) 476-493 

Garrison notes the Republican party s falling off in principle 
in view of its approaching electoral triumph ; yet judges it 
fairly in accordance with its own standards. He justifies John 
Brown s Virginia raid by the Bunker Hill code, and, as a 
non-resistant, disarms him only while disarming the slave 
holder. 

CHAPTER XX. ABRAHAM LINCOLN (1860) 494-509 

Seward retracts his irrepressible conflict" for the sake of 
the Presidency, and falls under the censure of Garrison, as 
does the Republican Party for its platform. The Demo 
cratic Party breaks in two at Charleston, and Lincoln is 
elected President. Garrison hails the secession of South 
Carolina as the end of the old Union and of slavery. 



WILLIAM LLOYD GABRISOK 



CHAPTER I. 
RE-FORMATION AND REANBIATIOX. 1841. 

IF a man s reputation were his life, the scene of this CHAP. i. 
biography would now properly shift once more to ^ 
England. Collins s mission to raise funds for the support Ante, 2 : 415. 
of the Standard encountered the obstacles for which Mr. 
Garrison had prepared him "in consequence of the intro- Ante, 2 = 417. 
duction of the new-organization spirit . . . in Eng 
land/ in connection with and as a sequel to the World s Ante, 2:353, 
Convention. The defence of the old organization was 368,370,431- 
imposed upon him from the start, and this, of course, 
involved a special vindication of its leader a task made 
doubly difficult after Colver s slanders had been indus- Ante, 2-. 429. 
triously put in circulation under the official cover of the Lib. 11:174, 
Executive Committee of the British and Foreign Anti- M &"coi- 
Slavery Society. "The Sabbath [Chardon-Street] Con- l %* 
vention," wrote Collins to Mr. Garrison, from Ipswich, 
the home of Clarkson, on January 1, 1841, "has com- MS. 
pletely changed the issue. Woman s rights and non-gov- 
ernmentism are quite respectable when compared to your 
religious views." In a recent interview, procured with 
much difficulty, and only in an unofficial capacity, with 
VOL. III. 1 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. 



CHAP. I. 
1841. 



Robert 

Owen. 

Ante, 2 : 390. 



MS. 



MS. 



MSS. Jan. 
14, Mar. 17, 

1841, 
E. Pease to 

Collins. 
Ante, 2:425. 

MSS. Apr. 

27, E. Pease 

to J. Scoble 

(May ?), 

1841, to 

Collins. 



MS. 



Clarkson, his family were unwilling to have Collins touch 
on the subject of the division among the American abo 
litionists. Allusion to this or to Mr. Garrison led the 
venerable philanthropist to speak of the evils resulting 
from destroying the Sabbath or religion, and of the dan 
gerous influence of Owenism. " It required no sagacity," 
adds Collins, "to see his design in referring to Owen, 
etc. . . . Owenism, in Great Britain, is considered 
double-distilled infidelity. Your views are being consid 
ered of the Owen school. 1 You are the Great Lion which 
stands in my way." Likewise, on February 3, Collins 
writes to Francis Jackson: "Garrison is a hated and 
persecuted man in England. Calumny and reproach are 
heaped upon him in the greatest possible degree." And, 
in a letter to Mr. Garrison himself, Richard D. Webb, 
on May 30, reported that Joseph Sturge, the weightiest 
member of the London Committee, regarded the mere 
defence of Garrison and Collins by Elizabeth Pease and 
William Smeal "as a species of persecution directed 
against himself, and as a gratuitous giving up of the 
slave s cause." When Miss Pease had obtained from 
America a truthful statement of Mr. Garrison s part in 
the Chardon-Street Convention, at the hands of the 
Quaker James Cannings Fuller, the London Committee 
refused her request to give it the same currency which 
they had given to Colver s libel. 

W. L. Garrison to Elizabeth Pease, Darlington, England. 

BOSTON, March 1, 1841. 

I am very much obliged to you for your letter by the Britan 
nia, and do not regret, on the whole, that bro. Collins has 
concluded to remain until the sailing of the steamer of the 
4th inst., though I trust he will not miss coming 1 at that 
time, for his presence here now is indispensable. In what 
ever he has been called to encounter, on your side of the 
Atlantic, by the evil spirit that reigns there, as well as here, 
in the anti-slavery ranks, I deeply sympathize with him. The 



" Socialism is thrown upon us both " (MS. 1841, Collins to W. L. G.). 



JET. 36.] 



HE-FORMATION AND EEANIMATION. 



attempt of Nathaniel Colver to injure his character is exciting 
among all the true-hearted friends of our cause among us an 
intense feeling of indignation and abhorrence ; and in the sequel 
it will be sure to recoil upon the head of that unhappy man. 

Equally abortive will be the effort of N. C. to affect my relig 
ious character by his absurd and monstrous statement to Joseph 
Sturge, that I have headed an infidel convention. Even sup 
posing the charge were true, I should like to know by what 
authority British abolitionists, as such, undertake to judge me, 
for this cause, on the anti-slavery platform. I need not say to 
you, that the charge is both groundless and malicious ; that 
my religious views are of the most elevated, the most spiritual 
character; that I esteem the holy scriptures above all other 
books in the universe, and always appeal to " the law and the 
testimony " to prove all my peculiar doctrines ; that, in regard 
to my religious sentiments, they are almost identical with those 
of Barclay, Penn, and Fox ; that, respecting the Sabbath, the 
church, and the ministry, Joseph Sturge and I (if he be a gen 
uine Friend) harmonize in opinion j that I believe in an indwell 
ing Christ, and in his righteousness alone ; that I glory in 
nothing here below, save in Christ and him crucified ; that I 
believe all the works of the devil are to be destroyed, and our 
Lord is to reign from sea to sea, even to the ends of the earth ; 
and that I profess to have passed from death unto life, and 
know by happy experience that there is no condemnation to 
them who are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but 
after the spirit. 

The truth is, N. Colver has a mortal antipathy to all the dis 
tinctive views of Friends, and he regards them all as infidel ; 
yet he writes to Joseph Sturge as though he fully agreed with 
him as to the nature of the Sabbath, and as though I held 
purely infidel views on this subject ! ! Why does not Joseph 
Sturge, as an honest man and a sincere friend to the anti-slav 
ery cause (I will not refer to his former professions of personal 
friendship for me), inform me by letter of what he has received 
from N. Colver and others, touching my religious character? 
Why does he not express a wish to hear what I can say in self- 
defence ? I confess, I am grieved and astonished at his con 
duct, and am forced to regard him much less highly than I 
once did. By the next packet, I hope to be able to address a 
letter to him on this subject. 

I am sorry, very sorry (and very much surprised, too), that 
bro. Collins should have applied to the London Committee for 



CHAP. I. 

1841. 



N Colver. 



Lib. ii 137, 
42. 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



[JET. 36. 



Lib. ii : 26; 

cf. Free 

American, 

3:2. 

Lib. II : 53. 



Ante, 2: 342, 
343. 35i. 



Collins. 



aid or approbation. It was an error of judgment, simply ; but, 
after what we, who sent him out, have said of that Committee, 
it looks upon the face of it like an imposition. 1 We supposed 
he would make his appeal to the abolitionists at large and take 
his chance accordingly. I fear, also, that he may not have 
been so guarded at all times in his language as could have been 
desirable, respecting the transfer of the Emancipator a trans 
fer that was certainly very dishonorable, and wholly unworthy 
of the character of those who participated in it. 2 Yet I doubt 
not that the mission of J. A. C. will do much for our persecuted 
enterprise. 

For what you have done to aid him, we all feel under the 
deepest obligations. May Heaven reward you a hundred-fold ! 
Fear not that truth shall not triumph over falsehood, right over 
wrong, and freedom over slavery. 3 



1 Miss Pease did not so judge the application (MS. Dec. 10, 1840, to Col 
lins) ; and there can be little doubt that it was ultimately of great advan 
tage to the cause. It at once forced the discussion of the merits of the 
American schism, and the shamefully partisan action of the London Com 
mittee determined many to side with the old organization who might else 
have remained either indifferent or deceived. See Collins s letter to E. 
Quincy, Mar. 2, 1841 (MS.). The attempt of the Executive Committee of 
the Glasgow Emancipation Society, under the influence of Captain Stuart, 
to follow suit in rebuffing Collins and disavowing the old organization, led 
to a division and reconstitution by which that important body was saved to 
the cause in America, at the cost of the resignation of a few members 
like Dr. Wardlaw (Lib. 11 : 77, 89, 93, 149 ; MSS. Feb. 23, 1841, R. Wardlaw 
to J. A. Collins, and May 2, 1841, Collins to W. L. G. ; and Collins s letter 
to the Glasgow Argus, April 26, 1841). Finally, Harriet Martineau took her 
stand with Mr. Garrison, Collins, and their associates in the most pro 
nounced manner (Lib. 11 : 51 ; MS. Feb. 20, 1841, Miss Martineau to Collins). 
George Thompson s open adhesion came later (Lib. 11 : 145, 201). The 
result was in all respects, pecuniary and moral, disastrous to the British 
and Foreign A. S. Society. 

2 " Gerrit Smith says the transfer of the Emancipator was a great out 
ragetold Burleigh so not publicly" (MS. Feb. 10, 1841, J. S. Gibbons 
to W. L. G.). " The transfer of the Emancipator was indefensible " (MS. 
Nov. 26, 1870, Gerrit Smith to W. L. G.). 

3 No one can read the private advisory correspondence of Miss Pease 
with Collins without feeling admiration for her sagacity, sound judgment, 
practical business talent, and unfailing grasp of principles. She was the 
Mrs. Chapman of the British agitation. "What mistakes people make! 
They think Victoria Queen of England, when it is Elizabeth Pease ; and 
know not that the Aliens and Webbs [of Dublin] are the Lords Spiritual 
and Temporal" (MS. Jan. 30, 1841, E. Quincy to Collins). "What more of 
royalty has England s queen ? " asked Mr. Garrison in his sonnet to Eliza 
beth Pease (Lib. 12 : 4). 



Mi. 36.] 



EE-FOKMATION AND REANIMATION. 



Colver was efficiently seconded by Torrey, temporarily 
conducting the Massachusetts Abolitionist, who brought 
the most cruel accusations against Collins s integrity and 
manhood; and by Phelps, who dressed up Mrs. Chap 
man s report of his own remarks at the Chardon-Street 
Convention, and gave his personal coloring to what was 
said by others all to prove the Convention s infidel 
character and Mr. Garrison s complicity. This he first 
ventilated in the New England Christian Advocate, 1 and 
then despatched abroad through the sectarian channels 
controlled by the London Committee. Mr. Garrison s 
reply was prompt, and warmed with a natural indigna 
tion, for to the charge of infidelity were added fresh 
insinuations of "no marriage" doctrines, calculated to 
horrify still more the English mind. In fact, Phelps s 
"priestly candor and magnanimity" proved more injuri 
ous than Colver s and Torrey s combined defamation, and 
caused great temporary damage abroad. 

Colver s effrontery was equal to a reaffirmation of his 
falsehoods on the platform of the Massachusetts Anti- 
Slavery Society at its ninth annual meeting, where they 
had come up for emphatic condemnation. 



Lib. II : ii ; 

MS. Mar. 2, 
1841, J.A. 
Collins to 
W. L. G. 

Lib. ii : 23, 

55, 79 : 14 : 

31; MS. 

Feb. i, 1841, 

J. W. Alden 

to London 

Committee. 



Lib. ii : 79. 



Lib. ii : 43. 

Ante, 2 : 289. 

MSS. Apr. 

3, 1841, J.A. 

Collins to 

W. L. G., 

May 2. 1841, 

E . Pease to 

Collins. 



Lib. ii : 22, 
23, 26. 



Edmund Quincy to J. A. Collins, in England. 

DEDHAM, Jan. 30, 1841. 

The annual meeting is just over, and went off in the best pos 
sible manner. . . . 

The morning of the first day (Wednesday, 27th) was taken 
up by Garrison s report, 2 which, for a marvel, was finished and 
printed (!) before the meeting. . . . 

In the afternoon (Thursday) we passed a severe resolution on 
Colver s letters to the London Committee he being present. 
Bradburn was down upon him in his usual tomahawk and scalp - 
ing-knife style. Colver then made a most demoniacal speech, 
saying but little on the subject-matter, but wandering over the 

l Edited in Lowell, Mass., by the Rev. Luther Lee. 

- This document, to be found in the regular series of reports, is an elab 
orate review of the origin of the Mass. Abolition Society and the schism in 
the American Society, with a brief glance at the Third Party. 



MS. 



Geo. Brad- 
burn. 



6 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKEISON. [^T. 36. 

CHAP. I. whole universe of abuse which the New Organization have 
j^. created for their delectation. I never saw a man who seemed 
to be more possessed with a devil. One of the Westons well 
said, that the Society might now be thought to have done some 
thing to justify his denunciation of it as a Non-Resistance 
Society, as an ordinary assembly of men of the world would 
have thrown him out of the window on less provocation. Brad- 
burn and Garrison replied briefly, and the matter ended by the 
passage of the resolution. 

We cannot nowadays understand the superstition for 
merly attached to the stigma of infidelity, both on the part 
of those who sought to fasten and of those who sought 
to avoid it. In the popular imagination it belonged in 
the category of self -operative curses, and was conclusive 

Lib. ii :43. of all argument. Hence it availed little for Mr. Garrison 
to reason that if the Chardon-Street Convention was infi 
del because some infidel addressed it, it was Orthodox 

Ante, 2: 427. because Phelps, Baptist because Colver, and Methodist 
because Father Taylor, did likewise. Nor could he hope 
to escape the imputation of being a double and treble 
dyed infidel for his attendance at the adjourned second 
and third sessions of that Convention, which fell in the 
year now under consideration. Convicted, too, of having 
" headed " this ungodly gathering in the beginning, the 
head and front of its offending he must remain to the 
bitter end. True, Edmund Quincy, who actually headed 

Lib. ii : 47. it, declared that the first suggestion of such a convention 

Ante,2-.42i, was made at Groton, where Garrison was not; that when 
he heard of it at a private dinner- table, he did not encour- 

Ante, 2 : 422. age it, and refused to be one of the committee to call it, 
and even urged Mr. Quincy (in vain) to strike out a strong 
passage in the call. But, continues the latter 

Lib. ii : 47. " But, then, these new ideas were first started by you, and 
therefore you are accountable for this development of them! 
My dear friend, they who say this, do you honor overmuch. 
You have but obeyed, you have not created, the spirit of the 
age, which is busy with old ideas, and will in due time change 
them, and with them the institutions which are their outward 
manifestations. " 



En. 36.] 



KE-FORMATION AND REANIMATION. 



CHAP. i. 



1841. 
Lib. ii : 58. 



However, it could not be denied that the Convention 
which assembled for the second time at the Chardon- 
Street Chapel on Tuesday, March 30, 1841, had met in 
pursuance of Mr. Garrison s motion, at the previous ses 
sion, to discuss the origin and authority of the Ministry. 
The participants and combatants were much the same as 
before, and a preliminary skirmish again took place over 
a clerical attempt to restrict discussion within the lines 
and sanction of the Bible. The defeat of this movement 
was the only positive action of the Convention, which 
then freely took sides individually for or against the 
proposition, " That the order of the ministry, as at pres 
ent existing, is anti-scriptural and of human origin." In 
this discussion Mr. Garrison appears to have said nothing, 
being unable to attend except for a few hours during the Lib. 11:55. 
three days 5 but he forestalled fresh clerical misrepre 
sentation of the Convention by moving a committee to 
prepare resolutions explanatory of its nature and doings, 
and these resolutions were from his pen. He also pre 
vented any notice being taken, by way of reply, of a Sab 
batarian letter from Clarkson, which Nathaniel Colver 
had craftily procured, and introduced at the earliest 
moment. The snare was too obviously meant on the 
one hand for Mr. Garrison himself, on the other for the 
Convention, whose members sought, as Emerson well 
said, " something better and more satisfying than a vote 
or a definition." 

This peculiar body met once more and finally on the 
26th, 27th, and 28th of October, 1841, taking for its last 
topic the Church. Various causes kept away its main 
clerical antagonists, but they were represented by Phelps, 
who found it as infidel as ever. Mr. Garrison s resolutions 
are all of the proceedings that can be noticed here : 

" Resolved, That the true church is independent of all human Lib. n : 179. 
organizations, creeds, or compacts. 

" Resolved, That it is not in the province of any man, or any 
body of men, to admit to or to exclude from that church any 
one who is created in the divine image. 



Lectures 



354- 



I?8< I79 



8 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. [^T. 36. 

CHAP. I. " Eesolved, That it is nowhere enjoined as a religious duty, 

1841 ky Christ or his apostles, upon any man, that he should connect 

himself with any association, by whatever name called ; but 

all are left free to act singly, or in conjunction with others, 

according to their own free choice." 

While the glow of this truly spiritual occasion was 

still on him, Mr. Garrison produced four sonnets, which 

contain the pith of his contributions to the theological 

interchange of the Chardon-Street Convention. They 

#.11:179, appeared in successive numbers of the Liberator, under 

183,187,191. the titles ^ The Bibi e> "Holy Time," "Worship," "The 

True Church. 77 As poesy, none deserves to be quoted 
entire. As landmarks, they may yield a line or two. 
From the first, " The Bible 77 : 

Lib. ii : 179. Book of Books ! though skepticism flout 

Thy sacred origin, thy worth decry ; 
Though transcendental * folly give the lie 
To what thou teachest ; though the critic doubt 
This fact, that miracle, and raise a shout 
Of triumph o er each incongruity 
He in thy pages may perchance espy, . . . 
Thy oracles are holy and divine. . . . 

l This adjective was changed to " atheistic " in the edition of Mr. Garri 
son s Sonnets and Other Poems, published in Boston in 1843 (p. 64), 
showing the liberalizing effect upon himself, unsuspected at the time, of 
those " memorable interviews and conversations, in the hall, in the lobbies, 
or around the doors," of which Emerson tells ( Lectures and Biographical 
Sketches, ed. 1884, p. 354). On the appearance of Theodore Parker s epoch- 
making ordination sermon on "The Transient and Permanent in Chris 
tianity," preached May 19, 1841 (Frothingham s Life of Parker, p. 152, 
Weiss s Life, 1 : 165), Garrison said gravely to his friend Johnson, "Infi 
delity, Oliver, infidelity ! " So thought most of the Unitarian clergy ; and the 
denomination first gave it official currency, as at once respectable and con 
servative doctrine, in 1885 (see the volume, Views of Religion, a selection 
from Parker s sermons). In reviewing, in January, 1842, a volume of relig 
ious poetry by Mrs. Sophia L. Little, of Pawtucket, Mr. Garrison said : 
" Whatever goes to exalt the character of the Saviour is at all times valu 
able ; but never more than when, as at the present time, attempts are made 
to decry his mission, to associate him with Socrates and Plato, and to reject 
him as the great mediator between God and man " (Lib. 12 : 7). The refer 
ence is to a letter of Christopher A. Greene s in the Plain Speaker (1 : 22) : 
"And we felt . . . that we were the brothers and equals of Socrates 
and Plato and Jesus and John of every man who had written or spoken 
or walked or worked in the name of God." 



^T. 36.] KE-FOKMATION AND KE ANIMATION. 9 

We may perhaps detect in this sonnet a squint at a CHAP. i. 
movement made, during a pause in the last session at ^ Im 
Chardon Street, to hold a convention " to consider the Lib. 11:178; 
authoritjr of the Scriptures, and the extent of their obli 
gation on men/ in which the Transcendentalists Emer 
son and Alcott were united as a committee with Edmund 
Quincy and Mrs. Chapman. That Mr. Garrison was not 
in sympathy with it seems likely from his disclaimer of #.11:183. 
responsibility for Quincy s justification of it, which was 
allowed to be copied from the Non-Resistant into the Lib- Lib. n : 183. 
emtor, and in which one remarks not only Mr. Quincy s 
emancipation from the supernatural sanction of the Bible, 
but his exposition of the way in which the question of 

its authority was forced on thoughtful minds by clerical cf.ante t i\ 
463, note 2. 

opposition to reform. 

The sonnet on " Holy Time " is a reflection of the poem, Ante, 2: 153. 
" True Rest." We cite the close of it : 

Dear is the Christian Sabbath to my heart, Lib. n : 183 ; 

Bound by no forms, from times and seasons free ; ^w^^G^ 

The whole of life absorbing, not a part ; /. 98. 

Perpetual rest and perfect liberty ! 
Who keeps not this, steers by a Jewish chart, 

And sails in peril on a storm-tossed sea. 

From " Worship" let us take the first half : 

They who, as worshippers, some mountain climb, Lib. 11 : 187; 

Or to some temple made with hands repair, Writings^ f 

As though the godhead specially dwelt there, p. 115. 

And absence, in Heaven s eye, would be a crime, 
Have yet to comprehend this truth sublime : 

The freeman of the Lord no chain can bear 

His soul is free to worship everywhere, 
Nor limited to any place or time. . . . 

In lieu of Mr. Garrison s metrical apostrophe to "The 
True Church/ we shall do better to seek a prose defini- 
tion of that entity in the following profession of faith, * II5> 
which was calculated for private circulation by the friend 
to whom it was addressed : 



10 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. [^T. 36. 

W. L. Garrison to Elizabeth Pease, Darlington, England. 

MS. BOSTON, June 1, 1841. 

I am ,an " infidel," forsooth, because I do not believe in the 
inherent holiness of the first day of the week 5 in a regular 
priesthood j in a mere flesh-and-blood corporation as consti 
tuting the true church of Christ ; in temple worship as a part 
of the new dispensation; in being baptized with water, and 
observing the " ordinance" of the supper, etc., etc., etc. I am 
an "infidel" because I do believe in consecrating all time, and 
body and soul, unto God; in "a royal priesthood, a chosen 
generation " ; in a spiritual church, built up of lively stones, the 
head of which is Christ ; in worshipping God in spirit and in 
truth, without regard to time or place ; in being baptized with 
the Holy Spirit, and enjoying spiritual communion with the 
Father, etc., etc. If this be infidelity, then is Quakerism infi 
delity. 

With regard to the " Church, Sabbath, and Ministry " Con 
vention, it should be understood that it was called not to deter 
mine what is or is not inspiration, or whether the Bible is or is 
not the only rule of faith and practice, but simply to hear the 
opinions of " all sorts of folks" in relation to the Church, the 
Sabbath, and Ministry leaving every one free to appeal to 
that standard which, in his judgment, might seem to be infal 
lible. Hence, the Convention could not have properly enter 
tained or decided upon any " extraneous " question. It was 
a trick of priestcraft, to induce the Convention to cut off free 
discussion, that led to the introduction of the Bible test by 
Colver, Phelps, Torrey, St. Clair, etc. These disorganizes and 
def amers resorted to this device merely to make capital for New 
Organization, and to bring a false accusation against the lead 
ing friends of the old organization, some of whom happened to 
be in the Convention. All who were present saw at once the 
spirit that animated this band of priestly conspirators ; so that 
they took the cunning in their own craftiness, and carried the 
counsels of the froward headlong. . . . 

Have you attentively read the little work I left with you, by 
J. H. Noyes ? If you have done with the file of the Perfectionist 
which I left in your care, I will thank you to send it to me by a 
private conveyance whenever perfectly convenient. 

cf. ante, The difference between Noyes s Perfectionism and Mr. 
Garrison s was soon to be illustrated in a very signal 



JET. 36.] KE-FORMATION AND KEANIMATION. 11 

manner. President Mahan and the Rev. Charles G. Ante 2 1285, 
Finney, of Oberlin, who belonged to the same school 
with Noyes and (nominally) the editor of the Liberator, 
assumed an attitude of hostility to non-resistance very 
afflicting to the last-named. Finney held, in a Fast ser- Lib. 11:151, 
mon, " that circumstances may arise, not only to render 
fighting in defence of liberty a Christian duty, but also 
to justify Christians in actively supporting despotism." 
Noyes s society at Putney, Vt., some months afterwards, #.11:183. 
discussed the question : " Is it according to Scripture and 
reason that women should act as public teachers in the 
Church, in large assemblies, except in cases of special 
inspiration?" and unanimously sided with Paul in the 
negative. 1 Their organ, the Witness, for the same rea 
son, pronounced the doings of Boyle, the Grimkes, and Ante, 2: 286. 
Garrison against the same Apostle " acts of flagrant sedi 
tion against God," and spoke of " the whole phalanx of 
Massachusetts Ultraists, with Garrison at its head." This 
outburst served a useful purpose in ridiculing the attempts Lib. n : 183, 
to connect Mr. Garrison with the marriage views of the 195 I ^". s 
Perfectionists because he was in agreement with some 
other part of their doctrine. It was a poor rule that would 
not work both ways, and the identification of Noyes with 
Phelps, Torrey, and Colver on the woman question was 
sufficient to prove that these clergymen, therefore, thought 
lightly of the marriage institution. 

All this did not prevent Mr. Garrison from coming to 
the rescue of the Perfectionists against attacks from eccle- Lib. n : 167. 
siastical bodies all over the country on "the doctrine of sin 
less perfection, or entire sanctification in the present life." 

1 The assumption of the headship of the male is curiously involved in the 
Putneyite affirmation that there is no intrinsic difference between property 
in persons and property in things ; and that the same spirit which abolished 
exclusiveness in regard to money, would abolish, if circumstances allowed 
full scope to it, exclusiveness in regard to women and children. Paul ex 
pressly places property in women and property in goods in the same category, 
and speaks of them together, as ready to be abolished by the advent of the 
Kingdom of Heaven" (Noyes s American Socialisms, p. 625; andc/. ante, 
2 : 289). See, on the other hand, Adin Ballou s scriptural defence of the 
equality of the sexes as maintained by his community (Lib. 12 : 16). 



12 WILLIAM LLOYD GARBISON. [-ET. 36. 



Lib. ii : 167. " Now, what," he asked, " is the point in controversy ? Not, 
who is a Christian, or whether this or that individual has attained 
to a state of i sinless perfection ; but whether human beings, 
in this life, may and ought to serve God with all their mind and 
strength, and to love their neighbor as themselves ! Whether 
1 total abstinence from all sin is not as obligatory as it is from 
any one sin ! . . . 

" We feel authorized to refer to this subject, not only as a 
public journalist, but also because it has a very important con 
nection with the righteous reforms of the day. Holiness is 
incompatible with robbery, oppression, love of dominion, mur 
der, pride, vainglory, worldly pomp, selfishness, and sinful 
lusts. But these ecclesiastical bodies are determined to make 
a Christian life compatible with a military profession, with kill 
ing enemies, with enslaving a portion of mankind, 1 with the 
robbing of the poor, with worldliness and ambition, with a par 
ticipation in all popular iniquities. Hence, when abolitionism 
declares that no man can love God who enslaves another, they 
deny it, and assert that man-stealing and Christianity may 
co-exist in the same character. 2 When it is asserted that the 

1 "Twenty years have passed since the abolition of serfdom [in Russia], 
and no one has taken the trouble to strike out the phrase which, in connec 
tion with the commandment of God to honor parents, was introduced into 
the catechism to sustain and justify slavery. With regard to the sixth 
commandment, Thou shalt not kill, the instructions of the catechism are 
from the first in favor of murder. . . . The Christian Church has 
recognized and sanctioned divorce, slavery, tribunals, all earthly powers, 
the death penalty, and war. . . . The world does as it pleases, and 
leaves to the Church the task of justifying its actions with explanations as 
to the meaning of life. The world organizes an existence in absolute oppo 
sition to the doctrine of Jesus, and the Church endeavors to demonstrate 
that men who live contrary to the doctrine of Jesus really live in accord 
ance with that doctrine" (Count Leo Tolstoi s My Religion, New York, 
1885, pp. 214, 215, 221). 

2 On Aug. 30, 1841, Henry C. Wright wrote to Edmund Quincy : "I once 
met Rev. Francis Wayland, D. D., President of Brown University, in the 
presence of several friends, to converse on the subject of slavery. The 
conversation turned on the question Can a slaveholder be a Christian ? 
To bring it to a point, addressing myself to the Doctor, I asked him Can 
a man be a Christian and claim a right to sunder husbands and wives, par 
ents and children to compel men to work without wages to forbid them 
to read the Bible, and buy and sell them and who habitually does these 
things? YES, answered the Rev. Dr. and President, provided he has 
the spirit of Christ. Is it possible for [a man] to be governed by the spirit 
of Christ and claim a right to commit these atrocious deeds, and habitually 
commit them ? After some turning, he answered, Yes, I believe he can. 
Is there, then, one crime in all the catalogue of crimes which, of itself, 



^T. 36.] KE-FOKMATION AND REANIMATION. 13 

forgiveness instead of the slaughter of enemies is necessary CHAP. I. 
to constitute one a Christian, they affirm that to hang, stab, or jj~~ 
shoot enemies, under certain circumstances, is perfectly con 
sonant with the spirit of Christ. Thus they make no distinction 
between the precious and the vile, sanctify what is evil, per 
petuate crime, and honor what is devilish. They are cages of 
unclean birds, Augean stables of pollution, which need thor 
ough purification. 

" We affirm that this is not a question of sectarian theology, 
but of sound morality and vital godliness. As men who are 
conscious of guilt should not attempt to excuse themselves, so 
should they not countenance sin in others. If they are forced 
to exclaim, Who shall deliver us from the body of this death ? 
let them not revile those who feel prepared to say from joyful 
experience, There is now no condemnation to them which are Rom.*-. 1,2. 
in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 
For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made us 
free from the law of sin and death. If a man has passed from 
death unto life, how much of death is attached to him ? If he 
has crucified the old man with his lusts, how corrupt is the new ? 
If he has the spirit of Christ, how can he have, at the same time, 
the spirit of Satan ? If he has put on Christ, what of iniquity 
has he not cast off ? 

" Instead, therefore, of assailing the doctrine, l Be ye perfect, 
even as your Father in Heaven is perfect, let us all aim to 
establish it, not merely as theoretically right, but as prac 
tically attainable; 1 and if we are conscious that we are 
not yet wholly clean, not yet entirely reconciled to God, 
not yet filled with perfect love, let us, instead of resisting the 

would be evidence to you that a man had not the spirit of Christ ? I asked. 
Yes, thousands, said the Dr. What? I asked. Stealing, said he. 
Stealing what, a sheep or a MAN ? I asked. The Doctor took his hat and 
left the room, and appeared no more " (Lib. 11:143). 

l Then as I read these maxims [of the Sermon on the Mount] I was 
permeated with the joyous assurance that I might that very hour, that 
very moment, begin to practise them. The burning desire I felt led me to 
the attempt, but the doctrine of the Church rang in my ears : Man is weak, 
and to this he cannot attain. My strength soon failed. On every side I 
heard, You must believe and pray ; but my wavering faith impeded 
prayer. Again I heard, You must pray, and God will give you faith ; this 
faith will inspire prayer, which in turn will invoke faith that will inspire 
more prayer, and so on, indefinitely. Reason and experience alike con 
vinced me that such methods were useless. It seemed to me that the only 
true way was for me to try to follow the doctrine of Jesus " (Tolstoi s My 
Religion, p. 6). 



14 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. 



. 36. 



CHAP. I. 



i John 5 
i John 3 



i John 3 : 
i John 3 



i John 3 : 9, 



Lib. 11:191. 



Elijah P. 
Lovejoy. 



Lib. 11:191. 



Ante, 2 : 144. 



light and the truth, and denying that freedom from sin is a 
Christian s duty and privilege, confess and forsake our sins 
give no quarter to unrighteousness put on the whole armor of 
God, that we may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil 
believe with all the heart exercise that faith which over 
comes the world, and therefore that cannot be overcome by any 
thing that is in the world and be willing to be wholly delivered 
from the power of darkness, and translated into the kingdom 
of God s dear Son. Whatsoever is born of God overcometh 
the world not half succeeds in the struggle, but wholly tri 
umphs. Little children, let no man deceive you : he that doeth 
righteousness IS righteous [not partly righteous, and partly 
sinful] , even as he [Christ] is righteous. And how righteous 
was Christ? Was any sin found in him? Did he not come 
expressly to do the will of his heavenly Father, and to teach his 
disciples to pray that that will might be done on earth as it is 
done in Heaven ? He that committeth sin is [what ? a saint, 
possibly ? no, is] of the devil. For this purpose the Son of 
God was manifested [what purpose <?] , that he might DESTROY 
the works of the devil. Therefore, Whosoever is born of God 
doth not commit sin ; for his seed remaineth in him : and he 
cannot sin [what a dangerous doctrine, what a l delusive 
error, and how i utterly destructive to the life and growth of 
true holiness !], BECAUSE HE is BORN OF GOD. In this the 
children of God are manifest, and the children of the devil. " 

A sentiment attributed to the Eev. Edward Beecher, 
President of Jacksonville (111.) College, in the course of 
some lectures in Boston, furnished another occasion for 
the display of Mr. Garrison s magnanimity, towards Noyes 
in particular. The stanch friend of Lovejoy was reported 
to have " prognosticated the speedy end of the world by 
1 the general wickedness which prevailed, the doctrines of 
the perfectionists , NON-RESISTANTS, deists, atheists, and 
pantheists, which are all those of false Christ s. " 

" With perfectionists, as such," rejoined Mr. Garrison, " we 
have little or no personal acquaintance. We have never met 
with more than two or three individuals who bear that name, 
and then have had no opportunity to converse with them in 
regard to their peculiar religious views. Some of their writings 
we have perused, in which we have found (as in other writings) 
much to approve and something to condemn. We are not their 



. 36.] 



KE-FOKMATION AND KE ANIMATION. 



15 



advocate or expositor ; for we choose to be responsible only for 
what we shall utter or write, and to let every man answer for 
himself. Doubtless, there are some diversities of views among 
them ; and also some, who profess to be of their number, who 
do not walk worthily of their profession. * All are not Israel 
who are of Israel, yet the true Israel of God remain loyal. If 
what we have heard of the sayings and doings of the perfec 
tionists, especially those residing in Vermont, be true, they have 
certainly turned the grace of God into lasciviousness, and given 
themselves over to a reprobate mind. So, also, if a tithe of the 
allegations that have been brought against the abolitionists 
by their enemies be true, they are a body of madmen, incen 
diaries, and cut-throats. We know how to make allowance for 
calumny in the one case, and it leads us to be charitable in the 
other. . . . 

" Now, whatever may be the conduct of these perfectionists, 
the duty which they enjoin, of ceasing from all iniquity, at once 
and forever, is certainly what God requires, and what cannot be 
denied without extreme hardihood or profligacy of spirit. It is 
reasonable, and therefore attainable. If men cannot help sin 
ning, then they are not guilty in attempting to serve two mas 
ters. If they can, then it cannot be a dangerous doctrine to 
preach ; and he is a rebel against the government of God who 
advocates an opposite doctrine. No matter how many, who pre 
tend to keep the royal law perfectly, break it in their walk and 
conversation, and are either hypocrites or self-deceivers : that 
law should be proclaimed as essential to the recovery of man 
kind from their fallen condition ; and no violation of it by those 
who profess to observe it, can make it nugatory. What though 
the American people, while they declare it to be a self-evident 
truth that all men are created equal, hold in unmitigated thral 
dom one-sixth portion of their number ? Is that truth thereby 
proved to be a lie ? Is it no longer to be asserted in the presence 
of tyranny? Christianity has been dishonored and betrayed 
by millions who have assumed the Christian profession; but is 
it henceforth to be abjured on that account ? 

" The attempt of Pres. Beecher to associate non-resistants 
with deists and atheists is not merely absurd not merely 
unfortunate not merely censurable but it is a flagrant as 
sault upon the character of Jesus, who suffered for us, leaving 
us an example that we should follow his steps. Non-resistance 
is based upon the teachings, doctrines, examples, and spirit of 
Christ. Christ is its pattern, its theme, its hope, its rejoicing, 



CHAP. I. 



Ante, 2 : 289 ; 

Noyes s 

American 

Socialisms, 

p. 624. 



16 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. [^T. 36. 



CHAP. I. its advocate and protector, its author and finisher, its Alpha 
I8 ~ and Omega. . . . 

" It appears that the subject of his [Beecher s] discourse was 
i The Last Times, or the end of the world j and, in order suit 
ably to affect the minds of those who listened to him, and 
to prepare them for the speedy coming of the Son of Man 
Lib. 13 : 23, (an event, by the way, which we believe transpired eighteen 
hundred years ago), 1 he warns them to beware of those who 
abjure all stations of worldly trust and preferment j who insist 
that Christians cannot wield carnal weapons for the destruction 
of their enemies ; who, when smitten on the one cheek, turn the 
other also to the smiter ; and who are willing to die for their 
foes, as did Jesus for his, rather than to imprison, maim, or 
destroy them ! " 

The doctrines defended in the foregoing extracts con 
tinued, as heretofore, to be merely subsidiary to Mr. Gar- 

Ante,a:3ps- rison s lifework. They were the unfailing feeders of his 
anti-slavery courage, energy, and persistence. " We have 

Lib. ii 199. never," said the editor of the Liberator in June, " devoted 
more of our time to the anti-slavery movement than we 
1839-41. have for the last three years. We are literally absorbed 7 
in that movement. We have yet to deliver our first pub 
lic lecture on the Church/ l the Sabbath, or < the Minis- 
:326. try, or even on non-resistance. We have been nominally 
one of the editors of the Non-Resistant for a period of 
two and a half years j and, during that time, we have not 
devoted half a day to the writing of editorial matter for 
its pages." His activity as an an ti -slavery lecturer dur 
ing the year 1841 is especially notable. The paralysis of 
this mode of propagandism as a consequence of the hard 
times, the Harrison Presidential campaign, the schism in 
the American Society, and the Liberty-Party secession, 
was lamentably felt at the close of 1840, and Mr. Garrison 
^s. had done what he could, by taking the field in person, to 
supply the lack of a full corps of agents. At the ninth 
annual meeting of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society 

l Father Miller, the head of the Second-Adventists, and so-called " end-of- 
the- world man," was at this epoch preaching in Massachusetts that the 
"day of probation," preceding the millennium, was no further off than a 
date somewhere between the vernal equinoxes of 1843-44. 



^T. 36.] KE-FOKMATION AND KEANIMATION. 17 

in January, 1841, Abby Kelley moved that lie again go Lib. n : 23. 
forth and meet his detractors. Accepting this commis 
sion impersonally, he labored for the cause in a great 
number of towns in eastern Massachusetts, in Connecti 
cut, in New Hampshire, with the annual May visit to New 
York, and an excursion, with N. P. Rogers, to Philadel 
phia. Edmund Quincy made good his editorial delin 
quencies, and, on the return of Collins, himself also Li6.n-.igi, 
turned lecturer. 2I1 - 

Collins s absence was, to the friends at home, unaccount 
ably prolonged, and the most urgent private and official MS. Apr. i, 
appeals to him to come back to his post, which no one 
else could fill, were disappointed. Month after month 
the date of his sailing was postponed; and, what with 
two visits to Ireland, the publication of a controversial 
pamphlet, 1 and the confirmation of the Scotch alliance 
with the old organization, summer overtook him before 
he felt free to rejoin his associates in America. He 
crossed in the same steamer with the Phillipses, arriving July 
July 17, 1841, ten days after the Chapmans had returned 
from Hayti. 2 Great was the rejoicing over this reunion, 
which was signalized by a formal reception. 3 The family Lib. u : 127. 

1 Eight and Wrong among the Abolitionists of the United States : or, 
the Objects, Principles, and Measures of the Original American A. S. Soci 
ety Unchanged. By John A. Collins, Eepresentative of the A. A. S. S. 
Glasgow : Geo. Gallie, 1841 (Lib. 11 : 77, 138). This was begun, with the 
aid of Elizabeth Pease, in the latter part of January, and was out by the 
third week in March (MSS. Feb. 2, 1841, E. Pease to W. L. G., and Mar. 
24, to Collins). 

2 They had embarked for the island on Dec. 28, 1840 (Lib. 11 : 3), for 
the sake of Mr. Henry G. Chapman s health, which was only temporarily 
benefited. 

3 In the evening there was a collation given by the colored people. Gar 
rison," wrote Wendell Phillips to Elizabeth Pease (MS. Aug. 26, 1841), 
"was in fine vein witty and fluent; his wife s eyes worth a queen s 
dowry. Miss Southwick and I were tied to a Haytian to speak bad French 
10 him, as he could talk only [to] two beside ourselves. Bradburn and 
"W. L. G. brightened each other by their retorts. Said Hiines, alluding mod 
estly to his wish to be always acting, though only effecting a little, I am 
but a cipher, but I keep always on the slate. Yes, said W. L. G., and 
always on the right side. [S. J.] May, whose extra care to be candid led 
some new-organized ones to fancy he was going to join them, took occasion 
to explain his position. Said he : One asked me the other day if I was 

VOL. III. 2 



18 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON 1 . 



. 36. 



CHAP. I. 

1841. 

Lib. ii : 139. 
Ante, 2 : 346. 



Aug. 10, n, 

12, 1841 ; 

Lib. ii : 130, 

134- 



Geo. Brad- 
burn. 



S. J. May s 

Recollec 
tions, p. 292. 



Life ofF. 
Douglass, 
ed. 1882, /. 

216; 

Cf. Anna 
Gardners 
Harvest 
Gleanings, 
pp. 17-19. 



circle of the abolitionists was now complete; discour 
agement gave way to hopeful, harmonious action, in 
which the organizing skill and " Herculean powers of 
despatch " of the man who had " saved the cause " in 1840 
were speedily manifested. 1 

Of the numerous meetings and conventions now insti 
tuted, that at Nantucket in August was a conspicuous 
example of the glad renewal of anti-slavery fellowship 
(the sectarian spirit having been exorcised), and was 
otherwise memorable. No report is left of the social 
delights of companionship between Bradburn (a sort of 
island host), Quincy, Garrison, and Collins j but the sig 
nificant incident of the public proceedings has been re 
corded by the chief actor in them. This was Frederick 
Douglass of New Bedford, formerly a Maryland slave, 
and only for three years a freeman by virtue of being a 
fugitive. His extraordinary oratorical powers were hardly 
suspected by himself, and he had never addressed any but 
his own color when he was induced to narrate his experi 
ences at Nantucket. 

" It was," he says, " with the utmost difficulty that I could 
stand erect, or that I could command and articulate two words 

going to Chardon-St. Chapel [i. e., to the reception to Phillips and Collins]. 
Yes. Why, Mr. May, I heard you were leaving the old party. Who told 
you so ? Many people. Well, said Samuel, when I am going to leave, I 11 
be myself the first to tell it. When I leave W. L. G., I 11 tell him so first. 
Good, was it not? You d say so if you had seen the noble, calm, whole- 
souled speaker." 

iMr. Garrison wrote to Miss Pease on Sept. 16, 1841 (MS.) : " Our anti- 
slavery struggle is constantly increasing in vigor and potency ; and never 
were our spirits better, or our blows more effective, or our prospects more 
encouraging, than at present. Our fall and winter campaign will be carried 
on with unwonted energy. The return of our friends Phillips, Chapman, 
and Collins infuses new life into the general mass. The people are every 
where eager to hear. I am covered all over with applications to lecture in 
all parts of the free States. The many base attempts that have been made 
to cripple my influence, and to render me odious in the eyes of the people, 
have only served to awaken sympathy, excite curiosity, and to open a wide 
door for usefulness." Notice the large and harmonious meeting of the 
Eastern Pennsylvania A. S. Society at Philadelphia in December, 1841, at 
which, however, the temporary suspension of the freeman in favor of the 
Standard was voted (Lib. 12 : 2, 3, 7, 8). 



^T. 36.] KE-FORMATION AND KEANIMATION. 19 

without hesitation and stammering. I trembled in every limb. Lib. 15 : 75. 
I am not sure that my embarrassment was not the most effec 
tive part of my speech, if speech it could be called. At any 
rate, this is about the only part of my performance that I now 
distinctly remember. The audience sympathized with me at 
once, and, from having been remarkably quiet, became much 
excited. Mr. Garrison followed me, taking me as his text ; and 
now, whether I had made an eloquent plea in behalf of free 
dom, or not, his was one, never to be forgotten. Those who 
had heard him oftenest, and had known him longest, were 
astonished at his masterly effort. For the time he possessed 
that almost fabulous inspiration, often referred to but seldom 
attained, in which a public meeting is transformed, as it were, 
into a single individuality, the orator swaying a thousand heads 
and hearts at once, and, by the simple majesty of his all-con 
trolling thought, converting his hearers into the express image 
of his own soul. That night there were at least a thousand 
Garrisonians in Nantucket ! " * 

l Another eye witness, Parker Pillsbury, reports ( Acts of the A. S. Apos 
tles, p. 327) : "When the young man [Douglass] closed, late in the even 
ing, though none seemed to know nor to care for the hour, Mr. Garrison 
rose to make the concluding address. I think he never before nor after 
wards felt more profoundly the sacredness of his mission, or the impor 
tance of a crisis moment to his success. I surely never saw him more 
deeply, more divinely, inspired. The crowded congregation had been 
wrought up almost to enchantment during the whole long evening, par 
ticularly by some of the utterances of the last speaker, as he turned over 
the terrible Apocalypse of his experiences in slavery. 

" But Mr. Garrison was singularly serene and calm. It was well that he 
was so. He only asked a few simple, direct questions. I can recall but 
few of them, though I do remember the first and the last. The first was : 
Have we been listening to a thing, a piece of property, or to a man ? A 
man ! a man ! shouted fully five hundred voices of women and men. And 
should such a man be held a slave in a republican and Christian land? 
was another question. No, no ! never, never ! again swelled up from the 
same voices, like the billows of the deep. But the last was this : Shall 
such a man ever be sent back to slavery from the soil of old Massachu 
setts? this time uttered with all the power of voice of which Garrison 
was capable, now more than forty years ago. Almost the whole assembly 
sprang with one accord to their feet, and the walls and roof of the Athenaeum 
seemed to shudder with the No, no ! loud and long-continued in the wild 
enthusiasm of the scene. As soon as Garrison could be heard, he snatched 
the acclaim, and superadded : No ! a thousand times no ! Sooner [let] the 
lightnings of heaven blast Bunker Hill monument till not one stone shall 
be left standing on another ! " 

Compare a similar scene in the Boston State House on Jan. 27, 1842 (Lib. 
12 : 26). 



20 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



CHAP. I. 

1841. 

Life ofF. 
Douglass, 
p. 217. 

Lid. 12:11. 



Writings 

ofN. P. 

Rogers, p. 

167. 



Lib. 11:78. 
Lib, 11:75. 



MS. July 
16, 1841, 
Rogers to 
G. 



Koger. 
W.L. 



Rogers s 
Writings, 

P- 158. 



Collins, at Mr. Garrison s instance, 1 lost no time in 
securing Mr. Douglass as an agent of the Massachusetts 
Society ; and the late " graduate from the i peculiar insti 
tution/ with his diploma written on Ms back," as Collins 
used to say, proved an invaluable accession to the apostles 
of abolition. 

One other glimpse of Mr. Garrison s lecturing at this 
period must suffice. " We bargained last year," wrote N. 
P. Rogers in his Herald of Freedom for October 1, 1841, 
"with our beloved fellow-traveller Garrison, in the Scot 
tish Highlands, either on Loch Katrine, on board the 
barge rowed by McFarlan and his three Highlanders, or 
else as we rode the Shetland ponies from Katrine to Loch 
Lomond, through Rob Roy s country/ and along his 
native heath/ and when we were gazing upward at the 
mist-clad mountains, that if ever we lived to get home 
again to our dear New England, we would go and show 
him New Hampshire s sterner and loftier summits, her 
Haystacks and her White Hills, and their Alpine passes." 
Released from the extra care of editing the Standard by 
the consenting of David Lee and Lydia Maria Child to 
conduct the new organ of the American Society, 2 Rogers 
in July began to urge his " very brother " to make the 
trip in question, then far from fashionable or well-known, 
or well-provided with houses of entertainment. "Forgive 
me for writing so much," he concluded. "You are the 
only person, almost, I love to write to well enough to 
attempt it, and the only one I can t write anything like a 
merchantable letter to" Such warm affection easily found 
a sentimental reason for a trip up the Merrimac by two 
friends, of whom the younger was born at the mouth, 
and the elder near the sources, of that noble river thus 

1 Lib. 15:75, from the preface to Douglass s Autobiography. But Ed 
mund Quincy wrote : "I believe I was the first person who suggested to 
him becoming an A. S. speaker " (MS. Dec. 13, 1845, to R. D. Webb). 

2 They reached this conclusion at the close of March, 1841, and it was 
arranged that both names should appear in the paper, but that Mrs. Child 
should have immediate charge, removing to New York, while her husband 
remained on his beet-sugar farm near Northampton, Mass. (MS. Mar. 30, 
31, 1841, J. S. Gibbons to W. L. G.). 



. 36.] 



RE-FORMATION AND REANIMATION. 



21 



" native " to both of them. Mr. Garrison, on his part, 
fully responded to an invitation which was to gratify 
also his keen admiration for natural scenery. 

This (in the main) pleasure excursion was the first ever 
undertaken by Mr. Garrison in his own country, and it 
made a lasting impression upon his memory. It began at 
Concord, N. H., on August 23, and ended at Conway on 
August 30 ; and in that time the Merrimac was ascended 
to the Franconia Notch, Littleton was visited, Mt. Wash 
ington ascended from Fabyan s, and the return made by 
way of the Crawford Notch. Rogers, in the Herald of 
Freedom, was the willing and graphic chronicler of the 
week s jaunt, which was put to anti-slavery account by 
holding meetings along the route, with little aid and 
much obstruction from the clergy. In Rogers s native 
town of Plymouth no meeting-house could be obtained, 
and recourse was had to a maple grove across the river 
in Holderness. 



CHAP. I. 

1841. 
Lib. ii : 147. 



Rogers s 
Writings, 

>>p. 156, 193. 

Cf. Lib. ii : 
147, 167. 



Aug. 24, 

1841. 



Writings 
ofN. P. 
Rogers, 
p. 160. 



" Semi-circular seats, backed against a line of magnificent 
trees, to accommodate, we should judge, from two to three hun 
dred, though we did not think about numbers, were filled princi 
pally with women, and the men who could not find seats stood on 
the greensward on either hand, and at length, when wearied with 
standing, seated themselves on the ground. Garrison, mounted 
on a rude platform in front, lifted up his voice and spoke to 
them in prophet tones and surpassing eloquence, from half -past 
three till I saw the rays of the setting sun playing through the 
trees on his head. It was at his back but the auditory could 
see it, if they had felt at leisure to notice the decline of the sun 
or the lapse of time. They heeded it not, any more than he, 
but remained till he ended, apparently undisposed to move, 
though some came from six, eight, and even twelve miles 
distance. . . . 

" Garrison spoke the better for being driven to the open air. Ibid., p. 162. 
The injustice and meanness of it aroused his spirit, and the 
beauty of the scene animated his eloquence. We never heard 
him speak so powerfully ; and as he spoke the more earnestly, 
the people, from like cause, heard with deeper interest. He 
scarcely alluded to the miserable Jesuitry that excluded us from 
the synagogue." 



22 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



. 36. 



Rogers s 

Writings, 

pp. 184, 190. 



Ibid. , p. 190. 

Aug. 28, 
1841. 

Writings, 
p. 192. 

Ibid., p. 177. 



Aug. 25, 

1841. 

Thos. Par- 

nell Beach, 

Ezekiel 

Rogers. 

E. Rogers. 



E. Rogers. 

At Little 
ton, N.H., 
Aug. 26, 
1841. 



E. Rogers. 
E. Rogers. 



We cannot dilate here on the wonderful horn at Fa- 
byaii s, waking the echoes of the mountains j on the sing 
ing of that air which, along with the name of Rogers, 
became household in Mr. Garrison s family, "In the 
days when we went gypsying," or else of psalms, " in good 
time and harmony / on the descent of Mt. Washington ; 
or on the visit to the Willey House, where, says Rogers, 
" we wrote brother Garrison s [name] and our own linked 
together on the wall with a fragment of coal." But the 
following incident is too characteristic of the men and the 
time to be omitted : 

"As we rode through the [Franconia] Notch after friends 
Beach and Rogers, we were alarmed at seeing smoke issue from 
their chaise-top, and cried out to them that their chaise was 
afire! We were more than suspicious, however, that it was 
something worse than that, and that the smoke came out of 
friend Rogers s mouth. And it so turned out. This was before 
we reached the Notch tavern. Alighting there to water our 
beasts, we gave him, all round, a faithful admonition. For 
anti-slavery does not fail to spend its intervals of public service 
in mutual and searching correction of the faults of its friends. 
We gave it soundly to friend Rogers that he, an abolitionist, 
on his way to an anti-slavery convention, should desecrate his 
anti-slavery mouth and that glorious Mountain Notch with a 
stupefying tobacco weed. We had halted at the Iron Works 
tavern to refresh our horses, and, while they were eating, 
walked to view the Furnace. As we crossed the little bridge, 
friend Rogers took out another cigar, as if to light it when we 
should reach the fire. Is it any malady you have got, brother 
Rogers, said we to him, that you smoke that thing, or is it 
habit and indulgence merely ? It is nothing but habit, said 
he gravely ; or, I would say, it was nothing else, and he sig 
nificantly cast the little roll over the railing into the Ammo- 
noosuck. A revolution! exclaimed Garrison, a glorious 
revolution without noise or smokej and he swung his hat 
cheerily about his head. 

" It was a pretty incident, and we joyfully witnessed it and as 
joyfully record it. It was a vice abandoned, a self-indulgence 
denied, and from principle. It was quietly and beautifully 
done. We call on any smoking abolitionist to take notice and 
to take pattern. Anti-slavery wants her mouths for other uses 



. 36.] 



BE-FOKMATION AND EEANIMATION. 



23 



than to be flues for besotting tobacco-smoke. They may as well 
almost be rum-ducts as tobacco-funnels. And we rejoice that 
so few mouths or noses in our ranks are thus profaned. Abo 
litionists are generally as crazy in regard to rum and tobacco as 
in regard to slavery. Some of them refrain from eating flesh 
and drinking tea and coffee. Some are so bewildered that they 
won t fight in the way of Christian retaliation, to the great dis 
turbance of the churches they belong to, and the annoyance of 
their pastors. They do not embrace these new-fangled notions 
as abolitionists but then one fanaticism leads to another, and 
they are getting to be m<mo-maniacs, as the Reverend brother 
Punchard called us, on every subject." 

Rogers s light-heartedness was manifested under diffi 
culties. In January the circulation of the Herald of Free 
dom had dwindled to some 900, and, the publisher being 
unable to sustain it, the New Hampshire Society had to 
take the paper on their hands again. " J. R. French and 
two other boys," as Quincy wrote to Collins, "print it 
for nothing, asking only board and clothes." In July, a 
frank review of the struggles of paper and editor, made 
by Rogers in his own columns, showed that very little of 
his salary had reached him, that much was due him, and 
that he forgave much. 1 Meantime he had given up the 
law, in which his career might have been brilliant. He 
had likewise broken with the church at Plymouth, N. H., 
" excommunicated " it, as Quincy said, and as was, in 
deed, the fashion of a " come-outer " period. He was, 
furthermore, in sympathy with that spirit of " no-organ 
ization " which we have seen manifested at the Chardon- 
Street Convention, and which had now to be combated 
by the abolitionists along with " new organization." 

No-organization and come-outerism were twin brothers ; 
protests, both, against pro-slavery clerical and ecclesias 
tical despotism. But the ranks of the disorganizes were 
swelled by the followers of Channing, whose dread of 
organization was most acute, and belief in the " superior- 

lOn Sept. 7, 1842, he writes to H. C. Wright (MS.) : " To-morrow I must 
go to my native village to hunt up some means of support, having received 
only half-a-dozen chairs and a bureau as my first quarter s salary." 



CHAP. I. 
1841. 



George 
Punchard. 



MS. Jan. 
30, 1841. 

Herald of 

Freedom, 

7 : 82, Lib. 

ii : 118. 

MS. Mar. 
14, 1841, 
Rogers to 
W. L. G. 

MS. Jan. 
30, 1841, 

toJ. A. 

Collins. 



Lib. 15 : 29 ; 
ante, 2 : 56. 



24 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKBISON. [^T. 36. 



CHAP. i. ity of individual to associated action " almost fatuous ; l 

1841. and especially by the Transcendental wing, who pushed 

individualism to its furthest limits. Finally, some non- 

Lib. ii : 79. resistants were alarmed for their consistency when sub 
mitting to presidents, vice-presidents, and committees. 
In these currents of opinion Mr. Garrison did not lose 
his head. At the Middlesex County An ti- Slavery Soci 
ety s quarterly meeting at Holliston on April 27, 1841, he 

Lib. ii : 70. drew the resolution which declared " That if l new organ 
ization be in diametrical opposition to the genius of the 
anti-slavery enterprise, no-organization (as now advocated 
in certain quarters) would, in our opinion, be still more 
unphilosophical and pernicious in its tendencies." Yet a 

Lib. ii : 90. like resolution from his hand was staved off at the closely 

M iBi 5 following New England Convention, under the lead of 

William Chace, who had imbibed most deeply what Abby 

MS. Sept. Kelley called the " transcendental spirit," and who at 

^wTK G. Nantucket flatly proclaimed the anti-slavery organization 
"the greatest hindrance to the anti-slavery enterprise, 
because of its sectarianism," and hence called on aboli- 

Lib. ii : 147. tionists to shake the dust from their feet against it " when 

they called upon others to leave church organizations. 72 
MS. George Bradburn wrote to Francis Jackson on June 1, 

Plain speak- 1841 : "William Chace has gone to tilling the soil, deem- 

er l 23 ing it a crime against God to get a living in any other 

way ! This seems not less strange than his condemna- 

MS. Aug. tion of associations." Chace had, however, a partner in 

G^w\*Bm- husbandry, Christopher A. Greene, with whom he lived in 
a sort of community j and notable in this very year were 



son to 
W. L. G. 



1 His flatterers pretended that the abolition societies had cost him the 
public ear on the subject of slavery. " Dr. Channing himself," said the 
Unitarian Monthly Miscellany, "has not a tithe of the influence he would 
have had, had there been no organization. Protest as he may, he will be 
identified with the organized mass " (Lib. 11 : 69). Mrs. Child, on the con 
trary, asserted in the Standard that Channing had intended to preach a 
sermon on slavery after his return from the West Indies (ante, 1 : 466), but 
never did, and only broke silence after he had caught the glow of associ 
ated anti-slavery action (Lib. 11 : 93). 

2 N. H. Whiting of Marshfield wrote to Mr. Chace on Aug. 29, 1841 : 
" Old and new organization are alike beneath my feet now" (Lib. 11 : 199). 



^T. 36.] HE-FORMATION AND KE ANIMATION. 25 

the attempts in advance of the great wave of Fourier- CHAP. i. 
ism to reconcile individualism with association and I8 "^ I 
organization. As Emerson notified Carlyle in the previ- Oct. 3 o, 
ous autumn, " "We are all a little wild here with number- l84 
less projects of social reform. Not a reading man but has 
a draft of a new community in his waistcoat pocket." 
And on December 31, 1840, Quincy wrote to Collins: MS. 
" Ripley is as full of his scheme of a community as ever. Rev. Geo. 
He has made some progress towards establishing one at Ri P le y- 
West Roxbury, where he lived last summer. The main 
trouble is the root of all evil, as he finds plenty of penni 
less adventurers and but few moneyed ones. Emerson 
thought of it but retired. Still, R. is sanguine, and I 
hope will succeed, for what a residence such a neigh 
borhood would make Dedham ! " On January 30, 1841 : 
" Ripley is actually going to commence the f New State MS. 
and the New Church > at Ellis s farm ... in the 
spring." The idea of " Brook Farm," as it was henceforth 
to be known, notoriously proceeded from Dr. Channing. In 
his recent work on West India Emancipation he had even 
professed to see in the original principles of the abolition 
ists " a struggling of the human mind towards Christian Lib. n:io. 
union," and said he had hoped that this body, purified, Lib. n:i. 
would found a religious community. One of their num 
ber, the Rev. Adin Ballou, presently set forth, in his Lib. n : 33. 
Practical Christian, the scheme and constitution of Fra 
ternal Community No. 1 at Mendon, Mass., afterwards 
known as the Hopedale Community, with non-resistance 
as one of its corner-stones. 

As little as he had been attracted to Noyes s religious 
community, was Mr. Garrison drawn towards any of these 
experiments, one of which, yet in the bud, would approach 
him from the side of his brother-in-law. 1 In the applica- 

1 George "W. Benson, early in 1841, having disposed of the family prop 
erty in Brooklyn, Conn. : " Where do you settle ? " asked Mr. Garrison ; and, 
suggesting that he remove to Cambridgeport, " What say you to a little 
social community among ourselves? Bro. Chace is ready for it; and I 
think we must be pretty bad folks if we cannot live together amicably 
within gun-shot of each other" (MS. Jan. 7, 1841). 



\ 



26 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. [^T. 36. 



tion of his peculiar views to the conduct of life, there was 

Lib. 13:47. nothing Utopian or extravagant. He sympathized with 
every honest motive and effort for the regeneration of 
mankind, and could make allowance for aberration either 
of judgment or of intellect. He saw the abolition cause 

Ante, 2, 1428. (like other fervid moral movements) unavoidably draw to 
itself the insane, the unbalanced, the blindly enthusiastic. 
He remained calm, collected, steadfast; hewing to the 

Lib. 12 : 94. line of principle, but tolerant to the last degree of tem 
perament, expression, measures, not his own. 

This contrast may be pursued, in the anti-slavery ranks, 
between their leader and some of his coadjutors who 
lacked either his breadth, his tact, his humor, his per 
suasiveness, or his felicitous command of phraseology 
qualities which make it doubtful if Mr. Garrison was 
ever mobbed for words actually spoken in public. Cer 
tain strongly marked individualities among the New Eng 
land field agents of the era succeeding the schism fall 
under the description just given negatively. As New 
Organization and the Liberty Party had furnished a 
cover to parsons and congregations to quit the anti-sla 
very field, and emboldened them to shut out and to perse 
cute the lecturers of the old organization, the iniquity of 
the American churches became the chief theme of those 
whose meetings were disturbed or suppressed, and persons 
assailed, in consequence. The logic of the picturesque 
group we have in mind was severe and relentless, their 
discourse "harsh" and not seldom grim, their invective 
sweeping; and, in one instance in particular, a deliberate 

#.11:193; policy of church intrusion brought upon itself physical 
and legal penalties but little softened by passive resist 
ance. It would be rash if not censorious to deny that 
these moral ploughshares were fitted for the rough work 
allotted to them. The self-denying and almost outcast 
lives they led for the slave s sake compel admiration and 
gratitude. Their anti-slavery character was tried by all 
manner of tests short of martyrdom without embitter 
ing them, and in private their disposition was singularly 



^T. 36.] KE-FOKMATION AND RE ANIMATION. 27 

mild, gentle, and amiable. In spirit Mr. Garrison was CHAP. i. 
completely in harmony with them. In details of language, I8 ^ 
of policy, he was free to differ from them. 

Thus, at the New England Convention in May, 1841, May 25. 
Mr. Garrison s resolution in regard to the church read 
as follows : 

" Resolved, That among the responsible classes in the non- Lib. 11:90. 
slaveholding States, in regard to the existence of slavery, the 
religious professions [professors], and especially the clergy, 
stand wickedly preeminent, and ought to be unsparingly ex 
posed and reproved before all the people." 

To Henry C. Wright, however, it appeared that it 
should read as follows: 

" Resolved, That the church and clergy of the United States, Lib. n -.go. 
as a whole, constitute a great BROTHERHOOD OF THIEVES, 1 
inasmuch as they countenance and support the highest kind of 
theft, i. e., MAN-STEALING; and duty to God and the slave de- Ante, pp. 12, 
mands of abolitionists that they should denounce them as the 
worst foes of liberty and pure religion, and forthwith renounce 
them as a Christian church and clergy." 

To this substitute rallied Parker Pillsbury, Stephen S. 
Foster, and N. P. Rogers, while Mr. Garrison and Charles 
C. Burleigh contended for the original formula; the 
debate raging long, with a drift toward the obnoxious 
expression in capitals, which was at last abandoned. 2 

So in a question of measures. At a quarterly meeting 
of the Massachusetts Society held at Millbury on August 
17, 1841, Mr. Foster moved the following : s. s. Foster. 

" Resolved, That we recommend to abolitionists as the most Lib. n: 139. 
consistent and effectual method of abolishing the negro pew, 

1 See Mr. Wright s exposition of this expression in his letter to A. A. 
Phelps entitled, " The Methodist Episcopal Church and Clergy of the 
United States a Brotherhood of Men-Stealers " (Lib. 11 : 130). 

2 Speaking for himself, however, , and not for the Society, Mr. Garrison 
presently declared "a great brotherhood of thieves" tame language to 
apply to the action of the Presbyterian General Assembly at Philadelphia 
on May 20. The Committee of Bills and Overtures unanimously refused to 
report on the " exciting topic " of slavery, and desired to return the papers 
on that subject to the presbyteries which had presented them. By an over 
whelming vote the whole business was indefinitely postponed (Lib. 11 : 95). 



28 



WILLIAM LLOYD GABKISON. 



, 36. 



CHAP. I. 
1841. 



to take their seats in it, wherever it may be found, whether in 
a gentile synagogue, a railroad car, a steamboat, or a stage 
coach." ! 



This had the approval of Messrs. Pillsbury and Collins, 
but not of H. C. Wright, or of Garrison, or of Edmund 
Quincy, and did not prevail. In fact, what J. H. Noyes 

Ante,?, a. called "the whole phalanx of Massachusetts Ultraists" 
had a conservative element of which the editor of the 
Liberator was, paradoxical as it might seem, the head. 
He was himself a shining example of moderate and cal 
culated utterance, while little disturbed by the want of it 
in those whose anti-slavery sincerity, courage, zeal, and 

Lib. 12:94. devotedness he felt to be equal to his own. "There is 
danger," he wrote in June, 1842, in a fine plea for tolera 
tion of idiosyncracies, " of abolitionists becoming invidi 
ous and censorious toward each other, in consequence of 
making constitutional peculiarities virtuous or vicious 

Lib. 12:95. traits," or, in other words, " on account of the manner in 
which the cause is advocated r by this person or that. " I 
see by the Post" writes George Bradburn to Francis 
Jackson, on August 7, 1841, "that friend Loring does 
not choose to be understood as discussing abolition top 
ics in the style of our friends Wright and Pillsbury. 



Boston Post 

MS. 

E. G. 

Loring. 

H. C. 

Wright, 
P.Pillsbury 



1 With the extension of the railroad system, the inhuman prejudice 
against color was catered to by corporations even in excess of the require 
ments of average public sentiment. A "Jim Crow " car was provided, in 
which colored travellers were forced to sit although they had purchased 
first-class tickets. They were expelled in the most ruffianly manner from 
white cars, against the remonstrances of white passengers, who not seldom 
were themselves dragged out for condemning such brutality (Lib. 11 : 175, 
180, 182), or for taking seats in the Jim Crow car by way of testimony, in 
the spirit of Mr. Foster s resolution. Colored servants, on the other hand, 
were allowed to accompany their employers (Lib. 11 : 132). The Eastern 
Railroad of Boston, of which a Quaker was the malignant superintendent 
(Lib. 12 : 35), attained an evil preeminence in these outrages (Lib. 11 : 47, 
94, 143, 157, 162, 163, 165, 166, 170). Worst of all, police justices refused to 
punish the assaults even upon white passengers (Lib. 11 : 127, 128, 180). 
Yet it was asked, What has the North to do with slavery ? And it is even 
now pretended that the North was peopled with abolitionists until the 
Liberator was founded (New-Englander, 45 : 1, et seq.J. See in Lib. 12 : 56 
the "Travellers Directory" time-tables of the several railroads, with a 
caption showing whether they make any distinction in regard to color. 



^ET. 36.] HE-FORMATION AND BEANIMATION. 29 

Neither would I, though I am quite a tomahawk sort of cf. ante, 
man my self. " On the other hand, Abby Kelley, writing 
to Gr. W. Benson, censures Charles Burleigh for not want- MS. Sept. 
ing S. S. Foster sent to lecture in Connecticut, where the I3> l841 
new-organized State Society was carrying on an active 
campaign and the old organization was doing nothing. 
"His [Burleigh s] manner will do much for a certain 
class, at certain times; but another class, and the same 
class, indeed, at other times, need Foster s preaching." 1 

So far as the preaching was directed against pro-slavery 
clericalism and denominationalism, the need of it cannot 
be doubted for the year 1841. Dr. Channing, in his work 
on West India Emancipation, sorrowfully admitted the Lib. u:6. 
pro-slavery character of American " religion " ; and G-er- 
rit Smith, speaking to this text, said: "I do not hesitate Lib. 11:7. 
to make the remark, infidel though it may seem in the 
eyes of many, that were all the religion of this land the 
good, bad, and mixed to be this day blotted out, there 
would remain as much ground as there now is to hope for 
the speedy termination of American slavery." The sooner, 
added Mr. Garrison, this truth is realized by abolitionists, Lib. n : 7- 
the better. " When we go into a place/ 7 said Wendell 

l See Cyrus Peirce s protests against Abby Kelley s and S. S. Foster s 
resolutions at Fall River, Nov. 23, 1841, and against their " style " generally 
(Lib. 12 : 3, 19), with Mrs. Chapman s comment (Lib. 12 : 23). Miss Kelley 
offered a resolution in these terms at the tenth anniversary meeting of the 
Mass. A. S. Society (Jan. 28, 1842) : " Resolved, That the sectarian organ 
izations called churches are combinations of thieves, robbers, adulterers, 
pirates, and murderers, and, as such, form the bulwark of American 
slavery "this last phrase being probably suggested by James G. Birney s 
tract, The American Churches the Bulwarks of American Slavery (pub 
lished first, anonymously, in London, Sept. 23, 1840 ; in a second and third 
[American] edition in Newburyport, Mass., in 1842; and again, in Boston, in 
May, 1843). Phoebe Jackson wrote from Providence, Nov. 18, 1842, to Mrs. 
Garrison, of the recently held annual meeting of the Rhode Island A. S. 
Society: "The strong ground taken by Rogers, Foster, and a few others 
occasions considerable feeling among our friends. By the way, Rogers is 
not a favorite speaker of mine, but Foster is deeply impressive. I do not 
always agree with him, but he has great power. . . . I do not think it 
wise in him to disturb the assemblies of others : it appears to me like an 
infringement on their rights. Neither do I sympathize in the Christian (?) 
course they pursue toward him and others " (MS.). 



30 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [^T. 36. 



Julys, Phillips at Weymouth, speaking as an anti-slavery lect- 

l8 ii:\23. urer, " we know, we feel instantly, whether the minister 
is for or against us. We judge instinctively." But that 
the presumption was that the minister would be adverse, 

Lib. 11:173. is clear from such a report on the attitude of the clergy 
as was made for Middlesex, one of the largest counties 
in Massachusetts, yet within easy radius of Boston, the 
Liberator office, and the engine of the State anti-slavery 
machinery, and by no means a neglected field. 1 As for 
the great representative religious bodies, they successfully 
pursued this year either the policy of silence and suppres- 

Ante,p.vj. sion on the subject of slavery like the Presbyterian 
General Assembly; or of satisfying the South by the 
exclusion of anti-slavery officers from the Board of Mis- 

LO>. 11:86, sions as in the case of the Baptist Triennial Convention 

10^113? at Baltimore, under Southern threats of turning mission 

contributions into other channels. The American Board 

of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, whose agents 

among the slaveholding Cherokees, Creeks, and Choctaws 

Lib. ii : 158. were themselves slaveholders, met a ministerial petition 

Lib. 11:154. that they should not keep silent about slavery, by reply 
ing that they could neither approve nor condemn it, and 
that they could not scrutinize the source of money con 
tributed to their funds. And this, too, satisfied the South. 

Apr: 4, 1841. The great political event of the year was the death 
of President Harrison and the succession of John Tyler. 
How much this change of Administration affected the 
destiny of slavery, either immediately or remotely, can 
only be matter of speculation. We can, however, affirm 
with certainty, that whatever legislation the Slave Power 
might have obtained from Congress, President Harrison 

1 Collins, who, after his return from England, devoted all his spare time 
to lecturing and recruiting in Massachusetts and the neighboring States, 
delivering more than ninety addresses in upwards of sixty towns and 
parishes, and travelling some 3500 miles, reported on Jan. 18, 1842: "All 
the opposition I have met with in the prosecution of my mission has orig 
inated, with scarcely an exception, with clergymen." Still, in all the places 
above enumerated except two, he was able to obtain a meeting-house from 
some one of the religious denominations (Lib. 12 : 11). 



^ET. 36.] KE-FOKMATION AND KEANIMATION. 31 

would have sanctioned with alacrity. His inaugural 
address, with its sophistical argument for the limitation Lib. 11:43. 
of the powers of Congress over slavery in the District, 
had been preceded by a speech at Richmond repudiating, Lib. n: 4 6. 
as a native Virginian, the slightest sympathy with aboli 
tionism. Tyler s message, on the other hand, made no Lib. n : 62. 
allusion to the subject. In the confusion caused by an 
extra session of Congress, the gag-rule was momentarily 
relaxed, and John Quincy Adams improved the opportu- Lib. 11:97, 
nity to reopen his inexhaustible budget of anti-slavery 9 I i C ? s . I < 
petitions. At the regular session in December a new Lib. 11:206. 
gag-rule was promptly applied. Meanwhile, two inci 
dents showed unmistakably the Southern purpose to 
make "pro-slavery" and " national" (or Federal) synony 
mous terms. One was the reluctance of the Senate, till 
the North showed its teeth, to confirm Edward Everett s Lib. 11:146, 
nomination to the court of St. James, on account of his I49>ISO> 
anti-slavery views. 1 The other (for no game was too 
small for this inquisition) was the same body s refusal 
to confirm the postmaster of Philadelphia unless he dis 
charged Joshua Coffin (newly appointed) from his letter- 
carriers ; Coffin s alleged offence being that he had once 
assisted in ransoming a kidnapped free person of color. Lib. n : 146, 
The sacrifice demanded was made, and even letter-carriers 
were taught to know the hand that fed them. 

More significant of the nominal character of the so- 
called Union were the efforts of Georgia and Virginia, on Lib. 10: i, 5, 
account of the refusal of Northern governors to surren- 54 , 57/183. 
der as felons citizens charged with aiding slaves to escape, 
to establish quarantine against the ships of Maine and 
New York. More desperately unconstitutional was the 
proposal of Governor McDonald of Georgia, that even Lib. 11:183. 
packages from New York or any like offending State 

1 In response to the abolition catechism of 1837, Gov. Everett had pro 
fessed his conviction that slavery was an evil, and should be abolished as 
soon as this could be done peacefully. He asserted the power of Congress 
over slavery and the slave trade in the District, and opposed the admission 
of any new slave State. Finally, such progress had he made within two 
years (ante, 2 : 76), he maintained the right of free discussion (Lib. 1 : 182). 



32 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. [^ET. 36. 



CHAP. i. should be subjected to inspection, and suspicious persons 

X 87i. therefrom be obliged to give security for good behavior 

in the midst of a contented slave population. The Gov- 

#.11:54. ernor of Virginia declined to honor Governor Seward s 

demand for the extradition of a New York forger a 

piece of retaliation too dangerous to escape the censure 

of his own Legislature, though it subsequently passed an. 

Lib. 12 \ 10. " inspection law " for vessels destined for New York, as 

^12:32, did South Carolina i Referring to McDonald s "bluster," 

#.11:183. Mr. Garrison said that the South had "long threatened a 

dissolution of the Union; and she may yet be taken at 

her word, in an hour when she is least prepared for such 

an event. The alternative is ultimately to be presented to 

her, either to put away her diabolical slave system, or to be 

put beyond the pale of a free republic." Already he had 

exclaimed, in view of the revived prospect of the annexa- 

Lib. ii : 179. tion of Texas, " Sooner let the Union be dashed in pieces " 

than that the Northern States should submit to this 

infamy. A little later, forecasting the doings of Congress 

at the first regular session 

#.11:191. " We expect," he said, "the sacred right of petition to be 
maintained impartially, and vindicated at all hazards. If this 
should be done, we are willing to risk all the consequences. 
The desperadoes from the South, in Congress, will fume and 
swagger, and threaten to blow up the Union, as a matter of 
course. Let them retire whenever they choose, if they wish 
to be alone. We would sooner trust the honor of the country 
and the liberties of the people in the hands of the inmates of 
our penitentiaries and prisons, than in their hands, for safe 
keeping. All that appertains to burlesque, paradox, impos 
ture, effrontery, is embraced in the fact that they are allowed 
to represent a people professing to believe in the Declaration 

1 These laws could be suspended by the Executive when New York sur 
rendered the alleged fugitives from justice to Virginia, and its Legislature 
repealed the act of 1840 extending the right of trial by jury to citizens 
whose freedom was called in question by kidnappers or Southern slave 
owners (Lib. 12 : 32. 33). Noteworthy is the making of common cause with 
Virginia on the part of South Carolina in seeking to coerce New York, and 
the justification of the means, viz., a " regulation of commerce" concur 
rently with that exercised by Congress under the Constitution. For a 
typical instance of the operation of the Virginia law, see Lib. 12 : 118. 



^T. 36.] KE-FORMATION AND BE ANIMATION. 33 

of Independence ! They ought not to be allowed seats in Con- Cf. Lib. 
gress. No political, no religious co-partnership should be had I2: 3 l - 
with them, for they are the meanest of thieves and the worst 
of robbers. We should as soon think of entering into a l com 
pact with the convicts at Botany Bay and New Zealand. So 
far as we are concerned, we dissolved the Union with them, 
as slaveholders, the first blow we aimed at their nefarious slave 
system. We do not acknowledge them to be within the pale 
of Christianity, of republicanism, of humanity. This we say 
dispassionately, and not for the sake of using strong language. 
With us, their threats, clamors, broils, contortions, avail noth 
ing ; and with the entire North they are fast growing less and 
less formidable." 

Like sentiments began to be heard from others at anti- Lib. n : 189. 
slavery meetings in Massachusetts, 1 but as yet disunion 
formed no part of the official creed or programme of the 
State Society, which did, however, include, as an object Lib. 11:166. 
to be striven for, an amendment to the Constitution either 
abolishing slavery, or exonerating the people of each free 
State from assisting in sustaining it. 2 So far, indeed, the 
Liberty Party might have gone, though not free, as being 
a party, to advocate disunion pure and simple. Towards 
this organization Mr. Garrison maintained a dignified 
attitude, not denying to his personal friends like Mr. 
Sewall, or to bitter enemies like Torrey, the moderate use Lib. 11:31, 
of his columns for Liberty Party notices and reports. He 3 * i^J. 1 * 
still held, with Channing, that, by such a conversion of Lib. n:i. 
their anti-slavery energies, abolitionists would " lose the 
reputation of honest enthusiasts, and come to be consid- 

1 Thus, at Hingham, Nov. 4, 1841, Edmund Quincy showed that slavery 
had already destroyed the Union ; and Frederick Douglass, that the Union 
pledged the North to return fugitives wherefore, He is no true aboli 
tionist who does not go against this Union" (Lib. 11 : 189). 

2 Noteworthy is the appearance of a book (midsummer madness, one 
might think it, considering the time of year, the deranged author, and the 
vain doctrine) by G. W. F. Mellen (ante, 2: 428), entitled, An Argument 
on the Unconstitutionality of Slavery. Mr. Garrison, on a hasty reading, 
judged it to deserve attention (Lib. 11 : 123) ; but when, at the Millbury 
quarterly meeting of the Mass. A. S. Society, in August, Mellen, in con 
junction with S. S. Foster, attempted to embody this argument in a reso 
lution, they were defeated (Lib. 11 : 139). It will be seen hereafter how 
the doctrine was forced upon the Third Party. 

VOL. III. 3 



34 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKEISON. 

ered as hypocritical seekers after place and power." Prac- 
Lib. 11:7. tically, lie viewed it as " an attempt to make bricks without 
straw to propel a locomotive engine without steam to 
navigate a ship without water. As an act of folly, it is 
ludicrous; as a measure of policy, it is pernicious; as 
a political contrivance, it is useless. . . . The ques 
tion is not one that relates to purity of motive, but 
to the safety and success of the anti-slavery enterprise." 
Again : 

Lib. ii : 159. " We admit that the mode of political action to be pursued by 
abolitionists is not strictly a question of principle, but rather 
one of sound expediency. We have never opposed the forma 
tion of a third party as a measure inherently wrong, but have 
Ante, 2 : always contended that the abolitionists have as clear and indis- 
245. 313- putable a right to band themselves together politically for the 
attainment of their great object as those of our fellow-citizens 
who call themselves Whigs or Democrats. . . . But every 
reflecting mind may easily perceive that to disregard the dic 
tates of sound expediency may often prove as injurious to an 
enterprise as to violate principle. It is solely on this ground 
that we oppose what is called the Liberty Party. . . . The 
rash, precipitate, almost factious manner in which it was 
formed, early excited our distrust as to the disinterestedness of 
the movement; and though we are not disposed to question 
the honesty of many who support it, we still remain to be con 
vinced that its tendency is good." 

We cannot follow here the doings or fortunes of the 
Ante, *:w. Liberty Party. In spite of its brave words at Albany 
about maintaining the moral agitation along with the 
new political movement, the task was impossible in the 
nature of things. If the anti-slavery organization was to 
be made partisan, it must be wholly so ; otherwise there 
would have to be two sets of machinery, and two sets of 
workers promoting different objects on different planes 
of pure principle and of half-a-loaf expediency. 1 One or 

1 Mrs. Child, telling in the Standard of the first anti-slavery meeting she 
ever attended "in which political rather than moral arguments gave a lead 
ing tone to the proceedings," relates : "I came from that meeting sad and 
disheartened. The moral elevation, the trust in God, which had been usu- 



-3BT. 36.] KE-FOKMATION AND KE ANIMATION. 35 

other arm must suffer, either by neglect or by the conflict CHAP. i. 
of ideals the religious becoming the critic of the politi- I 8^ I> 
cal, and the political in turn denying and disowning the Lib. 12 : 179. 
religious. Such, in fact, became the attitude of the Abo 
litionists (whose name henceforth is as technical as Whig 
or Democrat) and the anti-slavery party in its various 
transformations down to the Rebellion. 

For like reasons it was impossible that two purely moral 
agitations could be kept up side by side, as some had 
fondly imagined who would have let the sectarian seced- 
ers from the old organization go their own way, without 
exposure or refutation. The field from which one barely 
derived sustenance could not have given material support 
to both, and the weaker must have become, in the mere 
struggle for existence, less a propaganda of common doc 
trine than a professional opposition, thriving by the dis 
credit it could throw on its rival and the recruits it could 
seduce from it. New organization, in short, had but one 
destiny to be swallowed up in the Liberty* Party. Its 
nominal head at New York, the American and Foreign 
Anti-Slavery Society, was a mere mask for Lewis Tappan, 
who drew up its annual report, and bore the expenses of 
its single (annual) meeting and of its short-lived organ, the Ante,* . 386 ; 
(monthly) Anti- Slavery Reporter, which Whittier helped (e^igj 7 
edit. 1 It had no agents in the field ; it rendered no finan- #.11:37; 
cial accounts. Joshua Leavitt, who had been made its 

ally inspired by abolition gatherings, was wanting" (Lib. 11 : 109). " It is 
as impossible," wrote Mr. Garrison, " for men to be moral reformers and 
political partisans at the same time, as it is for fire and gunpowder to har 
monize together " (Lib. 12 : 179). 

iMrs. Mott writes to Hannah Webb of Dublin, Feb. 25, 1842 (MS.): 
" Maria W. Chapman wrote me that he [Whittier] . . . was in the 
[A. S.] office a few months since, bemoaning to Garrison that there should 
have been any divisions. Why could we not all go on together ? Why 
not, indeed ? said Garrison ; we stand just where we did. I see no rea 
son why you cannot cooperate with the American Society. Oh, replied 
Whittier, but the American Society is not what it once was. It has the 
hat, and the coat, and the waistcoat of the old Society, but the life has 
passed out of it. Are you not ashamed, said Garrison, to come here 
wondering why we cannot go on together ! No wonder you can t cooperate 
with a suit of old clothes ! " 



36 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



. 36. 



CHAP. i. secretary, while continuing to edit the Emancipator, found 
1841. that it had no vital or organizing power, and at the close 
of the year was obliged to seek his living elsewhere. " It 
Lib. 11:193. is not necessary," he said in his valedictory, " to recount 
the causes which prevented an effective meeting [in New 
York] in May, nor those which have hindered the Society 
from going into operation in a way to obtain a general 
sympathy and support of abolitionists. One great cause, 
doubtless, is that the generality of those who are willing 
to work and to give are engaged in political action, and 
in carrying on the State and other local societies. Many 
think, in fact, there is not, just at present, any very essen 
tial service for which a central Board is needed." So much 

Lib. 11:37. for the American side of the Society. Its Foreign depart 
ment was occupied with calumniating Mr. Garrison and 
the old organization, in concert with the Rev. John Scoble, 
who was the Lewis Tappan of the British and Foreign 
Anti- Slavery Society, another specious organization. 

Extraordinary, we are reminded by Leavitt s unsettling, 
was the dispersion of those whom hostility to the Liber 
ator had momentarily banded together to break it down. 
On the occasion of Torrey s valedictory in the Free Amer 
ican (as the Massachusetts Abolitionist was styled, with 
delightful vagueness, on becoming the organ of the Mas 
sachusetts Liberty Party), Mr. Garrison inquired : 

" Once consecrated to the anti- slavery enterprise where are 
they? Stanton has retired from the field, and is said to be 
aiming for a seat in Congress. 1 Wright is we scarcely know 
where ; and doing we know not what. 2 Phelps is a city mis- 



Lib. 22 : 9. 



Lib. 11:59. 



Lib. 11:38, 
39- 



Lib. 11:59. 
H. B. Stan- 
ton. 

Elizur 

Wright. 

A. A. 

Phelps. 



1 Stanton like Birney, who had gone to rusticate at Peterboro , N. Y. 
(Lib. 12 : 127) had prudently declined a secretaryship under Lewis Tap- 
pan s alias (Lib. 11 : 47), and had betaken himself to the law (MS. Mar. 14, 
1841, N. P. Rogers to W. L. G. ; Lib. 12 : 127), of which he would begin the 
practice in Boston the following year (Stanton s Random Recollections, 
2d ed., p. 58). He was supposed to be aiming at a seat in Congress (Lib. 
12 : 127), and though he never attained it, in spite of a Liberty Party nom 
ination (Lib. 14 : 174), he remained a politician to the end of his days. 

2 Beriah Green knew, though he put the question to Mr. Wright (Lib. 
11 : 82), What are you at? Has La Fontaine led you off altogether from 
the field of battle ? " The preface to Wright s translation bears date Sep- 



. 36.] 



KE-FOKMATION AND KEANIMATION. 



37 



sionary, and on the most amicable terms with Hubbard Wins- Lib. 12:127. 
low, George W. Blagden, et id., etc. Torrey is engaged in 
vilifying the old anti- slavery organization and its friends, and 
manufacturing political moonshine for a third party." 1 

More pitiful, if not more picturesque, than any of these 
dislocations was that of Mr. Garrison s old partner, now, 
"worse than foe, an alienated friend." The following 
letter bespeaks at once his outcast condition and his 
trust in the benevolence of the person to whom it was 
addressed : 



Isaac Knapp to W. L. Garrison. 

A. S. OFFICE, Sept. 31 [1841]. 

LONG DEARLY BELOVED FRIEND: 

My circumstances are such that [I] am induced to solicit an 
interview with you at your earliest convenience. For several 
reasons I am reluctant to call at the Printing Office, and there 
fore take this method to make known my desire. I am sincerely 
sorry to disturb you with my troubles, but for the sake of my 
dear wife, and her alone, I wish to do it. 

Wishing you and yours every blessing, I remain your old 
coadjutor and friend, 

ISAAC KNAPP. 

The next communication from this unhappy man of 
which we have any trace, reached Mr. Garrison when his 
house had for a week " been turned into a hospital." Its 
formal tone was a menace : 

tember, 1841. Meantime the apologetic, pro-slavery conduct of the Free 
American by a clerical successor of Torrey (Lib. 11 : 82, 91), whom even he 
had to denounce, forced the Mass. Abolition Society to make a shift of 
securing Mr, Wright s services as editor once more in June, 1841 (Lib. 
11 : 99). He was succeeded by Leavitt as above, and the paper became 
the Emancipator and Free A merican (Lib. 11 : 191, 203). In 1842 Mr. Wright, 
in a desperate struggle with poverty, was trying personally to find pur 
chasers for his translation (Lib. 12 : 127). 

1 In June, 1841, Mr. Torrey was active in forming in Boston a Vigilance 
Committee against kidnapping and for the prompt assistance of fugitives 
closely pursued by their owners (Lib. 11 : 94). In December he went to 
Washington as a newspaper correspondent (Lib. 12 : 10 ; Memoir of C. T. 
Torrey, p. 87). Those who are curious as to other leading new organiza- 
tionists will find the above list extended in Lib. 12 : 127. 



MS. [Bos 
ton] The day 
of the month 

is copied as 
written. The 
year is con 
jectural. 



MS. Dec. 
17, 1841, 
W. L. G. 
to G. W. 
Benson. 



38 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [^ET. 36. 

Isaac Knapp to W. L. Garrison. 

MS. BOSTON, Dec. 8, 1841. 

To THE EDITOR OF THE LIBERATOR. 

SIR : I have this day issued the annexed circular. You, in 
my opinion, being, next to myself, the most interested, are 
herewith furnished with the first copy I send forth. 

ISAAC KNAPP. 

This circular, dated Boston, December 6, 1841, pro 
fessed to be dictated by " a sense of private wrong alone," 
and alleged that Knapp had been deprived, " by treachery 
Ante.^-.ysi, and duplicity," of his former right and interest in the 
Liberator by an arrangement, it will be remembered, 
which would expire on January 1, 1842. All his offers to 
resume the publication of the paper, giving ample secur- 
E. G. Lor- ity, had been rejected, " mostly through the influence of 
*Knapps one merciless, hard-hearted rich man." "I have even," 
Lib., p. 2. continued Knapp, "been denied the most humble situa 
tion in the Liberator office ; at a time, too, when Mr. Gar 
rison well knew that I was absolutely suffering for the 
want of employment" the same rich man opposing. In 
order to tell his story, and to show " that, however many 
inferior causes may have been at work, the great and 
overshadowing reason why there has been so much divi 
sion and mutual alienation in the anti-slavery ranks, 
has been the selfish and deceptive conduct of Mr. Gar 
rison and others at his elbows," he proposed "to start 
the * true ? Liberator" (calling it Knapp s Liberator} "as 
often as there may be a call for it." Garrison s Liberator 
" is no longer a free-discussion paper, but has departed 
from its original character, and is the organ of a clique, 
always ready to puff and extol all those who will obse 
quiously bow to and profess the utmost faith in their 
rescript and as ready to condemn, as pro-slavery and 
enemies of virtuous liberty, all who dare express a doubt 
of its infallibility." A note appended to the circular (in 
which the hand of the New Organization Esau was mani 
fest) testified to the knowledge and belief of the signers, 



Mi. 36.] 



KE-FOKMATION AND REANIMATION. 



39 



J. Cutts Smith and Hamlett Bates, in the facts as stated 
by Knapp, for whom they offered to serve as a finance 
committee. 

On the same sheet containing the circular and Knapp s 
autographic letter of transmission, Mr. Garrison wrote 
thus to his brother-in-law : 



CHAP. 
I8 ~ x> 



W. L. Garrison to G. W. Benson, at Northampton, Mass. 

CAMBRIDGEPORT, Dec. 17, 1841. 

You will see, by the accompanying Circular, what mischief is 
brewing, and what a hostile position is assumed toward me, the 
Liberator Committee, and the Massachusetts A. S. Society, by 
my old, erring, and misguided friend Knapp, and his more 
crafty and malignant abettors to wit, Smith, Bates, 1 and 
Bishop. I have every reason to believe that it was drawn up by 
Bishop, 2 and that it has been sent to a great number of persons 
in all parts of the country. A copy was sent to our venerable 
friend Seth Sprague, at Duxbury (the superscription being in 
Bishop s handwriting), who, thinking I might not have seen it, 
promptly and kindly forwarded it to me, with the following 
characteristic lines: 

" Respected Friend I received the enclosed Circular, a few days since, 
by mail ; and although I think it most likely that you are informed that it is 
in circulation, yet it is possible that you may not. I see that there is another 
storm brewing. If the devil was ever chained, certainly he has been let 
loose on the old Massachusetts A. S. Society. 

" Yours with much respect, SETH SPRAGTJE." 

Thus far, we have not deemed it expedient to take any notice 
of the Circular, in the Liberator. The committee will probably 
wait until the first number of the "true" (! !) Liberator shall 
have made its appearance, when it will, doubtless, be necessary 
for them to make a calm and plain statement of the facts in the 
case. This, of course, will suffice to satisfy all candid and hon 
orable minds ; for nothing can be more absurd, or more untrue 

1 A former clerk in the Anti-Slavery Office. 

2 Joel Prentiss Bishop had likewise been a clerk in the Anti-Slavery 
Office, and took advantage of Collins s absence to attack the office accounts 
(Lib. 11 : 2, 23), and to play into the hands of New Organization. He pres 
ently left the Old (Lib. 11 : 99). He was associated with Torrey in his 
Vigilance Committee (ante, p. 37). He was admitted to the bar while a 
student in Stanton s office (Stanton s Random Recollections, 2d ed., p. 65), 
and became the author of many well-known legal treatises. 



MS. 



J. Cutts 



40 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



. 36. 



CHAP. 
1841. 



J. P. 

Bishop. 



(as you well know), than the charges brought against them and 
myself in the Circular. So artfully, however, is the Circular 
drawn up, and so widely has it been disseminated, that it will 
probably do a great deal of mischief, and penetrate where no 
reply will be allowed to follow. I presume it will be widely 
disseminated in England, and not unlikely through the agency 
of the London Committee. Well, I can truly say, " none of 
these things move me." . . . 

You will doubtless be anxious to know what is Knapp s pros 
pect of success in the publication of his new paper. I have no 
means of knowing ; but take it for granted that, among the 
numerous enemies of the anti- slavery cause in general, of the 
Massachusetts A. S. Society in particular, of the Liberator, and 
of myself (slavery, pro-slavery, new organization, and priest 
craft, all combined), he will not find it a very difficult matter to 
obtain an amount of funds sufficient to enable him to publish 
several numbers of the scandalous publication. The editing of 
the paper will be done, I presume, by Bishop. ... As soon 
as the paper is issued, I will send you a copy. 

The receipts of the Liberator for the present year will fall 
short of its expenses to the amount of about $500. This sum 
will probably be made up by the kindness of friends. If you 
can obtain any new subscribers for the new year in your region, 
or any one else, send their names along as a New Year s present. 1 

Bishop, as was expected, filled the entire first page 
of the first number of Knapp s Liberator 2 with his own 
Ante, p. 39. quarrel with the Massachusetts Board in regard to Col- 
lins s accounts. Smith and Bates followed with intended 
corroborations of the truth of Knapp s circular, which 
was here reprinted. Knapp had little to say in his own 
behalf, being the merest tool of his false friends; but 
there were many anonymous communications aimed at 
Mr. Garrison and the Board. 

1 Mr. Garrison wrote to Mr. Benson on January 7, 1841 (MS.), that in the 
twelvemonth the Liberator had lost nearly five hundred subscribers net, 
and cut off two or three hundred delinquents. Once firm friends had 
ordered the paper stopped. " The Sabbath Convention has been more 
than they could tolerate ; and to save the formal observance of the first 
day of the week, they are willing that slavery should be perpetuated." 

2 Dated Boston, Saturday, Jan. 8, 1842. The printed page was about 
9 3 /4 x 14 V& inches. No subscription price was named, nor any regular date 
of publication. 



^ET. 36.] KE-FOKMATION AND KEANIMATION. 41 

The solitary issue of this " paper " being industriously MS. Feb. 
circulated in England by Capt. Charles Stuart, Mr. Gar- 
rison was induced to give a very minute account of his 
entire business relations with Knapp, in a long letter to MS. May 
Elizabeth Pease, from which an extract has been already a *? e \ l 8 ^ 
made. The decisive fact appears, that, in less than three 
months after the transfer had been made, "Mr. Knapp 
failed in business, and conveyed all the property in his 
hands to his creditors," including his half-interest in the 
subscription-list of the Liberator. In the fall of 1841, 
Mr. Ellis Gray Loring effected a purchase of this inter- Oct. 22, 
est for the sum of $25, in order to rid the paper of all l84 I I 2 ; : ^ 
embarrassment from a divided ownership. The refusal 
of this offer would have led to the issue of a new paper, 
on January 1, 1842, with the title of Garrison s Liberator; 
and the creditors, being informed of this, gladly consented 
to make a legal transfer to Mr. Garrison. Knapp s over 
tures to buy back his interest were of course not enter 
tained. 

" After we separated," continues Mr. Garrison, in reference MS. May 
to the arrangement of 1839-1840, " I endeavored to stimulate 
Mr. Knapp to active exertions to retrieve his character, and 
promised to exert all my influence to aid him, if he would lead 
a sober and industrious life. I pointed out to him a mode in 
which I felt certain that he could do well for himself; and I 
assured him that all my friends were his friends, who would 
cheerfully contribute to his relief, provided he would only 
respect himself, and evince a disposition to work for a liveli 
hood. Instead of listening to this advice, or to the friendly 
suggestions of others, he gave himself up to idleness, the use of 
strong drink, and even to gambling often wandering about, 
not knowing where to find a place of rest at night leaving his 
poor wife a prey to grief and shame and making a complete 
wreck of himself. For a number of weeks I sheltered him and 
his wife under my roof assisted him in other respects and 
collected for him between thirty and forty dollars, from a few 
friends in a distant place; for, kindly disposed as were the 
anti-slavery friends in this region toward him, it was in vain to 
solicit aid from them so long as he gave himself to the intoxi 
cating bowl and the gambling table. You perceive what re- 



42 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. [^T. 36. 



CHAP. I. turns lie has made for my kindness ; but my heart yearns over 
I ^ I< him, and I cannot reproach him." 

No direct notice was taken of the circular, or of 
Knapp s publication, in the Liberator; but the simple 
Lib. 12 : 3. facts of the final transfer were stated by the financial 
committee on renewing their trust for the twelfth volume. 
Amid all the vexatious cares of this year 1841, Mr. Gar 
rison s health and spirits were at their height. With his 
verse the Liberator volume had opened, and with his verse 
it closed; the last half being freely sprinkled with son 
nets, lyrics, and other forms from the editor s active muse. 
To the new volume of the Liberty Bell he contributed 
"The Song of the Abolitionist," which, to the tune of 
#.12:205, "Auld Lang Syne," was sung at countless gatherings in 
hall and grove for twenty years. A verse or two shall 
close the present chapter : 
Lib. ii : 212 ; I am an Abolitionist ! 

^2f s G { I glory in the name ; 

p. 134. Though now by Slavery s minions hissed, 

And covered o er with shame : 
It is a spell of light and power 
The watchword of the free : 
Who spurns it in the trial-hour, 
A craven soul is he ! 

I am an Abolitionist ! 

Then urge me not to pause, 
For joyfully do I enlist 

In Freedom s sacred cause : 
A nobler strife the world ne er saw, 

Th enslaved to disenthrall ; 
I am a soldier for the war, 

Whatever may befall ! 

I am an Abolitionist 

Oppression s deadly foe ; 
In God s great strength will I resist, 

And lay the monster low j 
In God s great name do I demand, 

To all be freedom given, 
That peace and joy may fill the land, 

And songs go up to Heaven ! 



R 



CHAPTER II. 

THE IRISH ADDRESS. 1842. 

EMOND, landing in Boston in December, 1841, Dec. 21 

brought among his undutiable baggage a terse 
Address of the Irish People to their Countrymen and Lib. 12 . 39. 
Countrywomen in America on the subject of slavery. 
It exhorted them to treat the colored people as equals and 
brethren, and to unite everywhere with the abolitionists. 
Sixty thousand names were appended, 1 Daniel O Connell s 
at the head, as Member of Parliament and Lord Mayor 
of Dublin, with Theobald Mathew s close by. Great Ante,2:&o. 
hopes were entertained of its effect on the Irish- American 
citizen and voter. George Bradburn wrote from Lowell 
to Francis Jackson : 

" What is to be done with that mammoth Address from Ire- MS. Jan. 
land ? I know it is to be rolled into the Annual Meeting, but ^[ 
is that to be the end of it ? Might not the Address, with a few A. 
of its signatures, including O Connell s, Father Mathew s, and 
some of the priests and other dignitaries , be lithographed? 
The mere sight of those names, or facsimiles of them, rather, 
and especially the autographs of them, would perhaps more 
powerfully affect the Irish among us than all the lectures we 
could deliver to them, were they never so willing to hear. It 
is a great object, a very great object, to enlist the Irish in our 
cause. There are five thousand of them in this small city. 
Might not one be almost sure of winning them over to the cause 
of humanity, could one but go before them with that big Ad 
dress on his shoulders ? I have thought I would like to try the 
experiment, after our Annual Meeting, and would the more 
willingly do so from having learned, since coming hither, that 

l Ten thousand more were subsequently added (Lib. 12 : 63). 
43 



44 WILLIAM LLOYD GAEBISON. [^ET. 37. 



CHAP. II. your friend is mightily popular among the Irish of LoicellJ though 
1842. ne i g personally unknown to almost every mother s son of them. 
They have probably heard of his * blarney, let off in their be 
half on sundry occasions and in various places." 

The production of this ark of the covenant was certainly 

Jan. 26-28, among the thrilling incidents of the three days of " high- 

12 -23.* toned feeling, triumphant enthusiasm, and complete sat 

isfaction/ 7 occupied by the annual meeting of the Massa- 

jan. 28. chusetts Society. It took place in Faneuil Hall, before a 

great gathering, in which one seemed to discern large 

Lib. 12: 18. numbers of friendly Irishmen in a proper state of excite 

ment. Mr. Garrison, who presided, read the Address 

j. P. Mil- with due emphasis, we may be sure. Colonel Miller 

^2/ 3 7o^ spoke to it, alleging Irish blood in his Vermont veins. 

Bradburn, confessing himself the son of an Irishman, 

moved a resolution of sympathy with Ireland, then in the 

throes of the Repeal agitation. James Cannings Fuller, 

an actual old-countryman, told how he " stood in our 

Feb. 5, 1800. Irish House of Peers when Castlereagh took the bribe for 

the betrayal of Ireland." Wendell Phillips, with only 

the credentials of his eloquence, joined in what (but for 

its sincerity) might be called the " blarney " of the occa 

sion. To no purpose, so far as the immediate object was 

concerned. On February 27, 1842, Mr. Garrison (whose 

Ante, i : 14. Irish descent might also have been paraded) wrote to 

Ante, 2:340. Richard Webb by the hand of Thomas Davis : 

MS. il Our meeting in Faneuil Hall, to unroll the Irish Address, 

with its sixty thousand signatures, was indescribably enthusi 

astic, and has produced a great impression on the public mind. 

I am sorry to add, and you will be not less ashamed to hear, 

Lib. 12 : 27, that the two Irish papers in Boston sneer at the Address, and 

29. 33- denounce it and the abolitionists in true pro-slavery style. I 

#.13:19, fear they will keep the great mass of your countrymen here 

from uniting with us." 

Not only was the Irish press everywhere unanimous in 

this attitude, but the foremost Catholic prelate in the land, 

Lib. 12:43, Bishop Hughes of New York, impugned the genuineness 

of the Address, and, genuine or not, declared it the duty 



^T. 37.] THE IRISH ADDRESS. 45 

of every naturalized Irishman to resist and repudiate it CHAP. n. 
with indignation, as emanating from a foreign source. I ^ 2 . 
All the Irish Repeal associations at the South partic- Lib. 12:47, 
ularly took the same line, with explicit devotion to the 5 82 
existing " institutions " of their adopted country, however 
much they might deprecate slavery in the abstract. In 
short, the Address was no more successful than we can 
suppose a similar one, headed by Parnell in these days, 
would be, urging the Irish to abjure the " spoils system " 
and to cling to the civil-service reformers. At a second, 
widely advertised exhibition of the Address in Boston in 
April, with Bradburn " trying the experiment " and Phil 
lips assisting, hardly any Irish were visible even to the Lib. 12 : 59. 
eye of faith. The instinct of this, the lowest class of the 
white population at the North, taught it that to acknowl 
edge the brotherhood of the negro was to take away the 
sole social superiority that remained to it, to say nothing 
of the forfeiture of its political opportunity through the 
Democratic Party. When the summer heat had brought 
the customary tendency to popular turbulence in this 
country, the Irish rabble of Philadelphia made their inar 
ticulate, but perfectly intelligible, reply to the Address, by Lib. 12 . 123, 
murderous rioting, directed in the first instance against a J^i 139. 
peaceable colored First of August procession, and ending 
with the burning of a " Beneficial Hall " built for moral 
purposes by one of the more prosperous of the persecuted 
a close parallel to the destruction of Pennsylvania Ante, 2:216. 
Hall. 1 

The meeting in Faneuil Hall (for we must return to it) 
had for its main object to urge abolition in the District Lib. 12:18. 
of Columbia. As it fell to Mr. Garrison to preside, so 
to him was intrusted the drawing up of the resolutions. 

l For instance, the firemen would throw no water on the hall or on a col 
ored meeting-house which was also fired. The day following these scenes 
(Aug. 3) the Grand Jury presented as a nuisance a new temperance hall for 
the colored people, because it had twice been fired ; and ordered it torn 
down to avoid a third attempt ! (Lib. 12 : 126, 130, 133, 134, 138, 146.) The 
only Philadelphia clergyman who made this shocking outbreak the subject 
of a discourse was the Unitarian William H. Furness (Lib. 12 : 138). 



46 WILLIAM LLOYD GABKISON. |>ET. 37. 

CHAP. ii. These asserted once more the power of the Federal Gov- 
1842. ernment over the District ; noticed the insolent exclusion 
of memorials on this subject emanating from the Legis 
latures of Massachusetts and Vermont 5 and (amid im 
mense applause) returned thanks to John Quincy Adams 
for his bold and indefatigable advocacy of the right of 
petition. The following may not be summarized : 

Lib. 12 : 18. " 7. Resolved, That when the Senators and Representatives of 
this Commonwealth, in Congress, find themselves deprived of 
the liberty of speech on its floor, and prohibited from defend 
ing the right of their constituents to petition that body in a 
constitutional manner, they ought at once to withdraw, and 
return to their several homes, leaving the people of Massachu 
setts to devise such ways and means for a redress of their griev 
ances as they shall deem necessary. (Applause.) 

" 8. Resolved, That the union of Liberty and Slavery, in one 
just and equal compact, is that which it is not in the power of 
God or man to achieve, because it is a moral impossibility, as 
much as the peaceful amalgamation of fire and gunpowder ; 
and, therefore, the American Union is such only in form, but 
not in substance a hollow mockery instead of a glorious 
reality. (Applause.) 

" 9. Resolved, That if the South be madly bent upon perpet 
uating her atrocious slave system, and thereby destroying the 
liberty of speech and of the press, and striking down the rights 
of Northern citizens, the time is rapidly approaching when the 
American Union will be dissolved in form as it is now in fact." 

At the moment alike when these resolutions were pre- 
Lib. 12:18. pared and were "adopted by an almost unanimous vote 
and in the most impressive manner/ 7 it is clear from 
internal evidence that news had not yet been received of 
closely related proceedings in Congress. That body had, 
as usual, at its opening, in Edmund Quincy s happy 
Lib. 12:31. phrase, been "resolved into a national Anti-Slavery De 
bating Society, with John Quincy Adams as leader ; the 
petitions of his presenting being (also as usual) flatly not 
received, or the question of their reception being regu- 
Lib. 12:18. larly laid upon the table. On the 24th of January, 1842, 
however, the ex-President offered a petition from Haver- 



37.] 



THE IRISH ADDEESS. 



47 



CHAP. II. 

1842. 

Lib. 12 : 34. 



hill, Mass., praying for a peaceable dissolution of the 
Union. It was the first of the kind that had ever reached 
Congress, and, curiously enough, it did not proceed from 
professed abolitionists: the first signer was a Locofoco 
(alias Democrat) of high standing. Nor were the motives 
alleged ostensibly anti-slavery, but economic : there were, 
it affirmed, no reciprocal advantages in the Union; the 
revenues of one section were drained " to sustain the views 
and course of another section, without any adequate 
return." Moreover, Mr. Adams moved the reference of 
the petition to a committee with instructions to report 
adversely. What followed, therefore, would have been 
in the highest degree extraordinary but for the Southern 
consciousness that a Northern proposal of disunion was 
deadly to slavery. 

Wise of Virginia, with a Border State precipitancy, 
hotly declared that the person who presented such a peti 
tion ought to be censured, and his colleague Gilmer lost 
no time in making a motion to that effect. This was 
superseded on the following day by resolutions concocted 
in caucus, and presented in the House by Marshall of 
Kentucky again a Border State taking the lead. The 
preamble is a landmark in the history of Southern opin 
ion of the sacredness of the Union : 



" Whereas, The Federal Constitution is a permanent form of Lib. 12: 18. 
Government, and of perpetual obligation nntil altered or modi 
fied in the modes pointed out by that instrument, and the 
members of this House, deriving their political character and 
powers from the same, are sworn to support it, and the disso 
lution of the Union necessarily implies the destruction of that 
instrument, the overthrow of the American Republic, and the 
extinction of our national existence. A proposition, therefore, 
to the Representatives of the people to dissolve the organic law 
framed by their constituents, and to support which they are 
commanded by those constituents to be sworn, before they can 
enter upon the execution of the political powers created by 
it and intrusted to them, is a high breach of privilege, a con 
tempt offered to this House, a direct proposition to the Legis 
lature and each member of it to commit perjury, and involves 



Henry A. 
Wise. 



Thos. W. 
Gilmer. 



Lib. 12:18, 
21, 25. 
Thos. F. 

Marshall. 



48 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. [^ET. 37. 



CHAP. II. necessarily, in its execution and its consequences, the destruc- 
1842 tion of our country and the crime of high treason." 

Lib. 12: 18. The final therefore of this tremendous ratiocination was 
that Adams ought to be expelled; but rather let the 
House censure him most severely, and turn him over to 
his own conscience and the indignation of the American 
people. It was all the worse, said Marshall, in remarks 
of the same calibre with his resolutions, that Mr. Adams 
had asked for a committee to report against the petition 
for disunion, since this implied that the proposition was 
entertainable. The venerable object of this child s-play 
declined to make any reply till the censure should be 
voted ; but he had the clerk read the first two paragraphs 
of the Declaration of Independence, enforcing the right 
and duty to alter or abolish forms of government which 
had become intolerably oppressive. He desired to tell the 
petitioners that it was not yet time to adopt this mode for 
the redress of their grievances of the past ten years, though 
he stood ready to prove, by a review of the recent atti- 
Ante t pp. tude of certain Southern States toward certain Northern, 
3I> 32 " a settled system and purpose," on the part of the former, 
"to destroy all the principles of civil liberty in the free 
States, not for the purpose of preserving their institutions 
within their own limits, but to force their detested princi 
ples of slavery into all the free States." " If," he contin 
ued, " the right of habeas corpus and the right of trial by 
jury are to be taken away by this coalition of the South 
ern slaveholders and the Northern Democracy, it was 
time for the Northern people to see if they could not 
shake it off ; and it was time to present petitions such as 
he had done." He repeated, it was not time to resort to 
disunion till other means had been tried. 

Lib. 12:27. The attempt at censure failed on a direct vote (by 106 
to 93), but at the North it excited indignation where it 
did not provoke laughter, and increased the disposition 

Lib. 12:34. in that section to " calculate the value of the Union," and 
to murmur what Webster termed those " words of delu- 



. 37.] THE IRISH ADDRESS. 49 



sion and folly, Liberty first and Union afterwards. " id speech on 
The Southern colleagues of Mr. Adams on the Committee f u ttn, r jan. 
on Foreign Affairs, of which he was chairman, withdrew, 26> I83 - 
and sundry other Southern members refused to take their 
places "the precursor of great and important changes 
which are near at hand," as Mr. Garrison judged. " Noth- Lib. 12:31. 
ing can prevent the dissolution of the American Union 
but the abolition of slavery." 

This conviction had now complete possession of him. 

W. L. Garrison to G. W. Benson at Northampton, Mass. 

BOSTON, March 22, 1842. MS. 

If all be well (and, so mutable are all things here below, we 
can promise nothing as to the future without prefixing an if), I 
shall go to Albany about the 21st of April, in company with 
C. L. Remond, to attend an anti-slavery convention which our 
friends intend to get up in that city, with special reference to 
the Irish Address. 1 We shall carry that Address along with us. 
There is a pretty large Irish population in Albany, and an 
Irish Repeal Association ; but the Argus has had the effrontery 
and folly to deny the authenticity of the Address, and, of course, 
a meeting called with especial reference to it will be pretty sure 
to be well attended, and to create a wholesome excitement. In 
going or returning, I shall endeavor to visit Northampton 
(most probably on returning), and, if practicable, make Re 
mond accompany me. I intend, if I can, to add Wendell Phil 
lips to our company. So, you may make your arrangements, 
at your leisure, for at least one "incendiary" meeting in your 
place. 

Do not forget to suggest to my friend Child the importance of D. L. Child, 
preparing, without delay, a stirring Address to the friends of as ftfo 
the American Anti- Slavery Society, urging them to take prompt Standard. 
and effectual measures to insure a full attendance at the ap 
proaching anniversary, from all parts of the free States j and 
setting forth, in strong terms, the necessity of a large repre 
sentation on the occasion. For my own part, I avow myself 
to be both an Irish Repealer and an American Repealer. I go 
for the repeal of the union between England and Ireland, and 
for the repeal of the union between the North and the South, 
l This trip did not take place. 

VOL. III. 4 



50 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. [^T. 37. 



CHAP. II. We must dissolve all connexion with those murderers of fathers, 
1842 an( ^ muMerers of mothers, and murderers of liberty, and traf 
fickers in human flesh, and blasphemers against the Almighty, 
at the South. What have we in common with them ? What 
have we gained, what have we not lost, by our alliance with 
them? Are not their principles, their pursuits, their policies, 
their interests, their designs, their feelings, utterly diverse 
from ours? Why, then, be subject to their dominion? Why 
Cf. ante, not have the Union dissolved in form, as it is in fact espe 
cially if the form gives ample protection to the slave system, 
by securing for it all the physical force of the North? It is 
not treason against the cause of liberty to cry, " Down with 
every slaveholding Union ! " Therefore, I raise that cry ! And, 
0, that I had a voice louder than a thousand thunders, that it 
might shake the land and electrify the dead the dead in sin, 
I mean those slain by the hand of slavery. 

How marvellously Providence works ! The Irish Address, I 
trust, is to be the means of breaking up a stupendous con 
spiracy, which I believe is going on between the leading Irish 
demagogues, the leading pseudo-Democrats, and the Southern 
slaveholders. Mark three things. First The Irish population 
among us is nearly all " Democratic." Second The Demo 
cratic party is openly and avowedly the defender and upholder 
of the " peculiar institution" of slavery. Third The cry in 
favor of Irish Repeal is now raised extensively throughout the 
South, and sustained by the leading Democratic journals and 
why? To secure the aid of the Irish voters on the side of 
slavery, and to bring their united strength to bear against the 

Lib. 12:42, anti-slavery enterprise. 1 Also, if possible, by sending over do- 

43> 98 nations to Ireland, to stop O Connell s mouth on the subject of 

slavery, and to prevent anymore " interference" on that point, 

from that side of the Atlantic ! Hence, I observe, at the Repeal 

Lib. 12:37, meetings in various parts of the country, resolutions and decla- 

47.49.50.82. ra ti ons w hich amount to sacred pledges, that these " repealers " 
will stand by Southern institutions at all hazards ! Now, by 
the Address, which will cause every toad to start up into a devil 
as soon as he is touched, we shall be able to probe this matter 
to the bottom. If O Connell and our friends in Ireland remain 

Lib. 12 : 42, true to us, and renew their spirited attacks upon American 
43- 

l More particularly to insure the Southern control of the next Admin 
istration in the interest of Texan annexation. The marked increase in the 
Irish immigration now first began to have a Federal political significance, 
as would abundantly appear at the Presidential election in 1844. 



-ET. 37.] THE IKISH ADDRESS. 51 

slavery, and cry out against this unholy and frightful league CHAP. II. 
between Southern slave-drivers and his countrymen in America, 
then it will put down at the South this pretended sympathy for 
Ireland, and be the means of advancing our movement still 
more rapidly. 

In this week s Liberator, I shall publish copious extracts from Lib. 12:45, 
O Connell s speeches, for the last ten years, against American 4<5> 47- 
slavery. They will scathe like lightning, and smite like thun 
derbolts. No man in the wide world has spoken so strongly 
against the soul-drivers of this land as O Connell. 

Is it not heart-cheering to know that the British Government Lib. 12 : 42. 
will not give up the slaves of the Creole f * 

1 This action, and the fixed anti-slavery policy of the British nation, 
account sufficiently for Southern sympathy with Irish revolt, apart from 
the political interest insisted on (and correctly) by Mr. Garrison. And, 
vice versa, England s anti-slavery professions became one more count in the 
Irish- American indictment of her. (See the Irish Catholic Boston Pilot s 
article, "The Policy of England Abolitionism," copied in Lib. 12: 41.) 
The case of the Creole was this. The brig, of Richmond, left Norfolk on 
Oct. 30, 1841, for New Orleans, with a cargo of tobacco and slaves, to the 
number of 135. On the night of November 7 the blacks rose and took pos 
session of the vessel, killing the second mate in the melee, and wounding 
those who resisted, but otherwise acting humanely. They then had the 
course turned towards Nassau, in the British island of New Providence, 
where they arrived Nov. 9. Nineteen of the ringleaders (including one 
Pompey Garrison) were arrested and held for mutiny and murder, the rest 
set free (Lib. 11 : 206, 210 ; 12 : 34, 37). All efforts to secure the extradition 
of the prisoners, or of their fellow-slaves, or to obtain indemnity from Great 
Britain, were futile, and the mutineers were ultimately discharged (Lib. 
12: 42). Webster, as Secretary of State, conducted the diplomatic corre 
spondence through Edward Everett at the court of St. James (Lib. 12: 
34), prostituting his intellect in support of the Government s right "to 
demand from the whole human race respect to the municipal law of South 
ern slavery " to use Channing s words in review of Webster, in his pam 
phlet on the Duty of the Free States (Lib. 12 : 55, 57, 61, 65, 105). In the 
Senate, Calhoun led the furious Southern clamor for reparation or war 
(Lib. 11 : 211 ; 12 : 10). In the House, Joshua R, Giddings stood for the 
North in manly resolutions denying any offence against the laws of the 
United States on the part of the Creole mutineers, or any Constitutional 
right on the part of the Government to pursue them, or to strengthen the 
coastwise slave-trade as the Secretary of the Navy proposed to do by a gun 
boat patrol (Lib. 12:30, 31), and denouncing these proceedings as a national 
disgrace (Lib. 12: 50). This "British argument, and approximation to a 
treasonable view of the subject," as Caleb Cushing called it, nearly led to 
summary violence being executed upon Mr. Giddings by Southern col 
leagues. Without allowing him to be heard in self-defence, the House 
incontinently censured him by a vote of 125 to 69, and he resigned his seat, 
successfully appealing to his constituents for a reelection (Lib. 12 : 69, 75 ; 



52 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. [>ET. 37. 

CHAP. ii. A month after the date of the above letter, Mr. Garri- 
^2. son addressed his readers on the subject of the approach 
ing anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society at 
New York. It was time, he said, that milk should give 
place to meat; and, enumerating questions of policy 
not definitely settled, he placed first in importance " the 

Lib. 12:63. duty of making the REPEAL OF THE UNION between 
the North and the South the grand rallying-point until it 
be accomplished, or slavery cease to pollute our soil. We 
are for throwing all the means, energies, actions, purposes, 
and appliances of the genuine friends of liberty and 
republicanism into this one channel, and for measuring 
the humanity, patriotism, and piety of every man by this 
one standard. This question can no longer be avoided, 
and a right decision of it will settle the controversy 
between freedom and slavery. 77 

The vital force of this programme was at once mani- 

Lib. 12:71. fested by the eagerness with which the pro-slavery press 
of New York city copied the article, and used it to invoke 
mob violence against the abolition assembly. Mr. Garri 
son returned to the subject a fortnight later, disclaiming 
for the American Society any responsibility for his indi 
vidual utterances, but attacking anew the national idolatry 
for the Union : 

Lib. 12:71. " We affirm that the Union is not of heaven. It is founded 
in unrighteousness, and cemented with blood. It is the work 
of men s hands, and they worship the idol which they have 
made. It is a horrible mockery of freedom. In all its parts 
and proportions it is misshapen, incongruous, unnatural. The 
message of the prophet to the people in Jerusalem describes the 
exact character of our republican COMPACT : 

ha. 28: " Hear the word of the Lord, ye scornful men that rule this people. 

14-18. Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with DEATH, and with 

HELL are we at agreement ; when the overflowing scourge shall pass 



and pp. 117-124 of Buell s Life of Giddings ). J. Q. Adams would have 
voted against Giddings s first and second resolutions, allowing the slave 
States an exclusive control over slavery in their own borders. He affirmed 
once more the power of the general government to abolish slavery in case 
of insurrection or civil war (Lib. 12 : 85, and ante, 2 : 75). 



. 37.J 



THE IRISH ADDEESS. 



53 



CHAP. II. 

1842. 



ha. 30: 
12-14. 



through, it shall not come unto us : for we have made LIES our refuge, and 
under FALSEHOOD have we hid ourselves : Therefore thus saith the Lord 
God, Judgment will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet : 
and the hail shall sweep away the REFUGE OF LIES, and the waters shall 
overflow the hiding-place. And your covenant with DEATH shall be annulled, 
and your agreement with HELL slmll not stand ; when the overflowing 
scourge shall pass through, then shall ye be trodden down by it. 

"Another message of the same inspired prophet is equally 
applicable : 

" Thus saith the Holy One of Israel, Because ye despise this word, and 
trust in oppression and perverseness, and stay thereon : Therefore, this 
iniquity shall be to you as a breach ready to fall, swelling out in a high wall, 
whose breaking cometh suddenly, AT AN INSTANT. And he shall break it as the 
breaking of a potter s vessel that is broken to pieces ; he shall not spare : so 
that there shall not be found, in the bursting of it, a sherd to take fire from 
the hearth, or to take water withal out of the pit. 

" Slavery is a combination of DEATH and HELL, and with 
it the North have made a covenant and are at agreement. 
As an element of the Government it is omnipotent, omniscient, 
omnipresent. As a component part of the Union, it is neces 
sarily a national interest. Divorced from Northern protection, 
it dies ; with that protection, it enlarges its boundaries, multi 
plies its victims, and extends its ravages." 

In the same number of the Liberator the editor printed 
with "unfeigned surprise, deep mortification, and extreme 
regret," a circular addressed to the press of New- York by 
the Executive Committee of the American Society, and 
signed by James S. Gibbons and Lydia Maria Child. 
They regretted that the Liberator articles on disunion Lid. 12:71. 
had been " so construed as to commit the Society, in the 
public view, in favor of an object which appears to them 
entirely foreign to the purpose for which it was organ 
ized, viz., Dissolution of the Union." The Committee 
had not authorized the reports that disunion would, at 
the next anniversary, be made a prominent feature of 
the Society s operations. It was no part of the object 
of the American Anti-Slavery Society to promote the 
dissolution of the Union a measure which the Com 
mittee, by implication, condemned as not " strictly con 
sistent with morality and the rights of citizenship." 
While, however, the Society stood uncommitted as to 



54 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [J3 T . 37. 

CHAP. ii. its deliberations, and would not be bound by the previ- 
1842. ously expressed opinions of any of its members, neither 
would it be deterred from taking action for itself by any 
threats of violence. 1 

Mrs. Child s opposition was unexpected, for, only a few 

Lib. 12 : 34, weeks before, she had stated in the Standard her convic 
tion, of two years standing, that disunion was the only 
way out of Northern complicity with slavery. There- 

Mrs. Chap- upon she was not surprised when a friend, writing from 
Boston, informed her : " We launch, this campaign, the 
great question of repeal of the Union, and mean to carry 

Ub.i2-.s7- it through the Commonwealth." A little later she re 
peated her own readiness for the doctrine, though she 

Lib. 12 : 73. deprecated making a test question of it, as did J. S. 
Gibbons. 

With characteristic delicacy, Mr. Garrison decided to 
absent himself (for the first time) from the anniversary 
of the American Society. Public announcement of his 

Lib. 12:75. intention was made in the Liberator of May 13, on which 
date he wrote as follows to his brother-in-law : 

W. L. Garrison to G. W. Benson. 

MS. BOSTON, May 13, 1842. 

You will see, by the Liberator of to-day, that I did not go to 
New York, and the reasons why I remained at home. I re 
gretted to be absent from the meeting on account of the stormy 
aspect of things, created by the diabolism of the New York 
daily press; but, in consequence of the peculiar position in 
which I stood to the Executive Committee, by their unfortu 
nate disclaimer, I deemed it very important that the action of 

1 These newspaper threats were immediately reenforced by the charge 
of Judge Mordecai Manuel Noah, of the New York Court of Sessions, 
to the Grand Jury, to wit: that if, in spite of the above circular dis 
claimer, the convention should actually attempt to discuss " a project 
embracing a dissolution of our happy form of government" (which dis 
cussion "would evidently tend to a disastrous breach of the public 
peace " ), it would be their duty to indict the agitators (Lib. 12 : 71). 
The Court meant to convince "any body of men making this city the 
theatre of their deliberations, that their objects and intentions must be 
strictly legal, rational, and justifiable." 



-T. 37.] THE IRISH ADDRESS. 55 

the American Society, at its present anniversary, should be en- CHAP. II. 
tirely unbiassed by anything that I might say or do j so that it l{ J~ 2 
might appear, beyond all cavil, that the Society marked out its 
own course, and came to its own conclusions, without any aid 
from me. I hear that the meetings are proceeding in a very 
quiet manner, and that none of the sons of Belial have rallied 
either to molest or make afraid. The great question of a re 
peal of the Union has been boldly and earnestly discussed j but 
I do not know how the debate terminated. To-morrow morn 
ing, all our Eastern delegates will return about 250 of whom 
went on in the Mohegan, via Stonington and then all the par 
ticulars will be made known. I have not at any time supposed 
that a majority of old organizationists are prepared openly to 
go for repeal j for the question is one of recent agitation, and 
should be carefully examined before a verdict is made up, 
either pro or con. Yet I have no doubt whatever, that, in the 
progress of the discussion, all who mean to be consistent, un 
compromising abolitionists will ere long be found on the side 
of repeal. 

As for the disclaimer of our New York friends, I am sorry it 
was made j not only as it took a false position, but as it was 
extorted under circumstances that seemed to indicate a lack of 
self-possession, and an improper dread of mobocratic violence. 
It was certainly an error of j adgment ; but how different is this 
from a dereliction of principle ! It need not, and will not, I 
trust, create any breach of friendship, or lead to personal alien 
ation, in any quarter. 

For the annual meeting itself Mr. Garrison had pre 
pared a letter of like tenor with the foregoing : 

W. L. Garrison to the Executive Committee of the 
American Anti-Slavery Society. 

BOSTON, May 9, 1842. Lib. 12: 82. 

DEAR FRIENDS : After much reflection, I have come to the 
conclusion not to be present at the annual meeting of the Parent 
Society in New York. The motives which induced me to forego 
the pleasure of being with you on that interesting and impor 
tant occasion, I trust will be accurately understood and duly 
appreciated. In a recent number of the Liberator, I ventured to 
state (not with the intention of committing the Society to any 
definite course of action, but merely on my own responsibility), 



56 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [^T. 37. 

CHAP. II. that among the topics that would undoubtedly be presented for 
1842 discussion at the meeting in New York, would be the subject of 
a repeal of the Union between the North and the South or, in 
other words, between liberty and slavery in order that the 
people of the North might be induced to reflect upon their 
debasement, guilt, and danger in continuing in partnership with 
heaven-daring oppressors, and thus be led to repentance. In 
behalf of the Society, you have deemed it both necessary and 
proper publicly to disclaim any such purpose; and have led 
the country to infer, not only that no such topic will be intro 
duced, but that its discussion would be foreign to the object of 
the anti-slavery enterprise that it does not legitimately come 
within the constitutional sphere of the Society. Under these 
circumstances, I am most anxious that a free and unbiassed 
opinion should be expressed by the Society on this point, and 
that every appearance of personal anxiety on my part, as to its 
decision, should be avoided. I am determined not to allow it 
to be said that the Society was influenced by my presence and 
activity to reverse the position of its Executive Committee to 
disclaim the disclaimer and to occupy new and untenable 
ground in relation to this great question of repeal. It is for 
this reason that I remain at home. I think the Executive Com 
mittee have seriously erred in judgment, but I do not esteem 
them any the less, and am as ready to give them my hearty 
cooperation for the overthrow of slavery as at any previous 
period of my life. A difference of opinion and an abandon 
ment of principle are heaven-wide from each other. Of the 
latter, I do not believe the Committee will ever be guilty. I 
hope nothing will be done hastily, unkindly, or rashly ; and 
that the blessings of the Almighty will be with you all. 

With unabated regard, I remain, yours, to the end of the 
conflict, 

WM. LLOYD GARRISON. 



Meanwhile, the Liberator hoisted its flag in the shape 
of a declaration first placed at the head of the editorial 
Lib. 12:75. column on May 13, 1842, and kept standing there for the 
remainder of the year : 



REPEAL OF THE UNION BETWEEN NORTHERN LIBERTY 

AND SOUTHERN SLAVERY is ESSENTIAL TO THE ABOLITION OF 

THE ONE AND THE PRESERVATION OF THE 



Mi. 37.1 



THE IEISH ADDRESS. 



57 



The New York meeting proved to be ready not only to May 10-13, 
discuss disunion, but to adopt unanimously a resolution 
involving a modified form of it, in these words "That Lib. 12:82. 
the Constitution of the Union ought to be altered so 
as to prevent the national Government from sustain 
ing slavery, as well as from requiring the people of the 
several States to sustain it." 1 On the naked issue as 
presented by Mr. Garrison in the Liberator, the meeting 
showed a divergence of opinion. The first resolution 
offered was in the negative : 

u Resolved, That inasmuch as the people of the Northern Lib. 12:82. 
States have been guilty, jointly with the South, of enslaving 
men; and inasmuch as the people of the Northern States in 
general, nor even the mass of abolitionists, have ever petitioned 
for the abrogation of the slaveholding features of the Constitu 
tion, nor proved that such petitions, if supported by the free 
States, would be unsuccessful, therefore we see no reasonable 
ground, at this time, for asking for a dissolution of the Union." 

A substitute, moved by Henry C. Wright and seconded 
by Edmund Quincy, read as follows : 

" Resolved, That the provisions of the United States Consti- Lib. 12:82. 
tution in relation to slavery, and the history of our Government, 
which shows that free and slave institutions cannot exist dis 
tinct and independent under the same Constitution, both prove 
that fidelity to our principles as abolitionists, and to the cause 
of human rights, imperatively demands the dissolution of the 
American Union." 

The long and animated debate which ensued, and in 
which we remark Wendell Phillips and Abby Kelley 
among the advocates of the Garrisonian doctrine, showed Lib. 12 : 79 
a decided majority in its favor, but no action was deemed 
advisable, and no vote was attempted. Many of the par 
ticipants returned to renew the discussion at the New 
England Convention in Boston. Henry C. Wright was May 24-26, 



1842. 



1 Compare Channing s proposed " modifying of the Constitution so as to 
release the free States from all action on slavery," and "dissolving wholly 
the connection between slavery and our national concerns," in his pamphlet 
on the Duty of the Free States (Lib. 12 : 93). 



58 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. [^T. 37. 



CHAP. ii. ready with fresh resolutions, offered on behalf of the 
1842. business committee : 

Lib. 12:87. "Resolved, That the principles of anti-slavery forbid us, as 
abolitionists, to continue in the American Union, or to swear to 
support the Federal Constitution. 1 

" Resolved, That so long as the South persists in slaveholding, 
abolitionists are bound to persist in urging a dissolution of the 
Union, as one of the most efficient means l to establish justice, 
insure domestic tranquillity, and secure the blessings of liberty 
to ourselves and our posterity. " 

One may still, with Edmund Quincy, prefer this axio 
matic formula to the more extended display of motives 
which Mr. Garrison thought proper in the following 
resolves from his pen, introduced also through the busi 
ness committee. They had originally been prepared for 
Lib. 12 : 30. the Essex County Anti-Slavery Society in February, 1842 : 

Lib. 12:87. " Whereas, the existence of slavery is incompatible with the 
enjoyment of liberty in any country j 

" And whereas, it is morally and politically impossible for a 
just or equal union to exist between Liberty and Slavery j 

" And whereas, in the adoption of the American Constitution 
and in the formation of the Federal Government, a guilty and 
fatal compromise was made between the North and the South, 
by which slavery has been nourished, protected, and enlarged 
up to the present hour, to the impoverishment and disgrace of 
the nation, the sacrifice of civil and religious freedom, and the 
crucifixion of humanity ; 

" And whereas, the South makes even moral opposition to her 
slave system a heinous crime, and avows her determination to 
perpetuate that system at all hazards, and under all circum 
stances ; 

"And whereas, the right of petition has been repeatedly 

l " There is," writes H. C. Wright to Mr. Garrison from Philadelphia, 
Sept. 4, 1840 (MS.), " a short communication in the Freeman of yesterday, 
signed J. D. (Joshua Dungan), Bucks County. A leading abolitionist of 
the Co., who was for a time carried off with New Organizers at N. Y. Now 
in his right mind. He takes the ground that no true-hearted abolitionist 
can consistently hold the office of President, because he must swear to 
support slavery, to put down by arms and blood every attempt of the 
slave to gain his liberty as our fathers gained theirs. "What do you say 
to this ? " 



^T. 37.] THE IKISH ADDKESS. 59 

cloven down on the floor of Congress, and is no longer en- CHAP. II. 
joyed by the people of the free States the liberty of speech Ig ~ 2 
and the press is not tolerated in one-half of the Union and 
they who advocate the cause of universal emancipation are 
regarded and treated as outlaws by the South ; 

" And whereas, by a recent decision of the Supreme Court of 
the United States, the right of trial by jury is denied to such of 
the people of the free States as shall be claimed as goods and 
chattels by Southern taskmasters, 1 and slavery is declared to be 
the supreme law of the land ; from which decision there is no 
appeal to any higher judicatory, except to the people on the 
ground of revolutionary necessity ; 

" And whereas, to reverence justice, to cherish liberty, and 
to promote righteousness, are the primary duties of every 
people, from the performance of which they cannot innocently 
escape by any compact or form of government j therefore, 

" 1. Resolved, That the consequences of doing right must 
ever be more safe and beneficial than those of doing wrong j 
and that the worst thing Liberty can do is to unite with 
Slavery, and the best thing is to withdraw from the embraces 
of the monster. 

1 Case of Prigg against the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (Lib. 12 : 38, 
39, 41, 174, 175 ; 13 : 3, 37). The Court held that, under the Constitution, 
Congress had exclusive jurisdiction in the matter of fugitive slaves ; that 
State legislation was prohibited unless in aid of the Constitutional provi 
sion ; that this provision was operative of itself, and required no Con 
gressional legislation to give effect to it. " The enormity of this decision 
of the Supreme Court," wrote Mr. Garrison (Lib. 12 : 39), " cannot be 
exhibited in words. It is in vain for any man to pretend that it is a correct 
exposition either of the powers of Congress, or the intent of the Constitu 
tion. It is not law for the entire system of slavery is at war with the 
rights of man, with law which finds its seat in the bosom of God, with 
every dictate of humanity, and with all the principles of republicanism. It 
is to be spit upon, hooted at, trampled in the dust, resolutely and openly, at 
all hazards, by every one who claims to be a man, and in whose bosom 
remains a spark of the fire of liberty. The people of Massachusetts will 
scorn to regard it. The soil of Massachusetts shall be consecrated ground, 
and the victim of oppression who flies to it for shelter . . . SHALL 
BE FREE ! " It is easy to see what effect this unlimited license to kidnap 
pers (in which the Massachusetts Justice, Joseph Story, concurred) had in 
determining Mr. Garrison and his followers to repudiate once for all a 
Union thus given over to the dominion of slaveholders. The Court s 
admission that States might prohibit their own magistrates from assisting 
in the execution of the law, was destined to furnish a basis for such legis 
lation in many Northern States, e. g., the Massachusetts Personal Liberty 
Law of March 24, 1843 (Lib. 23 : 66, 74). 



60 WILLIAM LLOYD GAEKISON. f^T. 37. 



CHAP. ii. " 2. Eesolved, That the American Union is, and ever has 

1842 been since the adoption of the Constitution, a rope of sand (so 

far as the North is concerned), and a concentration of the 

physical force of the nation to destroy liberty and to uphold 

slavery. 

" 3. Resolved, That the safety, prosperity, and perpetuity of 
the non-slaveholding States require that their connexion be 
immediately dissolved with the slave States in form, as it is now 
in fact." 

Lib. 12 : 86, Bradburn was the chief opponent of Mr. Garrison, who 
was again satisfied to have the question freely considered 
in all its bearings without forcing it to a formal vote. 
This policy of forbearance was everywhere observed at 
anti-slavery meetings throughout the year. According 
to the disposition of each society or assembly, the dis- 

Lib.-Lz-.ej. union resolutions were either adopted, or (as commonly) 
laid upon the table. Disunion was in the air. The first 
petition to Congress had been followed by others from 

Lib. 12:38, Ohio, New York, and Massachusetts again (this last, 

49.50,77,81. mos t elaborate, as David Lee Child s compositions were 
wont to be, and able). But meantime the conspiracy for 
the annexation of Texas began to rear its head anew. 

Lib. 12 : 49. Southern State legislatures adopted resolves in favor of 
it which met with a willing reception in Congress, while 

Lib. 12 : 50. those in opposition fell under the ban of anti-slavery 

Lib. 12:57. petitions until the inconsistency became too glaring. 

#.12:55, Recruiting for the Texan army (even under clerical au 
spices) went on openly, at the North as at the South, 

Lib. 12:51, after the invasion of Texas by Mexico in March. When, 

53. 59- on April 13, a Representative from New York moved in 

Congress to suppress the Mexican mission, as being an 

Wm. siade. instrumentality of annexation, Slade of Vermont sec- 

Lib. 12:66. onded him, declaring that he would not give a snap of his 

finger for the Union after the annexation of Texas. To 

John M. Botts of Virginia, offering a preposterous pledge on the 

part of the South, not to annex Texas if the abolitionists 

Lib. 12:67. would disband, Mr. Garrison replied : " The annexation of 
Texas will be the termination of the American Union, and 



vET. 37.] THE IRISH ADDRESS. 61 

therefore the South will have more to lose than to gain 
by it." Dr. Channing, in a sequel to his pamphlet on the Lib. 12:95. 
Duty of the Free States/ was ready to make slavery 
extension (though not slavery itself) a ground of dis 
union : 

" Better that we should part than be the police of the slave- Lib. 12:97. 
holder, than fight his battles, than wage war to uphold an 
oppressive institution. So I say, let the Union be dissevered 
rather than receive Texas into the confederacy. This measure, 
besides entailing on us evils of all sorts, would have for its chief 
end to bring the whole country under the Slave Power, to make 
the general government the agent of slavery ; and this we are 
bound to resist at all hazards. The free States should declare 
that the very act of admitting Texas will be construed as a 
dissolution of the Unio- ." 

In the nature of the case, it could not be the Liberty 
Party that would join Mr. Garrison in his attacks on the 
Constitution and Union, under which it had undertaken 
to thrive and prevail. Common prudence dictated that Lib. 13:27. 
it should avert from itself the odium sure to attach to 
the doctrine of disunion (however qualified) among a 
Union-worshipping people ; that it should assist in fast 
ening the odium on the Old Organization. This course Lib. 12:75, 
was promptly pursued by the People s Advocate of New 
Hampshire, which, from being an independent paper 
under the editorship of St. Clair and others, had shrunk A. St. ciair. 
to a department in Leavitt s Emancipator. Speaking for 
the Liberty Party men of Ohio, in distinction from some 
of their brethren in the East, Salmon P. Chase wrote : 

" We think it better to limit our political action by the political Lib. 12:177. 
power, explicitly and avowedly, rather than run the risk of mis 
construction by saying that we aim at immediate and universal 
emancipation by political action. We regard the Liberty Party 
not so much as an abolition organization as a political party, 
willing to carry out the principles of abolitionists so far as they 
can be legitimately attained by political action. We think that 
all these objects can be accomplished in full harmony with the 
Constitution, which instrument, as we believe, does not sanc 
tion nor nationalize slavery, but condemns and localizes it. 



62 WILLIAM LLOYD GAEKISON. 

CHAP. II. We seek, therefore, to put an end to constitutional slavery, 
1842. * na/ t i g > ^0 slavery in the District of Columbia, in Florida, and 
in American vessels upon the seas, and to restore the Gov 
ernment to its true constitutional sphere. If we can accomplish 
this, slavery must die; and we may accomplish this without 
insisting on more than the fulfillment of the guarantees of 
the Constitution." 

In other words, Mr. Chase went for the Constitution as 
it was, and the Union as it was. One of his associates, 
writing at the same time to the Xenia (Ohio) Free Press, 
even more frankly denned the difference between the 
political and the moral agitation: 

Lib. 12:179. " Abolitionists seek to exterminate slavery everywhere, by 
all rightful means, religious, moral, and political. Liberty 
men strive to get rid of slavery, not everywhere, BUT wherever it 
eodsts within the proper range of POLITICAL ACTION ; to deliver the 
Government from the usurped control of the Slave Power . . . 
by imparting energy and activity to the action of all the depart 
ments, through the introduction into important offices of a far 
larger proportion of intelligent, non-slaveholding freemen. 

"It is obvious that a man who is not an abolitionist at all 
MAY BE A LIBERTY MAN j for he may anxiously desire and 
zealously labor for these objects, though he may not be pre 
pared to devote himself to the more general objects of uni 
versal emancipation." 

Mr. Chase s letter was appropriately addressed to the 
managers of a New York Liberty Party Convention in 

Lib. 12:170. Syracuse in October, where for the first time the lines 
were drawn so as to exclude all but party members from 
sharing in the proceedings. These managers, annoyed by 
the activity of the agents of the American Anti-Slavery 
Society in their preserves, complained that it and its 
organ encouraged abolition connection with the Whig or 
Democratic Party. A most voluminous onslaught was 

Lib. 12:170, therefore made on the Society and the Standard by Will 
iam Goodell, in an address to the political abolitionists 
of the State, read at the above convention. Mr. Garrison 

Lib. 12: 173. gave up a whole page of the Liberator to it ; so did Torrey 



^T. 37.] THE IEISH ADDKESS. 63 

of his Tocsin of Liberty, 1 with this emphatic endorsement: 
" The simple truth is, the American A. S. Society has linked Lib. 12 : 173. 
itself to pro-slavery, to get friends and, like the Colo 
nization Society, it has become an obstacle in the way of 
progress which must be removed. I trust the address 
will do the work in this State. We have too much to do 
to allow us to maintain a long contest over so slight a 
matter." 

It seemed desirable to meet this Liberty Party mani 
festo by sending Mr. Garrison to Central and Western 
New York, which was virgin soil in his experience, 
whether as a lecturer or a tourist. He had, since June 
came in, been extremely active in the field, making a 
memorable first visit to Cape Cod, together with cam- #.12:99, 
paigns in Maine, New Hampshire, and various parts of 
Massachusetts. His adventures in the Mohawk Valley 
and beyond the beautiful region settled by New Eng 
land emigrants, and popularly known as " the West " even 
down to the date of this narrative are related in the 
following letters, which give a glimpse of the bright and 
the dark sides of apostolic abolitionism : 

W. L. Garrison to Ms Wife. 

WATERLOO [N. Y.], Nov. 21, 1842. MS. 

Up to the present time, " all s well " with me ; but, as I antic 
ipated before I left home, I have been so busily occupied in 
attending meetings and seeing friends, letter-writing has been 
out of the question. I am now at the dear hospitable home of 
Thomas M Clintock, and at this moment am writing in a room 
crowded with rampant abolitionists, whose tongues are all in 
motion, and their hearts in joyous commotion. Whether, under 
these circumstances, I shall be able to write an intelligible 
scrawl, is at least quite problematical. 

" To begin with the beginning." I arrived at the Brighton Mass. 
depot half an hour before the cars came along ; from thence I 

took the train for Albany, where I arrived at 7 o clock in the Nov. 12, 

1842. 

1 Published at Albany, N. Y., Torrey being at this time the salaried 
editor. The name of the paper was subsequently changed to Albany 
Patriot ( Memoir of Torrey, p. 104). 



64 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARKISON. 



. 37. 



CHAP. II. 

1842. 
Nov. 13. 



Nov. 13. 



Nov. 14. 
Isaac Post, 



Collins. 
Nov. 15. 



Nov. 15-18, 
T I v 2 17 



midst of a cold rain-storm. I might have immediately taken 
another train onward, and arrived at Rochester (450 miles from 
Boston) on Sunday afternoon. Wishing to keep my rest un 
broken, I concluded to tarry overnight, and went to a Temperance 
hotel near the depot, and in the morning left for Utica, 1 arriv- 
ing in that beautiful city at 2 o clock p. M. Here I concluded 
to remain until the next morning. On going up Genesee Street, 
in quest of a Temperance house, I met Alvan Stewart going to 
church. We shook hands with each other, and he politely asked 
me to go and stop with him overnight. I declined, not wishing 
to incur any special obligations at that time, or in that quarter ; 
but, on his invitation, I spent the evening with him and James 
C. Jackson (whose headquarters are now in Utica), and we had 
a talk on a great variety of topics, not excepting third-party- 
ism. I spoke very plainly on the last topic, and made them both 
rather uneasy j for poor James evidently felt that he stood on a 
sandy foundation. 2 

Early on Monday morning, I left in the cars for Rochester, 
and arrived at that place in the afternoon, where I met with a 
most cordial reception from friends Post, Burtis, and others. 
Dear bro. Collins, to our astonishment, arrived from Buffalo 
the same evening, in feeble, but improved, health. 3 Abby 
Kelley did not get along till the next day at noon. She came 
from Waterloo, in company with friend M Clintock, wife, and 
daughter Mary. Our meetings continued in Rochester, three 
times a day, from Tuesday morning until Friday, 1 o clock P. M. 
-^ n consequence of the bad weather, and the very bad state of 
the travelling, and the uncertainty of my arrival, etc., etc., 
there were not so many delegates from abroad as were expected ; 

1 Mr. Garrison s scruples about travelling on the Sabbath had apparently 
vanished. 

2 In company with Luther My rick, J. C. Jackson founded at Cazenovia, 
N. Y., in September, 1841, a third-party paper called the Madison County 
Abolitionist. Gerrit Smith had invited him to edit it, and contributed to 
his support (Lib. 11 : 159 ; MSS. Sept. 29, 1841, J. S. Gibbons to W. L. G., 
and Oct. 9, 1841, J. C. Jackson to Abby Kelley). Just before Mr. Garri 
son s arrival, Jackson had publicly advertised a Liberty Party lecturing 
partnership with W. L. Chaplin, on the independent contract system 
i. e., not as agents for any society or organization, and neither salaried nor 
living off the field ; but on special terms for their services in every instance. 
This was as near as the Liberty Party in New York ever came to the main 
tenance of the moral agitation against slavery hand in hand with the 
political (ante, 2 : 434). 

3 " Collins is now acting as General Agent, pro tempore, of the National 
Society " (MS. July 8, 1842, W. L. G. to G. W. Benson). 



37.] 



THE IRISH ADDRESS. 



65 



though some came a distance of 30 or 40 miles. In the daytime, 
our meetings were respectably attended in point of numbers, 
and by some of the choicest spirits in the land. In the even 
ing, they were crowded to overflowing. They were held in the 
Second Presbyterian Church. The deepest interest was mani 
fested in them from the opening to the close. W. L. Chaplin 1 
was present, and endeavored to act the champion for the third 
party j but he made miserable work of it. On taking the vote 
on a resolution condemnatory of that party, it was carried by a 
very large majority, though all persons were allowed to express 
their views. The result was most unexpected to myself, inas 
much as nearly all the abolitionists in this section of the coun 
try have been carried away by this unwise measure. Neither 
Remond nor Douglass was present, but there was no lack of 
speech-making. I have had to talk a great deal, of course, for 
there has been a special curiosity to see and hear me ; and it is 
a satisfaction to me to know that my remarks have been received 
with much favor generally. 

On Friday afternoon, I started from Rochester for Farmington, 
in company with J. A. Collins, J. C. Hathaway, and Abby Kelley, 
in Joseph s team. It was a very blustering and severe day, and 
we suffered considerably from the cold, but had a warm recep 
tion on our arrival at Farmington. The next day, we had two 
meetings in the Orthodox Quaker meeting-house, which were 
addressed by Abby and myself principally by W. L. G. The 
day was raw and gusty, and the audience in the forenoon not 
very large ; but in the afternoon, the house and gallery were 
well filled, though very few Quakers were present, owing to 
a strong prejudice against us, as well as to the weather. In 
the evening, a large company (chiefly Quakers) assembled at 
Hathaway s house. . . We talked on phrenology, mesmer 
ism, anti-slavery, non-resistance, etc. 

In the morning, Joseph took his team, and brought us to 
Waterloo, where we arrived yesterday (Sunday) at 1 o clock. 
At 2 P. M., the Court House was crowded by a dense assembly, 
which was addressed by Collins and myself. Last evening, 
another crowded auditory convened at the same place, and 
were addressed by Abby, Jacob Ferris (a splendid young ora 
tor), and myself I occupying the greater part of the time in 
blowing up the priesthood, church, worship, Sabbath, etc., as 

1 A grandson of Colonel William Prescott, who commanded at Bunker 
Hill. For his subsequent prominence as a victim of the Slave Power, see 
Lib. 21 : 66 ; Wilson s Rise and Fall of the Slave Power, 2 : 80-82. 

VOL. III. 5 



CHAP. II. 

1842. 



Cf. ante, 
p. 62. 

Ante, 2:415. 



C. L. 

Remond. 
F.Douglass. 



Nov. 18. 
1842. 

Joseph C. 

Hathaway. 

Nov. 19, 
1842. 



Hathaway. 
Nov. 20. 



Abby Kelley. 



66 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 

they now exist. A very deep impression was evidently made. 
Nov. 21, This evening, I am to deliver a lecture on slavery in the same 
l842 place ; and at 12 o clock at night shall leave in the cars for 
Syracuse to attend the conventions to be held in that place, 
Nov. 22, commencing to-morrow forenoon. This is pretty close work, 
1 42 and draws upon all my mental and physical powers ; but, thus 
far, my health remains good, and my lungs do not seem to 
suffer from so much speaking. Collins s pleuritic complaint 
hangs on to him, and his whole constitution seems to be greatly 
impaired. He will probably not return until after the Utica con 
ventions. Abby Kelley is tasking her lungs too severely, and 
ought to be more careful for the future. She will continue in 
this part of the country during the winter. 

My dear one, how are you and the little ones, and all the 

household ? Do send me a letter to Utica, and give me all the 

little domestic particulars that you can think of. I shall hasten 

Nov. 21. back to you, on the wings of love, as soon as possible. To-day 

George we are all thrilled with emotion to think that poor Latimer s 

atimer. cage ^ g ^ o ^ e <j ec id e( i now. Great interest is felt in it here and 

elsewhere, and thousands are waiting with much anxiety to 

learn the result of the trial. All hope that Latimer will be 

rescued. 1 The Liberator has just come, and is extremely inter- 

1 This was the first of the fugitive causes cSlebres which periodically pro 
duced tremendous excitement in the leading cities of the North, and, by 
contagion, throughout the country. George Latimer, a fine-looking man, 
almost white, had escaped with wife and child to Boston from Norfolk, 
Va. He was arrested without a warrant on a charge of theft. Brought 
before Judge Lemuel Shaw, on a writ of habeas corpus, with S. E. Sewall 
as one of his counsel, he was remanded to be tried before Judge Story, of 
the U. S. Circuit Court ; Judge Shaw assenting to the doctrine of the Prigg 
case (ante, p. 59), and denying him a trial by jury. A public meeting was 
at once called in Faneuil Hall for Oct. 30 (to the great scandal of a portion 
of the clergy, because it was a Sunday evening Lib. 12 : 175). Prayers 
were asked on that day by Latimer, and were offered in some pulpits. The 
meeting was very turbulent, and Eemond, attempting to speak, was howled 
down by the mob. Wendell Phillips indignantly told them: "We pre 
sume to believe the Bible outweighs the statute-book. When I look upon 
these crowded thousands, and see them trample on their consciences and 
the rights of their fellow-men, at the bidding of a piece of parchment, I 
say, my CURSE be on the Constitution of these United States ! " (Lib. 
12 : 178. See Georgiana Bruce Kirby s Years of Experience, pp. 142-144.) 
The resolutions adopted denounced the Prigg decision ; declared the fugi 
tive-slave clause of the Constitution to be morally not binding ; called for 
a repeal of the fugitive-slave law, and for State legislation against the 
surrender of fugitives, and particularly against the use of State prisons, 
officials, etc., for their detention and rendition. The illegality of Latimer s 



^T. 37.] THE IRISH ADDRESS. 67 

esting. A thousand kisses for you and the babe l and boys, CHAP. II. 
and love to all. ^ 2 

W. L. Garrison to Ms Wife. 

SYRACUSE, Nov. 27, 1842. MS. 

I wrote to you a hasty letter from Waterloo, giving you some 
of the outlines of my visit to Rochester. Although many inter 
esting events have occurred since that time, I shall wait till I 
see you before I go into the particulars. Up to this hour, I 
have enjoyed myself far beyond my expectations. The spirit 
of hospitality, in this section, exceeds anything to be found in 
New England, with comparatively rare exceptions. Money is 
about " as scarce as gold dust," but there is no lack of food 
and the other necessaries of life, and to these you are heartily 
welcome. All the towns that I have visited are uncommonly 
agreeable in their appearance, and exhibit a neatness, taste, 
and regularity that have taken me by surprise. If the aspect 
of things is so pleasant now, in bleak winter, what must it be in 
the prime of summer ? I wish you could be with me, and so 
do many others, who would delight to extend to you the warm 
hand of friendship. If all things shall go well with us, and our 
means will allow of it, what say for a trip with me, next summer, 
to Niagara Falls ? 

confinement in Leverett-Street jail was, in fact, made so patent to the 
sheriff of the county that the latter ordered his release, and he might 
have gone scot free but for a philanthropic cross-action, which ended in 
his being ransomed at a low figure. This event Mr. Garrison had the 
pleasure of announcing at the Syracuse convention on Nov. 22, 1842, amid 
cries of "God bless old Massachusetts ! " (Lib. 12 : 205.) Meantime, in that 
State, Latimer meetings had been held in various towns ; and a North Star 
and Latimer 1 s Journal, edited by Dr. Henry I. Bowditch, issued every other 
morning in Boston, satisfied the public craving for news, and kept the anti- 
slavery flame at a white heat. Afterwards a Latimer and Grand Massa 
chusetts Petition to the Legislature was industriously circulated, with a 
view to prohibiting State or municipal intervention in the arrest of fugi 
tives, and to separating Massachusetts forever from all connection with 
slavery through an amendment to the Constitution (ante, p. 33). In these 
public demonstrations old and new organizationists participated, but the 
initiative came from the Board of the Mass. A. S. Society. See, for the 
whole story, Lib. 12 : 171, 174, 175, 178, 179, 186, 187, 199, 205 ; 13 : 34 ; MSS. 
Nov. 5, 1842, A. A. Phelps to F. Jackson, Dec. 18, N. Barney to F. Jackson, 
Jan. 29, 1843, E. Quincy to R. D. Webb, and an unpublished communica 
tion to the Courier by F. Jackson, Nov. 17, 1842. Add Whittier s true 
Northern lyric, "Massachusetts to Virginia" (Lib. 13 : 16). 
l Charles Follen Garrison, born in Cambridgeport, Mass., Sept. 9, 1842. 



68 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. [^ET. 37. 

CHAP. II. The friends at Waterloo were the kindest of the kind. I de- 
1842 Hvered three addresses in that place, to crowded houses, the 

Nov. 21. last on Monday evening, the effect of which was visibly bene 
ficial to our cause. At 12 o clock that night, I left in the cars 
for Syracuse, accompanied by friends Collins (who was far from 
being well) and J. C. Hathaway, where we arrived at 5 o clock 
A. M. G. W. Pryor, Jacob Ferris, W. 0. Duvall, and Abby Kel- 
ley arrived during the forenoon, in a private conveyance. We 
all came to the splendid mansion occupied jointly by Stephen 
Smith and Wing Russell (formerly of New Bedford), where we, 
and many others, have all been entertained with a hospitality 
and kindness never exceeded in my experience. Poor Collins had 
to go to bed at once, and has scarcely been able to sit up even 

Nov. 27, to this hour. To-day he is somewhat better, and may possibly 
leave to-morrow afternoon for Utica, under my care. He has 
had all possible attention paid to him, and as good nursing as 
he could have obtained in this wide world. He is nearly dis 
abled from the service, at least for some time to come. This 
morning (Sunday), G. W. Pryor, S. S. Foster, Abby Kelley, and 
Mrs. Russell left for Vernon, on their way to Utica, in a carry 
all. The day is cold and blustering, and a snowstorm beginning 
to set in. 

Nov. 22. On Tuesday forenoon, our Convention opened in this place, 
Lib. 12:205. under circumstances by no means auspicious. Not a meeting 
house could be obtained for us, and we were forced to meet in 
a hall three stories high, called " Library Hall." Handbills 
had been placarded about the town, announcing that Abby 
Kelley, C. L. Remond, Frederick Douglass, and W. L. Garrison 
would be at the Convention; but, notorious as we are, and great 
as is the curiosity usually manifested to see and hear either of 
us singly, our meeting in the forenoon consisted only of eleven 
persons, all told ! These were nearly all of our own company. 
We appointed J. C. Hathaway President, and J. N. T. Tucker 
Secretary, and then adjourned. In the afternoon, we had a 
small audience; but, such was the feeling we excited in the 
meeting, by our scorching remarks and " ultra" resolutions, 
the hall was crowded in the evening, when I opened my budget 
of heresies on the subject of temple worship, the church, the 
priesthood, the Sabbath, etc., which created no small stir. The 

Nov. 23, next day, S. S. Foster arrived, 1 and we soon had the town in 
commotion. 

l He was out on bail from Leverett-Street jail, Boston, having been com 
mitted on an absurd charge of assaulting the constable who took Latimer 



^ T - 37.] THE IRISH ADDEESS. 69 

During the [next] day, a considerable number of persons were Nov. 24, 
in attendance, and the discussions assumed so exciting an aspect l842 
that, at the close of the afternoon meeting, it became apparent 
that we should have a riot in the evening all in defence of 
the clergy and the church ! When the evening came, the hall 
was densely filled, partly by a highly respectable assemblage, 
and partly by a troop of mobocrats, having their pockets filled 
with rotten eggs and other missiles. Jacob Ferris opened the 
meeting in a short but eloquent speech, which, as it contained Lib. 12:205. 
nothing specially offensive, was listened to without disturbance. 
Our friend S. S. Foster then took the platform, and was allowed 
to proceed without much interruption until he made his favorite 
declaration, in his most excited manner, that the Methodist 
Episcopal Church is worse than any brothel in the city of New 
York. Then came such an outbreak of hisses, cries, curses! 
All order was at an end. Several ruffians rushed toward the 
platform to seize Foster, but were not allowed to reach him. 
The tumult became tremendous. Several citizens, who were 
well known, attempted to calm the storm, but in vain. Rotten 
eggs were now thrown, one of which was sent as a special 
present to me, and struck the wall over my head, scattering its 
contents on me and others. Next, a number of benches were 
broken, and other damage done ; and, finally, the meeting was 
adjourned, in much disorder, to meet at the same place, the 
next day, at 10 A. M. We all got through the mob safely, 
though they kept a sharp lookout for Foster and myself, hav 
ing prepared, as it was said, tar and feathers to give us a coat 
without any cost to ourselves. 

thither, and with whom he simply remonstrated as they walked along (Lib. 
12 : 187). Mr. Foster had already this year, in June, made acquaintance 
with the same jail, after a forcible expulsion by the Rev. A. St. Clair and 
other divines from the Evangelical Congregational A. S. Convention in 
Boston (Lib. 12 : 90, 129), and still earlier, in May, had been jailed in Am- 
herst, N. H., for interrupting the services in a Baptist church by speak 
ing in behalf of the slave ( Acts of the A. S. Apostles/ p. 266 ; Lib. 12 : 94). 
This practice, long conscientiously kept up, induced untold clerical and 
diaconal assaults upon Mr. Foster s unresisting person, in a spirit and with 
a violence hardly to be denominated Christian (Lib. 12 : 110, 118). Stephen 
Symonds Foster was born at Canterbury, N. H., in 1809, and graduated at 
Dartmouth College in 1838. He began his preparation for the ministry at 
the Union Theological Seminary, New York, but abandoned that career in 
favor of a reformer s. He quickly identified himself with the Non-Resist- 
ants (ante, 2 : 327), and entered the field as an anti-slavery lecturer in 1840. 
" A devoted, noble, single-eyed, pure, eloquent, John-the-Baptist character " 
(Wendell Phillips to E. Pease, MS. June 29, 1842). 



70 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARKISON. 



[Mr. 37. 



Nov, 25, 
1842. 



Ante, 1 1490 
2 : 9. 40- 



In the morning (Thursday [Friday]) we met agreeably to 
adjournment; but on the opening it was announced that we 
could not have the use of the hall during the day, unless we 
would become responsible for all damages that might be done 
to the building j and that we could not be allowed to occupy 
the hall in the evening on any conditions, such was the excited 
state of the public mind. This announcement led to a most 
animated discussion. We refused, of course, to give any such 
guaranty, as that would be a strong inducement to the mob to 
do all the injury they could to the hall. Syracuse was held up 
to the infamy of the world, in terms of merited severity, as a 
town under mobocratic sway, worthy to be associated with 
Boston, New York, and Utica, in 1835. Finally, the requisition 
was withdrawn, and we were allowed to continue our meetings 
through the day, but not in the evening. In the afternoon, 
Foster obtained a very respectful hearing in defence of his 
terrible charge against the Methodist Church, and produced an 
impression decidedly in his favor. He was followed by a petti 
fogging lawyer and editor, named Cummings, in reply, who 
kept the audience in a roar of laughter by his ridiculous non 
sense and silly buffoonery. He was put forward by the mob- 
ocrats (as well as another lawyer, named Hillis), as the champion 
of Church and State ; but all he said worked mightily in our 
favor. At dark a motion was made that we adjourn sine die ; 
but our opponents outnumbered us, and voted to adjourn the 
meeting until the next morning. The hall, however, was not 
opened to them, and we, of course, did not go to the place. 

The whole town is in a ferment. Every tongue is in motion. 
If an earthquake had occurred, it would not have excited more 
consternation, or made more talk. But we have no doubt that 
the result will be good for our cause. We sent the resolutions 
Lib. 12:205. we intended to discuss in the Convention, relating to the church 
and the clergy, to the clergymen in this place, by a committee ; 
but the corrupt and cowardly creatures did not dare to come 
and discuss them with us before the people. To-day, however 
(Sunday), in " coward s castle," they are denouncing us as 
" infidels," etc., and warning the people against us. This, too, 
will do good. Already the tide is turning in our favor, and, in 
a short time, genuine anti-slavery will obtain a strong foot 
hold here. 

Our next convention is to be held at Utica, on Tuesday next, 
and will continue in session at least three days. As bro. Foster 
will be there, I presume we shall have a repetition of the scenes 



D. D. 

Hillis. 



Nov. 27, 
1842. 



Nov. 29. 
7. 5. Foster. 



^T. 37.] THE IRISH ADDKESS. 71 

in Syracuse, as lie is remarkably successful in raising the spirit Lib. 12:201, 
of rnobocracy wherever he goes. Possibly, we may have quiet 20 ^ X 3 9- 
meetings j * but, come what may, may we all be faithful to the 
cause. I could wish that bro. Foster would exercise more 
judgment and discretion in the presentation of his views ; but 
it is useless to reason with him, with any hope of altering his 
course, as he is firmly persuaded that he is pursuing the very 
best course. 

On Friday evening next, I expect to lecture in Albany, and Dec. 2, 
on Saturday night hope to embrace you and the dear children 
again, in health and safety. ... I am pretty well worn 
down with exertion. During the ride from Waterloo to this 
place, in the night, I took cold, and have been troubled with 
influenza ever since j so that I have spoken at our meetings 
here with great difficulty, in consequence of hoarseness. I am 
now better. Fear not about my taking care of myself. On my 
return, I have many marvellous things to relate to you about 
animal magnetism, having seen many experiments, and in which 
I am a full believer. . . . 

Mr. Garrison s system, overtaxed by the fatigues of his 
tour, was ripe for the contagion which he found raging Lib. 13:10. 
among his little ones, on his arrival home : 

11 Garrison was very ill," wrote Edmund Quincy to Richard MS. Jan. 

D. Webb, " as ill, I suppose, as a man could be and live. He 29> l843 
said, and from his description I have no doubt of it, that his 

scarlet fever was no whit less virulent or less abominable than Cf. MS. 

the small-pox in its most malignant form. His family has been ^m JSma 

in much trouble the past year. His brother James, a poor to G. W. 
drunken sailor, was upon his hands for a long time, and died 

last summer [autumn] . Garrison s behavior to this poor fellow Oct. 14, 

was very beautiful. Then his wife s sister, Mary Benson, was lB .\fy* 

ill for a long time, and also died in his house. 2 Then all his Jan. 29, 

1842 ; Lib. 

1 There was no disturbance until the evening of the third day, and then 12: 19. 
it burst not upon S. S. Foster but upon J. Cannings Fuller and Abby Kelley. 

The Mayor of Utica, Horatio Seymour, being present, endeavored, as a 
simple citizen, to quell the uproar, until taxed with official responsibility 
for it, when he said he would prosecute every individual implicated that 
might be named to him, and order was at once restored (Lib. 12 : 205, 206). 

2 Mr. Quincy s chronology is again at fault, for Mary Benson died before 
James Garrison, and at the beginning, not at the close, of the year 1842. 
In the fall of 1841, Mr. Garrison had removed his residence in Cambridge- 
port to the north-west corner of William and Magazine Streets, the scene 
of these afflictions. 



72 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARKISON. 



37. 



CHAP. II. 

1842. 



MS. Oct. 
14, 1842. 



Oct. 16, 
1842. 



J. H. Gar 
rison. 



children had the scarlet fever, and some of them, I believe, the 
lung or brain fever, and his wife the rheumatic fever j and, in 
addition to all his troubles, the funds of the Liberator fell short 
towards the end of the year, and he was without money for his 
necessary expenses, though I suppose he had credit. All of 
which circumstances made the last a very trying year to him." 

Announcing his brother s demise to G. "W. Benson, Mr. 
Garrison wrote : 

" As his case had long been hopeless, his release from the 
flesh is cause of consolation rather than of sorrow. He retained 
his senses to the last, and died with all possible fortitude and 
resignation, being perfectly aware that his end was approach 
ing. ... I intend that the funeral arrangements and cere 
monies shall be as plain, simple, and free, as possible. Liberty 
of speech shall be given to all who may attend. I shall prob 
ably have a testimony to bear against the war system, the navy, 
intemperance, etc., in connection with J. s history, and also 
against that religion which sustains war and its murderous 
enginery." 1 

It is hard to decide whether the story of James Garri 
son s career would make a more powerful peace or tem 
perance tract. Certain is it that if fate had designed the 
most striking contrast in the fortunes of two children of 
the same parents, it need not have provided otherwise than 
it did in the case of this unhappy man and his brother. 
At first glance it would appear as if the elder had simply 
inherited the vices of his father; the younger, the ad 
mirable virtues of his mother. Doubtless the fondness 



1 This intention was carried out, "and produced some sensation among 
the warring sectarians who were present " (MS. March 1, 1843, W. L. G, to 
H. C. Wright). The day after the funeral, Phoebe Jackson wrote from 
Providence to Mrs. Garrison (MS. Oct. 17, 1842) : " I thought much of you 
yesterday, and desired this affliction might he sanctified to your own good, 
and that a blessing might attend Mr. Garrison s remarks at the funeral 
obsequies. I often call to mind the observations he made at the funeral of 
dear Mary [Benson], and always with profit. At the time, they were very 
exalting to my own mind, and I have never ceased to feel their good effects. 
To Mr. Garrison it must be a source of abiding comfort that he has watched, 
with more than a brother s love, over this only brother. So kind, so tender, 
so constant, have been his ministrations that the void must be deeply felt. 
Faithfully has he fulfilled his trust, and rich must be his consolation." 



-fir. 37.] THE IKISH ADDRESS. 73 

for strong drink was inherited by James, and likewise the CHAP. u. 
disposition to follow the sea. Yet, but for the mother s I8 ~ 2 
poverty, we can imagine that a wise discipline might have 
saved him from both these pitfalls, and that he might have 
become a useful and respected if not an eminent citizen. 
He had a beautiful person, a powerful physique, a good 
heart, a good intellect. The little schooling that he got 
made him an excellent penman, 1 with but slight traces of 
illiteracy in his compositions. These are sensible, shrewd, 
humorous, graphic, deeply pathetic in particular, the 
autobiography which he attempted, evidently for publica 
tion as a warning against intemperance. The high spirit 
which was wasted in stubbornly going to the bad, in 
resenting injustice and imposition at the risk of wounds 
and death, and in enduring without a murmur the atroc 
ities incurred in the service of his country, might have 
graced a martyr in a cause as noble as his brother s. 

The alcoholic habit was fastened upon James Garrison 
at the age of fourteen, while yet a shoemaker s apprentice 
in Lynn, owing to the custom of serving black-strap to 
the workmen. Once master of him, it led him, with an 
occasional reprieve and vain attempt to establish himself 
in an honest employment on land, through every degree 
of abasement and physical suffering now the literal bed 
fellow of swine, and now the victim of all those forms of 
torture which made the navy of his day truly hells afloat. 
At twenty-two, in the British service, he was flogged June 20, 
through Admiral Rowley s fleet at Port Royal, Jamaica, StrC.^tno- 
for desertion (not without cause), receiving one hundred ley K - C - B - 

l On account of his ability to write, he was suspected of being the author 
of the anonymous letter protesting against the cruel practices on board the 
U. S. ship-of-line Delatcare, in the Mediterranean in 1828 (J), mentioned on 
p. 112 of McNally s Evils and Abuses in the Naval and Merchant Service 
Exposed (Boston, 1839). This suspicion was frightfully avenged upon him 
by the lieutenant aimed at in the letter. Some years before this, at Port 
Royal, Jamaica, being brought to trial for an affray with his captain, his 
defence of himself caused him to be styled " the sailor orator." A piece of 
money which he received at this time from the sympathetic supercargo, he 
went and gave "to the poor slaves in the prison" from which he had just 
been released. 



74 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. [^T. 37. 

and fifty lashes : he names the ships to which the launches 
Cf. Penn. were successively taken, and the fellow-sufferer who died 
F Ma a t under the terrible infliction. In January, 1824, he had 
1847, /. i. esca p e( j to New York, and in September shipped for the 
first time in the United States navy in the North Caro 
lina seventy -four at Norfolk. " I considered myself," he 
records, " an adept in the usages of a man-of-war; but I 
was mistaken, and soon found out I was destined to treat 
ment to which I had before been a stranger, and which 
I considered that no officers belonging to any civilized 
country could adopt." His introduction to American 
naval cruelty was given him by the future opener of 
Japan to "civilization," Matthew C. Perry, then first 
lieutenant. 1 

We draw the veil over what followed, under the Ameri 
can flag, until James Garrison, a mere wreck, was rescued 
from the navy by his brother. But an earlier experience 
had in it an element which connects while it contrasts the 
lives of both. Towards the close of 1819, while Lloyd was 
in his early printer s apprenticeship, James, then in his 
twentieth year, bound himself to one Benjamin Sisson, 
a Savannah pilot a slaveholder, cruel and tyrannical, 
whose wretched treatment at last drove James to run 
away. On the road to Charleston he was overtaken ; and 
now, as if the South were taking satisfaction on his poor 
body for the future anti-slavery warfare of his brother, 
James Garrison was subjected to punishment such as 
slaves had meted out to them for similar offences. Stripped 
naked, and hung to a tree by his thumbs so that his toes 
would just touch the ground, he was almost flayed alive 

l In one instance the punishment was thirteen lashes ; the offence, whis 
pering on inspection to a shipmate who was treading on James Garrison s 
toes. " All who remember Perry know what a disciplinarian he was, while 
yet no one accuses him of being a martinet. Brusque in his manners, he 
yet had a kindly heart" (Rev. W. E. Griffis, in Mag. Am. History, 13 : 425). 
John Randolph said in Congress that he saw more flogging on his voyage 
to Russia in 1830 (as American minister, on a Federal man-of-war, the 
Concord, Captain Perry) than on his plantation of 500 slaves (McNally s 
Evils and Abuses in the Naval and Merchant Service, p. 128. But see 
Griffis s Life of M. C. Perry, p. 85). 



Ml. 37.] 



THE IKISH ADDKESS. 



75 



with rods. He fainted with pain, only to be revived with 
cold water and freshly tormented till he begged Sisson to 
shoot him. When this monster l was wearied rather than 
glutted, he desisted. The next day he mounted his horse 
for the homeward journey, and, fastening a rope to James s 
body, forced him to keep up on foot. A second flogging, 
on shipboard at Savannah, nearly finished the boy, and 
when his lacerated back was viewed by the Mayor and 
other white men, they were shocked at a sight which no 
negro had ever afforded them. To save his neck, Sisson 
and his wife had to nurse James as if he were their 
darling. 

The worst details of these barbarities were concealed 
from Fanny Garrison while she lived, by her wayward 
son. Before he had become a sailor, and even while living 
near his mother in Baltimore (" the noblest of mothers," 
he thought her), she had " lost the run n of him, and was 
heart-broken when she learned that he kept away from 
her, who would have done anything to redeem him. At 
last " I crawled into her presence like one who had com 
mitted murder and was afraid of every one he met. We 
went into a room by ourselves, and Mother, falling on 
her knees, poured forth her soul in prayer to God to have 
mercy on her son." No influence, however, could over 
come his inveterate habit and his roving disposition. In 
spite of her entreaties, he chose the sea for his living. 
" My parting from Mother on this occasion was dreadful. 
I cannot describe my feelings. When we came to shake 
hands and bid the last farewell, my Mother kneeled and 
took both my hands, kissed me, and gave me her blessing. 
I could not say farewell. My heart was full, and I trem 
bled like an aspen leaf shook by the wind. We parted 
for the last time on earth." In his trunk he afterwards 
found a letter from her which he could never read with 
out weeping. 

What intemperance and cruel suffering had spared of 

l Sisson had flogged Ms slave Maria 200 lashes while in pregnancy, to 
gratify his wife. 



CHAP. II. 

1842. 



Cf. ante, 
i : 270. 



1818-1819. 



76 

CHAP. II. 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. 



37. 



James Garrison s battered hulk drifted at last by a kind 
Providence into the port of Boston, where a brother s love 
was ready to be proved superior to all temptations to 
disownment. 



MS. Navy 

Dept. 
Archives. 



Ante, p. 74. 



John 
Downes. 
Geo. W. 
Storer. 



August, 

1835? ante, 

1:516. 



W. L. Garrison to Secretary Paulding. 1 

BOSTON, December 14, 1839. 

I have a brother, James H. Garrison, who is now attached 
as a seaman to the U. S. Ship Columbus at the Navy Yard in 
Charlestown. He has been in the naval service of his country 
for the long period of sixteen years. It is rather more than 
four months since his last enlistment. During nearly all this 
time he has been on the sick-list, wholly incapacitated to per 
form any labor. His disease is a difficult one to eradicate from 
the system, if it be not immedicable ; and must, for an indef 
inite period, render him of little or no value to the Navy. . . . 
Through the kindness of Commodore Downes and Capt. Storer, 
I have been permitted to take him to my house for a few weeks 
past, in order to procure for him such medical treatment, and 
pay him such attention, as his case demands and a brother s 
affection could prompt. He is now in a somewhat better condi 
tion than when he was removed, but it is wholly uncertain how 
much he may yet be called to suffer under surgical operation, or 
how soon he will be able (if ever) to discharge the duties of a 
seaman in the U. S. service. Of course, under these circum 
stances, to have him remain under pay cannot be a very desir 
able object to the Government, the burdens of which should be 
lessened wherever and whenever it is practicable. My object, 
therefore, in writing this letter is respectfully and earnestly to 
solicit of you the immediate discharge of my brother from the 
Navy, upon the usual conditions. I cannot doubt your kindness 
in this matter, and shall gratefully appreciate its exercise. 

It may have additional weight with you to add, that, during 
the sixteen years in which he has done not only the state but 
the country some service, it has not been my privilege to enjoy 
his society more than a fortnight until his recent sickness. He 
is an only brother in whose welfare I feel a deep interest j and 
none the less because of the buffetings and perils through which 
he has been called to pass from boyhood. You will, I am sure, 
make the case your own, and act accordingly. 

1 For the Secretary s reply, see ante, 2 : 330. 



J&r- 37.] THE IKISH ADDKESS. 77 

The next three years were spent by James Garrison 
under his brother s roof, with a temporary stay at Brook- /*/*, 2 1358. 
lyn during the letter s journey to England. In the sum 
mer of 1841, he made a voyage to New Brunswick, to 
visit his relations. He had taken the pledge of total 
abstinence, but was betrayed by the captain into break 
ing it, yet on the whole kept steady until he landed in 
Boston in August. Then that fatality which seemed to 
him to have its iron grip upon him, suppressing every 
effort of his fallen manhood to rise again, brought him 
to the Liberator office during his brother s absence in New 
Hampshire. While the latter, with Rogers, was making Ante, p. 22. 
the woods of the White Mountains ring with the anthems 
of the free, or rejoicing in the conversion of their com- Ante, p. 22. 
panion from the smoker s habit, James Garrison for the 
thousandth time fell, a victim to circumstances : 

" Had I have come out home when I left the vessel, all per- MS. 
haps would have been well. But no, it was not to be until the 
cup of my bitterness was full ; and none but God and myself 
can tell what I have suffered in body and in mind for my rash 
ness. A great number of the O/MO S, Macedonian s, and Grampus s 
ship s company being ashore, I had a great many old shipmates 
among them. Suffice to say, I was led on to destruction. Com 
ing to my senses, I thought of you, of Helen, of Mary, Mother, Mrs. Garri- 
and the Home (the only one I ever knew) [where] I had spent S0 ^J^ 1 7 
so many happy hours. The amount of suffering and expense I Mrs. Sally 
had caused you all, the breaking of my pledge, the promises I 
had made to reform all rushed to my mind like the advanc 
ing roar of some mighty whirlwind. To drown those dreadful 
thoughts, I procured two ounces of laudanum, with a full deter 
mination to put a stop to my wretched existence." 

The attempted suicide was baffled, and once more, and 
to the end, the hapless man found a refuge in the home 
ever open to him in Cambridgeport. He lacked the nerve 
to tell his brother what had happened, so wrote a frank 
account, which he left on his table ; his mind balancing 
between futile plans of engaging anew as a sailor, and a 
half -formed resolve still to make away with his hated life. 
Thus the affecting paper closed : 



78 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKEISON. 



MS. 



Mary Ben 
son; Mrs. 
Sally Ben 
son; Mrs. 
Garrison. 



#.12:159. 



Cto. 3 , 1842; 
Lib. 12:159. 



" I am not writing this to show you my good or evil qualities, 
for I am confident you know them all. But my only wonder is, 
how you can put up with such treatment even from a brother. 
I write without flattery, for I am well assured you know it your 
self there is no one, under such circumstances, who would 
receive under his threshold such a brother. How often and 
often has it been said to me in Boston, by men in good stand 
ing in life, and by those who have only heard of you by hearsay, 
James H. Garrison, I would give all I possess in this world to 
have such a brother. But I have abused that brother s lenity, 
and how can I expect any clemency from his hands ? 

" I do not ask it j but one boon I crave : Forget you ever had 
such a brother. To-morrow I go into Boston. I thank you for 
your kindness this last time, for when I came out, I was labor 
ing under the mania potu and deliriums, and my hand is not 
steady yet. I have suffered, and that greatly, this last few 
nights, with that terrible disease, which none knows but those 
who have experienced it : it is horrid, indescribable ! I am 
sorry for poor Mary, Mother, and Helen. I know their feel 
ings are mortified, but what will they be when they see this "? 
But as I do not wish to conceal anything from them, I must 
expect their condemnation on him who has acted so improperly. 
I hope they will receive my thanks for their past kindness, the 
remembrance of which I shall hold dear in this throbbing bosom 
while life retains its empire. What I have written is facts 
without exaggeration. My mind could not rest until I had told 
you all. I stated it in writing, as I could not do it verbally, my 
mind being too much agitated." 

The month in which James Garrison passed away was 
marked by two other deaths of much greater consequence. 
O n Sunday, October 2, Channing breathed his last at 
Bennington, Vt., l close beside the printing-office in which 
Garrison had pledged himself to Lundy to make the cause 
of abolition his life-work. His last public effort had been 
in behalf of the slave, for at Lenox, on August 1st, he 
delivered an admirable address in eulogy of West India 
emancipation and of the anti-slavery enterprise in his own 
country. The next day, in Boston, Henry G. Chapman 
n j s thirty-ninth year, with Roman philosophy : 



l In the present Walloomsac House. 



. 37.] 



THE IKISH ADDKESS. 



79 



MS. Jan. 
29, 1843. 



Mrs. H. G. 
Chapman. 



" I happened," wrote Edmund Quincy to Richard Webb, < to 
call not long after his departure, and was invited, as one who 
had long stood in the relation of a brother to the family, to the 
chamber of death. It was the most striking scene I ever beheld. 
The body was surrounded by the surviving family ; Maria stand 
ing, with all the composure and peace of a guardian angel, at 
its head, and his venerable father seated in resignation at his 
feet. The serenity of Mrs. Chapman was as perfect as I had 
ever seen it, and she told all the little incidents of the last few 
hours with the utmost tranquillity. Her sisters were not all 
as calm as she, but they all felt the power of her peace upon 
them. 

" At the funeral, she evinced the same tranquillity. Samuel 
J. May was invited to perform the usual services, at Chapman s 
request, not as a priest but as a friend, out of regard to the 
feelings of his father and mother. After he had made a prayer, s. J. May. 
Garrison, who had been told by Mrs. Chapman if he had any 
word to utter not to withhold it, made a very excellent address, 
to the no small astonishment of certain of the relatives, who had 
not looked for an anti-slavery lecture at such a time. Neither 
Mrs. C. nor any of the family put on mourning, which was a 
strange thing in a community where the chains of custom and 
public opinion are like links of iron. 

" A day or two afterwards, I went to town to see her, appre 
hending that when the excitement was over, a reaction might 
take place. But I found her in the same angelic peace that I had 
left her. She said she had no feeling of separation ; that she 
had gone down with him to the brink of the River, and that he 
had gone over and she returned. And the household fell natur 
ally back into its usual liveliness and helpfulness, without any 
effort or affectation." l 

With one more death we close the chapter. The Non- Lib. 12:107. 
Resistant expired, on June 29, 1842, for want of means 
conclusive evidence that the Non-Resistance Society was Ante, 2 1347. 

l Hardly a number of the Liberator in the last two months of 1842 but 
shows traces of Mrs. Chapman s preternatural activity with pen and in 
deed. During Mr. Garrison s illness, she helped to nil his editorial page, 
and yet found time to foment the Latimer agitation (ante, p. 66), and to 
direct, as usual, the Anti-Slavery Bazaar. In short, she illustrated anew 
the force of a lesson which she early learned from an old sea-captain. 
" Talk of fast sailers ! " he would say. " I never saw a vessel that would 
sail without a great deal of assistatice " (MS. May 23, 1840, M. W. Chapman 
to Louisa Loring). 



M. W. 
Chapman. 



80 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. 



. 37. 



Lib. 12: 171. 
Lib. 12 : 47, 

143. 155 ; 

Herald of 

Freedom, 

8:129. 



MS. Mar. 
26, 1843, E. 

Quincy to 

R.D. Webb. 

Ante ,2: 233, 

234; also, 

229. 

Lib. 12:83. 



Cf. Lib. 



not identical with Garrisonian abolitionism. J The Society, 
nevertheless, held its fourth annual meeting, and had 
already, in September, 1841, at Mr. Garrison s instance, 
authorized Henry C. Wright to go abroad as a sort of 
general missionary for the causes of peace, abolition, 
temperance, chastity, and a pure and equal Christianity. 
The suspension of its organ, however, beyond hope of 
recovery, showed that the limit of organized growth had 
been reached, and that the millennial expectations of the 
Declaration of Sentiments must be fulfilled in some other 
form. " It does not follow," wrote Mr. Garrison in review 
of Judge Jay s i War and Peace/ " that the Almighty will 
crown with success all means and measures alike, for 
the furtherance of the cause of peace. . . . It is not 
enough that we have a good cause 5 this will avail us 
little or nothing unless the principles which we advance 
and the measures which we adopt to carry it forward are 
just and appropriate." The most appropriate peace meas 
ure in America was clearly the abolition of slavery. 

1 The absence of H. C. Wright in England was one of the causes of the 
lapse of the Non-Resistant ; but chief was the fact that "our time, our 
means, our labors are so absorbed in seeking the emancipation of our 
enslaved countrymen, that we cannot do as much specifically and directly 
for non-resistance as it would otherwise be in our power to perform " (MS. 
Mar. 1, 1843, W. L. G. to H. C. Wright). " The A. S. cause misses you 
much even more than the N. R. cause (as far as they are separable). 
But I never could separate N. B. from my idea of reform generally. It is 
the temper of mind in which all enterprises for humanity should be under 
taken, rather than a distinct enterprise of itself " (MS. Mar. 31, 1843, M. 
W. Chapman to H. C. Wright). " The [Non-Resistance] Society, I regret 
to say, has had only a nominal existence during the past year and, indeed, 
ever since your departure. It is without an organ, without funds, without 
agents, without publications " (MS. Oct. 1, 1844, W. L. GK to H. C. Wright). 



CHAPTER III. 



THE "COVENANT WITH DEATH." 1843. 

MR. GARRISON returned to his editorial duties in 
the latter part of January, 1843, but his health 
was far from restored. He struggled on till June, when 
a mysterious distress in the left side again caused him 
grave apprehensions that he had not long to live. His 
latest residence in Cambridgeport, though very health 
fully situated, was associated with an extraordinary 
amount of sickness and fatality. As the lease would 
expire on July 1, it was decided to remove for the sum 
mer to the country, and no place offered such attractions 
as the Community at Northampton, Mass. 

This was the third of those original experiments by 
which Massachusetts, as J. H. Noyes says, " appears to 
have anticipated the advent of Fourierism, and to have 
prepared herself for or against the rush of French ideas," 
throwing them out "on her three avenues of approach 
Unitarianism [Brook Farm], Universalism [Hopedale], 
and Nothingarian ism. 77 The Northampton Association 
of Education and Industry was, indeed, committed to no 
creed, not even to communism, as it was a joint-stock 
concern. All its prominent members were known per 
sonally to Mr. Garrison, who vouched for them as "among 
the freest and best spirits of the age," when publishing 
their manifesto. Organization was effected on April 8, 
1842, and as George "W. Benson was one of the founders, 
the progress of the enterprise was constantly reported to 
his brother-in-law. "The subject of social reorganiza 
tion," wrote the latter on December 16, 1843, to R. D. 

VOL. III. 6 si 



Lib. 13 : 10. 



MS. Apr. 

IS. 1843, 
W. L. G. 
to G. W. 

Benson. 



Am. Social 
isms^. 154. 



Ante, p. 25. 



Lib. 12 : 143. 



Noyes s Am. 

Socialisms, 

P- 155. 



MS. 



82 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. [^T. 38. 



CHAP. in. Webb, "is attracting general attention, and exciting a 
1843. growing interest. Many schemes are in embryo, and 
others have had a birth, and are now struggling for an 
existence. As experiments to bless our race, I feel an 
interest in them all, though I am not very sanguine as to 
the result of this new species of colonization." 

Edmund Quincy to Richard D. Webb. 

MS. DEDHAM, June 27 (-July 26), 1843. 

Garrison has been but in indifferent health since his dread 
ful illness in the winter. He has some sort of a swelling in his 
breast, about the region of his heart, which he believes will soon 
destroy him. He always speaks of it as an animal or devil (I 
don t mean that he thinks it is either) busy about his heart, 
John Collins which will soon put an end to him. However, Dr. Warren, our 
Warren. mos t eminent surgeon, and one of the first in the world, does 
not regard it as anything serious. When Garrison had finished 
consulting him, and tendered him his fee, he declined taking 
any fee " from Mr. Garrison," which we regard as quite a sign 
of progress, as the Dr. has never shown any leaning towards 
anti- slavery. 

Notwithstanding this handsome conduct on the part of the 
Dr., of which G. was duly sensible, he regards his opinion 
with infinite scorn and contempt, having on the other side the 
opinions of certain homosopathists l and hydropathists, not to 
mention a couple of clairvoyants who examined his internals 
with the back of their heads. The ocular, or rather occipital, 
evidence of these last worthies is the most satisfactory to his 
mind. To most men, the circumstance that they gave diamet- 

iJune 12, 1843, Mr. Garrison writes to G. W. Benson (MS.): "Last 
Tuesday [June 6] Dr. Warren made a careful examination of my side in 
the presence of Dr. [Henry L] Bowditch. He says it is neither a tumor 
nor an enlargement of the spleen, but a great distension of the intestinal 
parts connected with the stomach, and more troublesome than dangerous. 
Dr. [Robert] Wesselhoeft laughs at his opinion, and is confident that his 
own is the correct one. Who shall decide when doctors disagree? The 
examination, though tenderly managed, gave me great pain for several 
days afterward. I think Dr. Wesselhoeft is nearer right than Dr. Warren ; 
but Dr. Bowditch fully agrees with the latter." Dr. Wesselhoeft s diagno 
sis was a tumor, "partaking somewhat of the nature of a polypus"; Dr. 
H. B. C. Greene s, the enlarged spleen ; and this was confirmed by the 
post-mortem examination in 1879. 



MB. 38.] THE "COVENANT WITH DEATH." 83 

rically opposite accounts of the case would be startling, but CHAP. ill. 
then G. believes them both equally, which arranges the affair x ^7 
satisfactorily. 1 

It is a thousand pities that New Organization is not to do 
over again, for besides Garrison s heresies about Non-Resistance, 
Church, Sabbath, Ministry, Perfectionism, and Thomsonianism 
(do you know what that is ?) which last Phelps industriously Cf. ante, 
bruited about to disgust the country doctors, an influential class 
with us they would now have homoeopathy, hydropathy, and 
animal magnetism to add to the list. The rest of us, however, Lib. 14:35; 
are inclined to hope that Dr. Warren knows as much about the ante >P- 7 1 - 
matter as any of these new lights, and that Garrison may get 
over it. 

He is now at Northampton, with Geo. Benson, his wife s 
brother, at a Community to which Prof. Adam belongs. He Ante, 2: 353. 
went there for rest, and the way he rests himself is to lecture Lib. 13:111, 
every night in the neighboring towns, and on Sundays in North- II7> II8 
ampton in the open air ! D. L. Child, however, who took Boston 
in his way to New York to take the Standard, reports that he Lib. 13:123. 
looks well and seems well, with the exception of his enemy in 
the chest. He is also engaged, or is to be, in making selections Lib. 13:31. 
for the volume of his works. I hope he will have grace to select 
the best and to omit the mediocre. Literary taste, however, is 
not his forte. I wish he had left the selections to Mrs. Chap 
man. When Caroline Weston expressed her regrets that certain 
things were inserted in the volume of his poems by Johnson, he Oliver 
replied, with a smile, " Ah, you know there are all sorts of tastes Johnson - 
in the world." To which she answered, that was true enough j 
but when a man was collecting his writings in a permanent form, 
that there was but one kind of taste to be consulted, and that 
was the best.% 

The Northampton Community had chosen a beautiful 
site on Mill River, some two or three miles from the 
town, in the suburb now known as Florence and as a 

1 Badinage. Of one of these, Mr. Garrison wrote that she "could not 
see that anything affected my left side, but said that I had been consider 
ably troubled with my right side a piece of intelligence which was entirely 
new to me ! " (MS. May 1-June 10, 1843, to Phoebe Jackson.) 

2 Both were right. Mr. Garrison s literary ambition, like his poetic 
talent, was subordinate to his moral purpose in life. Hence, in noticing 
the appearance of his little volume of Sonnets and Other Poems (ante, p. 
8), he professed not to be ashamed of the sentiments expressed in his 
verses, " though not persuaded of their poetical merit " (Lib. 13 : 71). 



84 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [2ET. 38. 

CHAP. in. great manufacturing centre. Mr. Garrison s delight in 
1843. the natural scenery of the Connecticut Valley was shared 

#.13:131, for a week in August by N. P. Rogers, with whom he 
Aug. 12, drove in a gig on both sides of the river from Greenfield 

tfy. Jack- to Springfield. Shortly afterwards an accident occurred 
which sadly marred the pleasure of the sojourn at the 
Community. In watering his horse at a wayside brook, 

Lib. 13: 135, Mr. Garrison, by some maladroitness, upset his wife, with 
her three-year-old boy in her arms, and her aged mother, 
who all narrowly escaped drowning. 1 Mrs. Garrison s 
right arm was dislocated at the elbow, but was mal 
treated by an ignorant doctor as if broken, so that weeks 
of suffering ensued till the limb could be set. This was 

Lib. 13:171. made the occasion of special visits to Dr. Stephen Sweet, 
the famous bone-setter, at Franklin, Conn., who succeeded 
in the difficult operation, though a subsequent dislocation 
of the same joint was carried through life. By the end 
of October the family had returned to Boston, occupying 
NO. 13. a new house on Pine Street, with Oliver Johnson and his 
wife as welcome co-tenants. 

The Liberator, all this time, had been supplied editori 
ally by several friends by Quincy and Mrs. Chapman 
above all with no loss to the readers of the paper. Mr. 
Garrison s physical condition and various distractions 
during the past two years had confirmed his native habit 
of procrastination, and laid him open to friendly criticism : 

Edmund Quincy to W. L. Garrison. 

MS. DEDHAM, November 6, 1843. 

Lib. 13 : 179. I have sent in to you my concluding article on Leavitt, 2 which 
I hope will meet with your gracious approbation. This, I pre 
sume, will terminate my editorial labors for the present, and I 

1 Anne Weston says: It was Garrison s vain attempt to show how 
well he could drive. It may be well enough to talk about "every man his 
own priest," but every man his own driver " is another thing " (MS. Aug. 
24, 1843, W. Phillips to E. Pease). 

2 See the whole series of articles, discussing anew the embezzlement of the 
Emancipator, in which Quincy had the help of D. L. Child, and compelled 



2ET. 38.] 



THE " COVENANT WITH DEATH." 



85 



i8 43 . 



gladly resign my share of the vice-regal throne to its legitimate CHAP. in. 
possessor. I congratulate you, and all the friends of the cause 
at the same time, upon your restoration to health and your 
ancient occupation. May you live long to discharge it worthily ! 

And now, upon the occasion of my restoring to you my part 
of your delegated authority, will you pardon me if I say a word 
as to what I, in common with the best friends of the paper, wish 
to see the Liberator in your hands ? I am sure that I know you 
well enough to feel confident that you will pardon the bungling 
manner in which it is very likely I may perform the delicate and 
somewhat ungracious task of finding fault and giving advice. I 
think that you cannot doubt my interest in you and in the 
Liberator, and that you cannot attribute anything I may say, 
however awkwardly I may express myself, to anything but an 
earnest wish to make you and your paper as useful as possible 
to the cause. Now, my dear friend, you must know that to the 
microscopic eyes of its friends, as well as to the telescopic eyes 
of its enemies, the Liberator has faults. These they keep to them 
selves as much as they honestly may, but they are not the less 
sensible of them, and are all the more desirous to see them 
immediately abolished. Luckily, they are not faults of prin 
ciple neither moral nor intellectual deficiencies but faults 
the cure of which rests solely with yourself. 

I hardly know how to tell you what the faults are that we find 
with it, lest you should think them, none at all or else unavoid 
able. But no matter, of that you must be the judge ; we only 
ask you to listen to our opinions. We think that the paper often 
bears the marks of haste and carelessness in its getting up ; that 
the matter seems to be hastily selected and put in higgledy- 
piggledy, without any very apparent reason why it should be in 
at all, or why it should be in the place where it is. I suppose 
this is often caused by your selecting articles with a view to 
connect remarks of your own with them, which afterwards in 
your haste you omit. Then we complain that each paper is not 
so nearly a complete work in itself as it might be made, but that 
things are often left at loose ends, and important matters broken 
off in the middle. I assure you, brother Harriman is not the 
only one of the friends of the Liberator who grieve over your 



Jesse P. 
Harriman, 
ofDanvers, 

Mass. 



notice at the hands of Leavitt, Torrey, Elizur Wright, and Lewis Tappan 
(Lib. 13 : 165, 169, 170, 171, 174, 179, 185, 201). The Whig papers eagerly 
copied the attacks on their Liberty Party opponents, who all in turn had a 
hearing in the Liberator, though Quincy s arraignments were carefully 
excluded from the Ematwipator (MS. Nov. 27, 1843, Quincy to E. D. Webb). 



86 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAEEISON. 



38. 



CHAP. III. "more anon" and "more next week" which "anon" and 



1843. 



Nov. 3, 10, 
1844. 



Joshua 
Leavitt. 



" next week " never arrive. This continuation from one num 
ber to another is, of course, sometimes unavoidable, but surely 
should be done as seldom as possible, and never proposed with 
out being performed. 

Then we complain that your editorials are too often wanting, 
or else such, from apparent haste, as those who love your fame 
cannot wish to see ; that important topics, which you feel to be 
such, are too often either entirely passed over or very cursorily 
treated, and important moments like the present neglected. 
Perhaps the last Liberator and the present are the two most 
important ones in the year, as thousands of persons read them, 
on account of the elections, who never open an A. S. paper at 
any other time. And yet the last was without editorial. 

We have our suspicions, too, that good friends have been dis 
affected by the neglect of their communications ; but of this 
we can only speak by conjecture. In short, it appears to those 
who are your warmest friends and the staunchest supporters of 
the paper, that you might make the Liberator a more powerful 
and useful instrumentality than it is, powerful and useful as it 
is, by additional exertions on your part. It is very unpleasant 
to hear invidious comparisons drawn between the Liberator and 
the Emancipator with regard to the manner of getting it up, and 
to have not to deny but to excuse them and we knowing all 
the time that you have all the tact and technical talent for 
getting up a good paper that Leavitt has, with as much more 
intellectual ability as you have more moral honesty, and only 
wanting some of his (pardon me) industry, application, and 
method. 

Now we know that you have talent enough and to spare to 
write editorials, such as no other editor can ; that you have the 
most ample materials for the best of selections, and eminent tact 
and sagacity for judging what is timely ; and, moreover, that 
you have abundance of time for doing all this, if you would but 
have a little method in your madness. A week is long enough 
and to spare for getting up a paper if it be properly used, and 
all its work be not crowded into the last day. Fewer hours a 
day than most men of business have to give to their affairs, 
would do it all provided the work were begun soon enough. 
It is not often that a crisis occurs that demands the editorial of 
an A. S. paper to be written at the last moment. Selections 
might be made with an eye to two or three papers ahead, and 
even editorials written, so as to give you opportunity to perform 



MT. 38.] THE " COVENANT WITH DEATH." 87 

your important duties as a lecturer. Hildreth told me that in Richard 
Demerara he often prepared the matter in advance of two or ^/^ re ^ 
three weeks papers (issued three times a week), and then went 
into the country to enjoy himself. Surely you could do some 
thing of the sort by a little forecast and method. 

Sound as was this complaint and reproof, the remedy 
was not to be found in " pigeon-holes labelled < Refuge, 
Selections/ l Selections to be commented upon/ n etc. 
The demands on Mr. Garrison s time and strength merely 
as a journalist were greater than Mr. Quincy could realize. 
He had no editorial assistant. The volume of matter, in 
manuscript and in print, relating to the cause was grow 
ing with tremendous rapidity. As a rule, besides reading 
proof, he shared in the mechanical work of the paper. Add 
the interruptions to which he was exposed as the leader of 
the abolitionists ; his lecture engagements ; his anti-slavery LH>. 14: 63. 
hospitality ; his domestic cares ; his constant anxiety con 
cerning his means of support, and the wonder is that he 
found leisure to write as much as he did, whether for the 
Liberator, the Massachusetts Board, the American Society, 
or in his private correspondence. 1 

In a more important particular he was never delin 
quent. As a reformer, he was never dispirited ; he never 
lost his grip on leading principles. He came directly 
from his sick-room to his post in January, with a cheer 
ing survey of recent events during his absence. It had Lib. 13:10. 
consoled him while ill to reflect that his removal would 
be of no consequence to the cause. He affirmed anew the 
irrepressible conflict betwixt freedom and slavery, and 
advanced fresh arguments for disunion : 

" The proposition," said he, " may be ridiculed and denounced, Lib. 13 : 10. 
and some who call themselves abolitionists may be loudest in 
their condemnation of it ; but all this will avail nothing. The 
hour is coming when men of all sects and of all parties at the 
North will rally under one banner THE BANNER OF LIBERTY ; 

1 Quincy himself bore testimony to the sum of his friend s performance : 
" Garrison is, as usual, putting off everything he can till the last moment, 
but contriving to do a good deal on the whole " (MS. Sept. 22, 1844, to R. D. 
Webb). 



88 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKEISON. [^T. 38. 

CHAP. III. and a similar coalition will be seen at the South rallying under 
jjj" THE BLACK FLAG OF SLAVERY. It will not be a strife of blood 
but a conflict of opinions, and it will be short and decisive. 
Possibly, in that hour, the South may yield (and such a sur 
render would be to her victory and renown) possibly, the 
spirit of desperation may triumph over her instinct of self- 
preservation ; but, in either case, the fate of slavery would be 
sealed, the character of the North redeemed, and an example 
given to mankind worthy to be recorded on the brightest page 
of history. Thus much, at least, I am bold to prophesy." 

Jan. 27, At the annual meeting of the Massachusetts Anti-Sla 
very Society in Faneuil Hall, he secured the passage of 
the following resolution, of his own phrasing, which was 
shortly hoisted at the Liberator masthead in place of the 
less pungent declaration which had hitherto been kept 
flying there : 

Lib. 13 : 19. " Resolved, That the compact which exists between the North 
ha. 28 : 15 ; and the South is a covenant with death and an agreement with 
ante, pp. 52, j^jp involving both parties in atrocious criminality and 



should be immediately annulled." 



Edmund Quincy to R. D. Webb. 

MS. DEDHAM, January 29, 1843. 

We dissolved the Union by a handsome vote, after a warm 
debate. 1 The question was afterwards reconsidered and passed 
in another shape, being wrapped up by Garrison in some of his 
favorite Old Testament Hebraisms by way of vehicle, as the 
apothecaries say. 

The Church question next came up, introduced by Garrison 
in the broadest Herald of Freedom shape, and maintained in a 
speech attacking the Church and Ministry as direct obstacles to 
the progress of the cause. This I marvelled at, knowing his 
extreme caution, and the untenableness of his position on our 
platform. I replied to him, affirming that the origin or author 
ity of the Church or Ministry were questions we had nothing to 
do with as members of the Mass. Society ; that all we had a 
right to do was to demand that every one should use all the 
means and machinery he thinks he has a right to use for the 

l This was on a resolution offered by Wendell Phillips (Lib. 13 : 19). 



^T.38.] THE "COVENANT WITH DEATH." 89 

extinction of slavery, leaving him to settle the propriety of the CHAP. III. 
means with his own conscience ; that it would be as much a ^ 
breach of faith to appropriate time or money bestowed by per 
sons believing in the divinity of those things, for the agitation 
of the slavery question, to an attack upon them, as it would be 
to apply funds given by one believing them to be mischievous 
impostures, to their defence and maintenance; that there is 
nothing the pro-slavery clergy desire so much as to have the 
issue shifted from their hypocrisy, and faithlessness to their 
own acknowledged standard of duty, to the authority of that 
standard. 

Eogers replied, making the points you would suppose from N. P. 
reading the Herald, and made the assertion that slavery could Rogers. 
not be abolished until the order of the ministry had been ! I 
know the ministry, like all falsehoods, must miserably perish, 
but I believe it will survive negro slavery many a long year. 
The substitute which I moved, denying the Christian character Lib. 13 : 19. 
to pro-slavery churches and ministers, and denouncing the in 
consistency of abolitionists who sustained them, passed by an 
almost unanimous vote. 

The Non-Resistance question, the Property question (on which 
Collins is horsed just at present, and galloping away at a great Lib. 13 : 67. 
rate), as well as the Temperance question and multitudes of 
others, might just as reasonably be made test questions as the 
Ministry question. The short of the argument you will find in 
the Annual Report, which I wrote in consequence of Garrison s 
illness. In fact, this question which Garrison thus proposed 
bringing upon the A. S. platform, is the very one which New 
Organization made the false pretence of the secession, and 
which we most strenuously denied. I think, however, that he 
will see the utter incompatibility of making such test questions 
with associated action, and do not apprehend that this false 
policy will be pushed in Massachusetts. 1 

Church and state were united in the disunion resolution Lib. 13 : 81. 
which Wendell Phillips offered at the anniversary of the ^9,1843. 
American Society at New York, and which read as fol 
lows : " That anti-slavery is only to be advanced by tramp 
ling under foot the political and ecclesiastical links which 
bind slavery to the institutions of this country." Mr. Gar 
rison reported, from the business committee, " That we 

l Of this episode no detailed report remains. See Lib. 13 : 19. 



90 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. 

CHAP. in. cannot regard any man as a consistent abolitionist who, 
1843. while holding to the popular construction of the Consti 
tution, makes himself a party to that instrument, by tak 
ing any office under it requiring an oath, or voting for 
its support." This was laid on the table, but its future 

Lib. 13:81. triumph was ensured by the election of its mover to be 
President of the Society for the ensuing year. 

Edmund Quincy to R. D. Webb. 

MS. DEDHAM, June 27 (-July 26), 1843. 

I don t exactly remember when I wrote to you last, but am 
sure it was before the annual meeting of the Am. A. S. Society 
at N. Y. It was a singularly pleasant meeting in all its partic 
ulars. We did not carry on from Boston so strong a force as 
we have done for the three last years, when we chartered rail 
ways and steamboats 5 but we were a goodly company notwith 
standing. The whole number at the meeting was about as large 
as it ever was, the deficiency from the Eastern States being 
made up from the Western ; some having come eight and six 
Lib. 13:81. hundred miles in their own wagons to attend it, at an incon 
ceivably small expense. This was the first year since the seces 
sion that we were fairly wheeled into line of battle against 
slavery proper. . . . 

The principal business of the meeting was to decide what was 
best to be done with the American Society. Some were for dis 
banding it, as a machine costing more than it was worth. More 
were for removing it to Boston, on the ground that there was 
literally nobody in New York but James S. Gibbons who either 
would or could act as a member of the Executive Committee. 
To prevent the scandal of a discussion of these topics before the 
pro-slavery reporters and the miscellaneous audiences we usu 
ally had, we referred all the business of the Society to a Com 
mittee of 25, to be arranged and in fact done by them. 

In this Committee the question of the removal to Boston was 
urged vehemently by Garrison, Collins, Foster, Abby Kelley, and 
others, and was apparently well received by all the rest except 
the members of the Boston Clique l themselves, viz., Wendell 

l "The Boston Clique, the system that, in the elegant phrase of Elizur 
Wright, jr., wabbles around a centre somewhere between 25 Cornhill [the 
Liberator and A. S. Offices] and the South End (meaning 11 West St., the 
house of H. G. and M. W. Chapman) " (MS. Jan. 29, 1843, Quincy to Webb). 



. 38.] 



THE COVENANT WITH DEATH." 



91 



i8 43 . 



W. Phillips. 



Phillips, Caroline Weston, and myself. We urged that the CHAP. III. 
removal was to all intents and purposes a dissolution ; that it 
would be but the Mass. Society with another name ; that it was 
unnecessary to give pro-slavery and New Organization such a 
triumph ; that the nominal existence of the Society had better 
be maintained at N. Y., if all it did was to print the Standard, 
etc. Notwithstanding and nevertheless, the proposition would 
probably have been carried, had I not meekly suggested the 
prudence of first ascertaining whether, in case of a removal of 
the Society, the services of the Boston friends on whom they 
depended would be secured ; for that I thought, from what I 
knew of their opinions, that they regarded the measure as so 
unwise that they would decline taking office. Wendell con 
firmed what I said. 

This was an unexpected damper. Garrison dilated his nos 
trils like a war-horse, and snuffed indignation at us. " If the 
Boston friends were unwilling to take the trouble and responsi 
bility, then there was nothing more to be said; we must try 
to get along as well as we could in the old way," etc. Any 
unwillingness to take trouble and responsibility was of course 
disclaimed, but the necessity of their acting on their own ideas 
of what was best affirmed. At this crisis, Thomas Earle of 
Philadelphia proposed, as something that would combine effi 
ciency with the preservation of our old front to the enemy, that 
a quorum of the Committee should be appointed in Boston, and 
the business done there. 1 This seemed to satisfy everybody and 
was adopted. 

The appointment of Garrison as President was, I think, an 
excellent idea, and it was entirely " my thunder." He " nolo 
episcopariW a little at first, but was prevailed upon to accept 
the crown. Garrison makes an excellent president at a pub 
lic meeting where the order of speakers is in some measure 
arranged, as he has great felicity in introducing and inter- 
locuting remarks ; but at a meeting for debate he does not 
answer so well, as he is rather too apt, with all the innocence 
and simplicity in the world, to do all the talking himself. This, 
however, we shall arrange by having Francis Jackson to act as 
V. P. on such occasions. It seemed necessary to do something 
to define the position of the Am. Society, as Lewis Tappan had 

1 This was, in effect, to acknowledge and confirm the leadership of the 
Mass. Board (which, with all due modesty be it said, gives the tone to the 
anti-slavery of the country)" (MS. Jan. 30, 1844, E. Quincy to R. D. 
Webb.) 



92 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. [^T. 38. 



actually had the face to propose to James Gibbons a union meet- 
J. Leavitt. ing at our anniversary, and Leavitt had said in the Emancipator 
that the Society would probably have to call in the help of the 
old Committee to keep it alive ! I thought Garrison s election 
as President would be as effectual a way [as possible] of telling 
them and everybody else whereabouts we stood. His nomina 
tion was received with a burst of applause. 

The question of who should be editor of the Standard was also 
one of great importance. Great opposition was made to David 
Lee Child on account of his bias towards Whiggery, but the 
matter was referred to the Executive Committee to do the best 
they could in the premises. The meeting went off with the 
greatest harmony possible. Wendell Phillips s speech at the 
public anniversary was one of the most magnificent orations I 
ever heard or read. 

As every act by which Northern freemen were protected 
in their liberties was regarded by the South as an infringe 
ment of the Constitution, the progress of disunion was 

Lib. 13 : 55. considerable in the year 1843. Massachusetts passed, in 
answer to the Latimer petition, a Personal Liberty Act 

Lib. 13 : 34. forbidding judges and justices to take part in the capture 
of fugitive slaves, and sheriffs, jailors, and constables to 

Lib. 13 : 170. detain them. The Governor of Vermont recommended a 

Lib. 13:65. similar measure. Maine rejected it, as being tantamount 
to disunion but imitated Massachusetts in appointing an 

Lib. 13:45, agent to protect the State s colored seamen in Southern 

5 74 183 ports.1 

In his admirable report recommending a Personal 

Lib. 13:35. Liberty Act, Charles Francis Adams said: "It is the 
slave representation which ... is effecting, by slow 
but sure degrees, the overthrow of all the noble principles 
that were embodied in the Federal Constitution." Joint 
resolves were accordingly passed by the Massachusetts 
Legislature, praying that the clause of the Constitution 

1 A memorial of Boston shipowners to Congress on this subject elicited 
a report from the Committee on Commerce (Robert C. Winthrop of Massa 
chusetts, chairman), affirming the unconstitutionality of the Southern laws 
by which colored seamen were arrested and kept in jail while their vessels 
lay in port, and sold as slaves if charges were not paid. But the House 
refused leave to print it (Lib. 13 : 24, 26, 30 ; 15 : 7). 



^T. 38.] THE " COVENANT WITH DEATH." 93 

providing for the representation of slaves might be re- CHAP. in. 
moved from that instrument j 1 and these were presented i8 43 . 
to Congress in the House by the elder Adams, and not Lib. 13: 206; 
received. In the Senate they were received with reluc 
tance, and leave to print was refused. King of Alabama Lib. 14:38. 
termed them "a proposition to dissolve the Union," and Lib. 14:21, 
so did the General Assembly of Virginia in a counter 
memorial, which was promptly printed by the Senate. Lib. 14:42. 

John Quincy Adams, in conjunction with Giddings, 
Slade, Gates, Borden, and Hiland Hall, had, earlier in the 
year, issued an address to the people of the free States, #.13:78. 
warning them that an attempt would be made at the next 
session of Congress to annex Texas. The "real design 
and object of the South/ 7 they declared, "is to add new 
weight to her end of the lever. . . . We hesitate not to 
say that annexation, effected by any act or proceeding of 
the Federal Government or any of its departments, would 
be identical with dissolution " as being in violation of 
the national compact. "We not only assert that the 
people of the free States ought not to submit to it/ 
but we say, with confidence, they would not submit to it." 2 

1 Mr. Garrison had proposed this a dozen years before (ante, 1 : 264). 

2 William Slade, elected Governor of Vermont in 1844, discussed annexation 
at great length in his message to the Legislature, saying : " Upon the con 
summation of the threatened measure, I do not hesitate to say that it would 
be the duty of Vermont to declare her unalterable determination to have 
no connection with the new Union, thus formed without her consent and 
against her will. To carry out this determination would not be to dissolve 
the Union, but to refuse to submit to its dissolution not to nullify, but to 
resist nullification " (Lib. 14 : 170). And John Quincy Adams, in an address 
at North Bridgewater, Nov. 6, 1844, held this language : " The hero [Andrew 
Jackson, Lib. 14 : 181] enquires, who but a traitor to his country could 
appeal, as I have done, to the youth of Boston [Lib. 14 : 169] to oppose by 
arms the decision of the American people, should it be favorable to the 
annexation of Texas to the United States. . . . No ! the people of the 
United States will never sanction the annexation of Texas, unless under the 
delusion of such fables as the Erving treaty [Lib. 14 : 165, 169, 182] ; and if 
the faction of its inventor, invested with the power of the nation, should 
consummate the nefarious scheme, by the semblance of the people s appro 
bation, to imbrue their hands in blood for wicked conquest and the per 
petuation and propagation of slavery, then I say to you my constituents, 
as I said to the young men of Boston : Burnish your armor prepare for 
conflict and, in the language of Galgacus to the ancient Britons, think 



94 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAEKISON. 



. 38. 



Lib.iy. 191; 

cf.Lib.i$: 

58, [62]. 



Lib. 15 : 82. 



Lib. 13:191. 



MSS. Alar. 
3 1 * 1843, 
M. W. 
Chapman 
to H. C. 
Wright; 

June 27, E. 
Quincy to 

R.D. Webb; 

Lib. 13:23, 
27. 

Lib. 13:91. 



So Judge Jay, about to sail for Europe, wrote to Gerrit 
Smith : " Rather than be in union with Texas, let the 
confederation be shivered. My voice, my efforts will be 
for dissolution, if Texas be annexed." " We go one step 
further," commented Mr. Garrison, " DISSOLUTION NOW, 
Texas out of the question. 77 The sequel will show which 
of these classes of disunionists had root, and which would 
wither away before the glare of the Slave Power. But it 
may be noticed here that the group of anti-slavery Whigs 
led by Adams, who were content with the Union as it 
had been formed, and even as it had been altered by the 
admission of fresh slave States, but drew the line at Texas, 
did not find an enthusiastic response to their disunion 
menace in the Liberty Party. 

As usual, Mr. Garrison s mind had been occupied with 
many subjects besides that which claimed his chief atten 
tion. Great was the popular fermentation over Millerism, 
which drew off many abolitionists from the ranks, includ 
ing Charles Fitch and J. Y. Himes, and was controverted 
by the editor of the Liberator in two elaborate articles. 
Communism and socialism also diverted many. In June, 
Mr. Garrison attended as a spectator two meetings, in the 
Chardon-Street Chapel, " for the discussion of the ques 
tions pertaining to the reorganization of society and the 
rights of property ," in which Collins took a leading part. 
He heard nothing which attracted him to the doctrines 
advocated. 1 A few weeks previously he had replied to 

of your forefathers think of your posterity! " (Lib. 14 : 182.) Compare 
the position taken by Josiah Quincy in the House of Representatives, 
speaking to the bill for the admission of Louisiana, Jan. 14, 1811 : I am 
compelled to declare it as my deliberate opinion that, if this bill passes, the 
bonds of this Union are virtually dissolved ; that the States which compose 
it are free from their moral obligations, and that, as it will be the right of all, 
so it will be the duty of some, to prepare definitely for a separation ami 
cably if they can, violently if they must " ( Life of Josiah Quincy, p. 206). 
lOn Dec. 16, 1843, Mr. Garrison wrote to H. C. Wright in Dublin (MS.) : 
"John A. Collins is almost entirely absorbed in his Community project 
at Skaneateles, and is therefore unable to do much directly for the anti- 
slavery cause. He goes for a community of interest, and against all indi 
vidual possessions, whether of land or its fruits of labor or its products ; 
but he does not act very consistently with his principles, though he says 



JET. 38.] THE " COVENANT WITH DEATH." 95 

some urging for an expression of his views on " the prop- Lib. 13:47. 
erty question " : " We can only say that we have, at present, 
no thunder to expend upon its discussion, pro or con, 
for reasons that are satisfactory to our own mind. We 
hope to be always ready to give our cooperation to every 
Christian and feasible attempt to regenerate and redeem 
our species, come what may. 77 In December, Charles 
Burleigh saw him at the Fourierite Convention of Friends Lib. 13: 195, 
of Social Reform held in Boston, where he spoke, "and MS^Dec 
spoke well, but not in accordance with the views of the 29, 1843, 
Community leaders." Capital punishment, too, was a J. M^MC- 
frequent topic of the Liberator s editorial page, owing to a 
rather flagrant clerical demonstration in support of it Lib. 13:23, 
so that the Massachusetts Legislature was satirically ||: ^ .^ 
petitioned to make the hangman s office a ministerial 
perquisite. Finally, amid all these phases of opinion, a 
revolution was taking place which is thus described in a 
letter of Edmund Quincy s to R. D. Webb : 

" I am told that Garrison s opinions, as well as Rogers s, have MS. Nov. 
been greatly modified of late with regard to the Bible. He is 27> l843 
pretty well satisfied that God has not grown wiser by experi- Cf. ante, 
ence, and that he did not command people to cut their brothers 2 : 42<5> 
throats a thousand years before he commanded them to love one 
another. As a man I rejoice at his progress, but I don t know 
whether I do as an abolitionist. It was so convenient to be able 
to reply to those who were calling him infidel, that he believed 
as much as anybody, and swallowed the whole Bible in a lump, 
from Genesis to Revelation, both included. They say that in 
Connecticut they always keep one member of every pious family 
unconverted to do their wicked work for them. I suppose my 
policy is something of the same sort." 

he does the best he can in the present state of society. He holds, with 
Robert Owen, that man is the creature of circumstances, and therefore not 
deserving of praise or blame for what he does a most absurd and demoral 
izing doctrine, in my opinion, which will make shipwreck of any man or 
any scheme under its guidance, in due season. Still, it cannot be denied 
that circumstances are often very unfavorable to the development of man s 
faculties and moral nature ; and if, by a reorganization of society, these 
can be rendered more favorable, as doubtless they can, let it take 
place. But it is an internal rather than an outward reorganization that is 
needed to put away the evil that is in the world." Compare Lib. 14 : 3, 168. 



CHAPTER IV. 
" No UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS ! " 1844. 



MS. Jan. " i^\ ARRISON S favorite hobby of the Dissolution of 

j/*%M. ^Jt the Union/ as Quincy dubbed the doctrine slowly 
evolving in the abolition mind, was discussed in Faneuil 

Jan. 24-27, Hall and at the State House at the twelfth annual 
meeting of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society. 
Quincy himself reported, for the business committee, 

#.14:18. resolves deeming it "the only true and consistent posi 
tion to withhold support and sanction from the Consti 
tution of the United States ; and to present to the 
consciences of our countrymen the duty of dissolving 
their connexion with the Government, until it shall have 
abolished slavery. 7 Stephen Foster presented an elabo- 

#.14:18. rate protest as of the Massachusetts Society against the 
Constitution and the Union, which was ordered printed. 

#.14:18. Mr. Garrison was at the front with a resolution, "that 
the ballot-box is not an anti-slavery, but a pro-slavery, 
argument, so long as it is surrounded by the U. S. Con 
stitution, which forbids all approach to it except on con 
dition that the voter shall surrender fugitive slaves 
suppress negro insurrections sustain a piratical repre 
sentation in Congress, and regard man-stealers as equally 
eligible with the truest friends of human freedom and 
equality to any or all the offices under the United 
States Government." Later in the proceedings, he intro- 

#.14:19. duced and maintained other resolutions condemning the 
nature, and showing the natural consequences, of the 
"bloody compromise " on which the Constitution was 
founded, and urging the duty of withdrawing allegiance 



^T. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDER. 97 

to the compact and, " by a moral and peaceful revolu- CHAP. iv. 
tion," effecting its overthrow. 1844. 

No action was taken upon any of these, owing to the 
diminished attendance at the close of the meetings, but #.14:19. 
the Society was unmistakably in accord with the policy 
of the future. It followed Mr. Garrison in renewing the 
testimony against the Liberty Party, and specifically (in 
this Presidential year) against its candidate, J. G. Birney, Lib. 14: 19. 
as well as against Henry Clay, the predestined nominee 
of the Whig Party, and Calhoun and Van Buren, possible 
candidates of the Democratic Party. 

" The behavior of the Society in all these circumstances was MS. Jan. 
admirable," wrote Edmund Quincy to R. D. Webb, " and 3 l844 
showed that it perfectly understood itself and what was going 
on. I never felt more relieved and satisfied at the adjournment 
of any meeting since that of 1839, when the real battle of New 
and Old Organization was fought, the question being the Ante, 2:272- 
accepting of Garrison s Report. We instituted a series of a 
Hundred Conventions in Massachusetts, 1 which will sufiice to #.14:18. 
open the eyes of any who need enlightenment as to the true 
character of the Liberty Party. If it cannot control and use 
them, it will do all in its power to thwart them and destroy their 
effect. 

" John Quincy Adams occupied a good deal of time, 2 and D. 
L. Child made an unfortunate show of zeal in defending his A. #. 14: 19. 
S. character a character which Mr. A. has always, and very 
emphatically in his last speech, disclaimed. Thomas Earle of Lib. 13 : 206. 
Philadelphia (who is about as rabid a Democrat as Child is a Ante, 2:343. 
Whig, though with more command of his prejudices) and Gar 
rison brought up a mass of facts respecting him which surprised Lib. 14: 19, 
me by their amount. 3 One of the most remarkable proofs of 4<5> 
the profligacy of the Third Party is the adopting of Mr. A. as 
their candidate, virtually, by not setting up one of their own in 

1 In imitation of the grand double series of a Hundred Conventions engi 
neered by the American Society the year before in the Middle and Western 
States Collins s farewell impulse to the anti-slavery movement (Lib. 13 : 
95, 139, 143, 155 , and see Sydney Howard Gay s review in Lib. 14 : 11, 15). 
These Massachusetts Conventions became the natural vehicle of the dis 
union propaganda. 

2 Videlicet, as a topic, not in person. 

Mr. Child himself, in a letter to the Standard, confessed the weight of 
Mr. Garrison s arraignment of Adams (Lib. 14 : 26). 

VOL. III. 7 



98 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. [JET. 39. 

CHAP. IV. his District, and thus procuring* his election, although they pro- 

1844. ^ ess that they can support no man but one belonging to their 

party, and especially aim their blows at the Whigs and friends 

of Clay. Now Mr. Adams is a Whig, a supporter of Clay, a 

repudiator of Liberty Party, rejects Immediate Emancipation 

as impracticable and unjust, declares that he will vote against 

the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia and in 

Florida, denounces abolitionists and the A. S. agitation ; and 

while he admits that slavery can be abolished by a change 

of the Constitution, all that he has ever done towards it was to 

ask leave at the last moment of a session, four years ago, when 

another member had possession of the House, to offer an amend- 

Ante,2-.32$. ment providing for the emancipation of all slaves born after 

1850 ! He was refused permission to offer his amendment then, 

and has never proposed it since, such as it is, though he has had 

four years to do it in ! And yet Leavitt claims him as one of 

Joseph his men, and Whittier, in a letter to Sturge, in one of the last 

Sturge. g ^ p Reporters, describes him, in effect, as the leader of the 

A. S. movement, and gives the British public to understand 

that he is the head of the Liberty Party ! " 1 

In a letter from Boston to the Standard, reviewing the 
annual meeting, Mr. Child wrote that, as to disunion, he 
was convinced his repugnance to discussing the subject 
had been wrong. It was a duty to discuss it. " I can see 

Lib. 14:26. plainly," he said, " that the doctrine of Repeal/ as it is 
called, is gaining, and must gain, ground. With me it 
is a question of time. I am in favor of dissolution if 
we cannot have abolition, and that at a day not very 
distant ; but I could wish to see all reasonable means 
used of reforming before we destroy the Constitution." 
But no means could be reasonable where the attainment 
of the object was hopeless in the nature of things. The 
shallowest observer of the Southern temper, from the very 
Cf. ante, outset of the anti-slavery agitation, ought to have per- 

1:303, 304- ceivedthat any Constitutional change adverse to slavery, 
and diminishing by one jot or tittle its hold upon the 
direction of the general Government, would, before it 

1 The real head (or figure-head) of that party, J. G. Birney, having exposed 
Adams s erratic course on the subject of slavery, Leavitt expressly dissented 
from his chief (Lib. 14 : 45). They were at one in opposition to disunion on 
any pretext (Lib. 17 : 14). 



Mi. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDER. 99 

could be consummated, be the signal for a violent dis- CHAP. iv. 
ruption of the Union. The election of Lincoln in 1860 18^4. 
did not touch the Constitution, nor did it avowedly or 
necessarily involve any amendment of that instrument ; 
yet the Slave Power refused to live for a single hour 
under a regime pledged only to the Constitutional restric 
tion of the area of slavery. In this very year, 1844, toasts Lib. 14: 129, 
were drunk on the Fourth of July in South Carolina to 
" Texas or Disunion"; and there and in Alabama a con 
vention of the slaveholding States was demanded, "to #.14:129, 
count the cost and value of the Federal Union." Thomas 
H. Benton openly denounced annexation, not per se, but Lib. 14:142. 
as being an actual cover for a disunion conspiracy. 

The policy of seeking anti-slavery amendments to the 
Constitution Mr. Garrison had relegated to the limbo 
to which he had long ago consigned that of address- Ante, i: IBB. 
ing moral appeals to slaveholders. His Liberator call 
for the tenth anniversary of the American Society now 
unhesitatingly made the repeal of the Union a main #.14:59. 
object of rallying to New York. The results of this meet- May 7-9, 
ing, which lasted three days, were tersely summed up by 
Francis Jackson in a letter to N. P. Rogers : " The princi- MS. May 
pal things we did were to mend up the Constitution of 
our Society, and do what we could to break down the 
Constitution of the Union. . . . The Executive Com 
mittee was located in Boston, and this afternoon we shall 
muster our crew, and hoist anchor for another voyage. 7 
Wendell Phillips led off with resolutions affirming " that #.14: 
the only exodus of the slave to freedom, unless it be one i^d 
of blood, must be over the ruins of the present American 
Church and the grave of the present Union ; " " that the 
abolitionists of this country should make it one of the 
primary objects of their agitation, to dissolve the Ameri 
can Union;" and again, "that secession from the present 
United States Government is the duty of every abolition 
ist; since no one can take office, or throw a vote for 
another to hold office, under the U. S. Constitution, with 
out violating his anti-slavery principles, and rendering 
himself an abettor of the slaveholder in his sin." 



100 WILLIAM LLOYD GABKISON. 

Lib. 14: Mr. Garrison s part was a written address to the Friends 
t 82 ]- o f Freedom in the United States. This document, in view 
of the first decade of the Society s existence, undertook 
a fresh declaration of its principles first, as regards 
slavery, "that it ought to be immediately and forever 
abolished j " and as regards the existing national compact, 
" that it is a covenant with death and an agreement with 
hell/ 77 and that "henceforth, therefore, until slavery be 
abolished, the watchword, the rallying-cry, the motto on 
the banner of the American Anti-Slavery Society shall be, 
<NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS! 7 " "To ac 
complish this sublime resolution, the Society registers its 
sacred pledge" to continue its agitation on the above 
lines : 

Lib. 14 : " 5. To give no countenance to any political party which is in 

C 82 ] favor of continuing in alliance with the slaveholding States, or 

Ante, p. 33. which is for allowing slaveholders to act [sit ?] in the national 

halls of legislation, or for entrusting them with any of the 

interests of freemen. 

"6. To persuade Northern voters, that the strongest political 
influence which they can wield for the overthrow of slavery, is, 
to cease sustaining the existing compact, by withdrawing from 
the polls, and calmly waiting for the time when a righteous 
government shall supersede the institutions of tyranny. 

"8. To endeavor to effect, by all just and peaceful means, 
such a change in the public sentiment of the North as shall 
convince the South that nothing but the immediate abolition of 
slavery can make us a united people." l 

Lib.-n .jg, This paper, together with Mr. Phillips s resolutions, 

^ 1 was adopted by the Society by a large majority, after 

vigorous opposition from all quarters Ellis Gray Lor- 

ing, David Lee Child, Joseph Southwick, Abner Sanger, 

l So Washington, in a conversation at Mt. Vernon in 1798 with John 
Bernard, a highly intelligent English comedian, remarked of (gradual) 
emancipation: "Not only do I pray for it on the score of human dignity, 
but I can clearly foresee that nothing but the rooting out of slavery can 
perpetuate the existence of our Union, by consolidating it in a common 
bond of principle " (Bernard s Retrospections of America/ New York, 
1887, p. 91). 



. 39.] 



NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 



101 



William A. White, 1 etc., from the East j Arnold Buffum, 
from the West j Thomas Earle, with C. C. Burleigh and 
J. M. McKim, editors of the Pennsylvania Freeman, and 
Thomas S. Cavender of Philadelphia ; and James S. 
Gibbons of New York. Mr. Child, in accordance with a 
notice already given, withdrew from the editorship of the 
Standard, and was replaced by a committee of three, con 
sisting of Sydney Howard Gay, 2 office editor, Edmund 
Quincy, and Mrs. Chapman. He joined in the protests 
formally entered against the new policy by some of those 
whose names have just been given. The nature of the 
objections will appear from the following extracts from 
Mr. Garrison s rejoinder through the Liberator, on his 
return to Boston : 

" 1. To the objection, that the action of the Society virtually 
does away with the rights of conscience of its members, and 
narrows the anti- slavery platform, we reply, that this charge 
can be sustained only by showing that none are allowed to re 
tain their membership in the Society excepting those who sub 
scribe to the action alluded to. But no such test is required 
the Constitution remains unaltered the platform remains the 
same as hitherto as a condition of membership, nothing more 
is required than an assent to the doctrine, that slaveholding is 

1 Of Watertown, Mass., a graduate of Harvard College in 1838, an ardent 
abolitionist, and most zealous and generous promoter of the temperance 
cause, as lecturer and journalist (Lib. 27 : 92). 

2 Wendell Phillips wrote to Elizabeth Pease in October, 1844 (MS.): 
"The ri-editorship was my plan, and Gay my peculiar selection. Don t 
you like him?" Of this colleague, "a very well-looking man of about 
thirty," Quincy writes to Webb (MS. June 14, 1844): "He has not been 
much heard of in the cause, but has been engaged in it for several years. 
He belongs to one of the best of our New England families (in the Old 
World sense of good family hereditary gentility, successive generations 
who have not demeaned themselves by doing anything useful), and is a 
man of excellent talents, good taste, and good education. . . . Last 
summer he accompanied the agents of one of the series of the Hundred 
Western Conventions as a volunteer, receiving only his travelling expenses. 
He also attended our Hundred Massachusetts Conventions, so that he has 
had some experience in the field. He was also for a time the editor of the 
village paper published in Hingham [Mass.], so that he is not without some 
knowledge of the details of a newspaper establishment. He is, moreover, 
in perfect unity with the Boston Clique, which is a great thing, you may be 
sure." 



CHAP. IV 
1844. 



Lib. 14 : 
[82]. 

All three 
protests. 



102 



WILLIAM LLOYD GABKISON. 



. 39. 



CHAP. IV. 
1844. 



Protest of 

Wm. A. 

White. 

Ante, p. 29. 



a sin against God, and ought to be immediately abandoned j 
and, therefore, this objection falls to the ground. Is the Soci 
ety to adopt only that course of action which shall at all times 
obtain an unanimous vote ? Then it can make no progress, for 
its reformative power is lost. There may, there must, be una 
nimity of sentiment in regard to the principles of our enterprise ; 
but in the application of those principles to existing religious 
and political institutions, similar unanimity is not to be ex 
pected, nor required as a condition of membership and the 
minority of this year may be the majority of the next. 

"2. It is objected, that it is the adoption of a creed. No 
more than the declaration, that the American churches are the 
bulwarks of slavery ; that the Whig and Democratic parties 
ought to be abandoned as pro-slavery ; that no abolitionist can 
consistently support a pro-slavery clergyman, or continue in 
Christian fellowship with a pro-slavery church, or vote for 
Henry Clay or Martin Van Buren. No more than a thousand 
similar opinions which have been expressed, from time to time, 
by anti-slavery societies and at anti-slavery meetings, in all 
parts of the free States. Are these opinions to be stifled be 
cause all who belong to those societies, or who profess to be 
abolitionists, are not ready for their adoption ? And because a 
majority feel bound to utter them, is it for the minority to com 
plain that such utterance is a trespass on their rights of con 
science 1 Have the majority no such rights ? and when they 
are called upon to suppress their convictions of duty, to gratify 
the minority, do not the latter interfere with the rights of con 
science ? Is not the argument as broad as it is long ? But, 
the truth is, no proscription is implied or intended 5 nothing 
invidious is meant. The majority may err, and the minority 
may be in the right, in regard to particular propositions or 
modes of action ; but this does not alter the platform on which 
both parties stand ; and where there is honesty of purpose, in 
due season experience will prove whose views are most worthy 
of unanimous approval. Besides, what is the creed that is ob 
jected to? It is all summed up in a single sentence: NO 
UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS ! How would it read : 
Union with tyrants, for the preservation and extension of liberty ! 
What fellowship has light with darkness "? and how can Christ 
and Belial belong to the same government, and cooperate to 
gether for the promotion of righteousness in the earth ? 

" 5. The minority regard the proposition [of disunion] as 
impracticable. If the people of the United States are free 



^ET. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 103 

agents, then what they have done they can undo. 1 They have Protest of 
made a covenant with death that covenant they can abro- Q Lor* 
gate. With hell they are at agreement from it they can ing, J. 
withdraw their countenance. The proposition may be, and j.s.Gib- 
really is, impracticable to those who feel unwilling or unable 6ons etc - 
to support it ; but not to those who hail it as eternal truth, as 
the true anti-slavery issue, as the ground of safety and success 
and who, by their deeds, are resolved to show that it is a 
duty which can be easily performed in the strength of con 
scious rectitude. The objection that it is impracticable may 
only mean that, in the opinion of the protestants, no consider 
able portion of the people can ever be persuaded to adopt it. 
We conceive that our obligation to do a righteous act is not at 
all dependent on the question whether we shall succeed in car 
rying the multitude with us. Of one thing we are sure, that we 
may not innocently go with them to do evil. Broad is the road 
that leads to death, and many there be that walk therein. 
Some of our friends who look on this revolutionary step as D. L. Child, 
impracticable were as strongly persuaded, at the formation ^ n ^- ante 
of the New England Anti-Slavery Society, that the doctrine of i : 279- 
immediate and unconditional emancipation was futile, intoler 
ant, and presumptuous ; but they were not long in discovering 
their mistake, and they rectified it with penitent and grateful 
hearts. So we trust it will prove in the present case. When 

1 Win. H. Channing wrote to Mr. Garrison from New York on May 
12, 1844 (Lib. 14 : [83] ) : "The Confederation was adopted by the People 
of the United States. And when this bond was found insufficient, the 
People of the United States it was who assented to, ratified, and estab 
lished the Constitution as the Supreme Law. The adoption of the Constitu 
tion did not make us a Nation. We as a Nation adopted the Constitution. 
This is a most important point. The People of the United States, by a 
Sovereign Right, under God, established this Constitution ; the People of 
the United States, by the same Sovereign Right, having found that this 
Constitution, in place of securing a more perfect Union, and establishing 
justice, &c., has broken our Union, and established injustice, &c. (vide Pre 
amble to the Constitution), can pass on from that Constitution, thus proved 
imperfect, to a higher and better one, as they did from the Confederacy. 

AND THE END IN VIEW SHALL STILL BE UNION, NOT DISUNION. . . . This 

is not schismatic, nor treacherous, nor nullifying; it is legitimate, and 
right, and reasonable. ... In demanding that the People of the 
United States be faithful to their professed principles, they [the aboli 
tionists] assume a Positive position, and throw the odium of mere Nega 
tion and Opposition upon the Slaveholder. The Rectitude of this is plain, 
and the Policy of it is equally so. It puts the Slaveholder in his true place as 
the Disunionist ; it exposes to the world that the only actual disturbing 
element in our Union is our injustice to our colored brethren." 



104 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



CHAP. IV. 
1844. 



Protest of 
Child, Lor- 
ing, South- 
wick, Gib 
bons, etc. 



Protest of 
T. Earte 

and 
A. Buff i4m. 



Ante, p. 46. 



Protest of 
Earle and 
Bu/um. 



the doctrine of teetotalism was first advocated, to all but a 
clear-sighted; adventurous few it seemed utterly chimerical. 
How is it now regarded ? Now, it seems to us that the doctrines 
referred to are not more consonant with reason and duty than 
that which requires freemen to have NO UNION WITH 
SLAVEHOLDERS. 

" 6. The protestants regard the proposition as calculated to 
impair the character and influence of the Society. The Ameri 
can An ti- Slavery Society has never had any character, except 
for fanaticism; and never can have any, safely, until the 
trumpet of jubilee sounds throughout the land. Our prophecy 
is, that while the new position which it has assumed will subject 
the Society to fresh contumely and derision, for a time, posterity 
will regard it with special admiration and gratitude ; and uni 
versal tyranny shall feel it as a blow struck by the hand of 
omnipotence. The i influence of the Society has been just in 
proportion to its faith in God, its fidelity to its principles, its 
readiness to be without reputation. We believe it now occu 
pies the highest defensible ground against the enemy. 

"7. It is objected, that this is i precisely the course which all 
the crafty advocates of slavery would wish us to pursue. This 
is empty assertion and the facts that have already transpired 
prove it to be equally fallacious. What rage and consternation 
were excited in Congress on the presentation of the famous 
Haverhill petition for a peaceful dissolution of the Union ! How 
did the crafty advocates of slavery gnaw their tongues for 
pain, and cry out, as did kindred spirits of old, that they were 
tormented before their time ! How did it extort the confession 
from the lips of Southern Senators and Representatives, that a 
dissolution of the Union would be a dissolution of slavery ! How 
effectually has it silenced Southern bluster, and humbled South 
ern audacity, in regard to a separation ! And now that the Ameri 
can Anti-Slavery Society calls for secession now that a host 
of the foremost and most unflinching advocates of emancipa 
tion are ready to sound the tocsin of disunion now that the 
motto on the anti-slavery banner is, * NO UNION WITH 
SLAVEHOLDERS! is it to be credited that they who 
quailed before the solitary petition from Haverhill, signed by 
some thirty individuals, will now rejoice and take courage ? 
0, most lame and impotent conclusion ! But let time deter 
mine this. 

"9. It is in opposition to the evident doctrine of the consti 
tution of the Society. But that constitution provides for the 



. 39.] 



NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 



105 



use of all moral and legal means for the overthrow of slavery ; 
and these are embodied in the doctrine of secession from the 
Government. 1 

" 11. It is urged that the ground of disunion is an attack 
upon the conscientious convictions of the minority, of the same 
character as that which is said to have been formerly attempted 
by new organizationists, but repudiated by this Society they 
having proposed to decide that it was the moral duty of every 
abolitionist in the country to go to the polls and vote for public 
officers, and the present measure being a decision that it is the 
duty of all abolitionists to abstain from such voting. Here we 
have a comparison of cases, but there is no analogy between 
them. The fact is, that, though James G. Birney and a few 
others advocated the moral duty of voting, the question was 
never presented to the American A. S. Society for its consider 
ation. The division in 1840 took place in consequence of Abby 
Kelley being placed on a business committee, and the refusal of 
the Society to put a padlock on the lips of any of its members 
who might feel moved to speak in behalf of the suffering and 
the dumb. Besides, the ground assumed by Birney and his 
abettors was, not simply that voting was an anti-slavery duty, 
but that it should be recognized as a religious obligation at all 
times, and this bloody and atheistical government as having a 
divine origin and approval i This creed they wanted abolition 
ists to swallow before they should be allowed to occupy the 
anti-slavery platform as those in i regular standing. It was 
justly regarded by the bone and muscle of our enterprise as a 
prescriptive and unjustifiable measure, resorted to evidently for 
an evil purpose, and urged out of no regard for the onward 
march of emancipation, as the sequel has fully proved. It is 
now charged, as an equally heinous offence, that the Society 
has decided that it is the duty of all abolitionists to abstain 
from voting. True voting to sustain a blood-cemented Union 
and a pro-slavery Constitution but not true in regard to the 
abstract question of voting, or of the form of government which 
is in harmony with the will of God and the freedom of the 
human mind. A wide difference. 

l Mrs. Chapman patly recalled the passage in the Declaration of Senti 
ments of 1833 (ante, 1 : 411), in which Mr. Garrison, after having described 
the pro-slavery obligations of the North under the Constitution in other 
words, having characterized the Union concluded : "This relation to 
slavery is criminal, and full of danger : IT MUST BE BROKEN UP " (Lib. 14 : 
171). 



CHAP. IV. 
1844. 

Protest of 
Earle and 
Buffum. 



Ante, 2:348, 
349- 



106 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. 



. 39. 



Protest of 
Earle and 
Buffum. 



Protest of " 13. It is argued, that l if voting under the Constitution be a 
criminal participation in slavery, the paying of taxes under it 
is equally so. Without stopping to show that there is a fallacy 
in this argument, we reply, that, in the common use and under 
standing of the terms, no seceder will ever again pay taxes to 
the Government while it upholds slavery. He may consent 
peaceably to yield up what is demanded of him, but not with 
out remonstrance, and only as he would give up his purse to a 
highwayman. He will not recognize it as a lawful tax he 
will not pay it as a tax but will denounce it as robbery and 
oppression. 

" 17. The last objection urged by the protestants is, that l it 
proposes to dissolve the American Union, and our membership 
of it, before having petitioned for a change of the objectionable 
features of the American Constitution. Of what avail is it to 
petition when the right of petition is denied and trampled in the 
dust ? What is it but to mock us to say, when we are treated 
as outlaws, and slavery reigns over the land, that we have not 
gone through certain worthless forms before declaring that we 
will not any longer walk in the counsel of the ungodly, nor 
stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of the scornful ? 
It is enough that the Government is powerless to protect us 
nay, that it gives us up to destruction nay, more, that it keeps 
in chains, as beasts of burden, three millions of the people. As 

Gen. 19:17. the angels said to Lot, Escape for thy life ! look not behind 
thee, neither stay thou in all the plain : escape to the mountain, 
lest thou be consumed! so are we to come out and be sep- 

fsa. 26: 13. arate, in the spirit of heavenly allegiance exclaiming, t Lord 
our God, other lords beside thee have had dominion over us j but 
by thee only will we make mention of thy name. How appli- 

ha. 8: 11-14. cable the language of Isaiah to the present emergency ! For 
the Lord spake thus to me with a strong hand, and instructed 
me that I should not walk in the way of this people, saying, 
Say ye not, A confederacy, to all them to whom this people shall 
say, A confederacy ; neither fear ye their fear, nor be afraid. 
Sanctify the Lord of hosts himself ; and let him be your fear, 
and let him be your dread ; and he shall be for a sanctuary. 

" We have thus examined every objection brought by the 
protestants against the action of the Parent Society, as far as 
our narrow limits will permit with what success, our readers 
must decide. The more we weigh this matter, the stronger 
grows our conviction that the true issue is now made, that 
abolitionists should take a revolutionary position, and that 



^T. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDER. 107 

the watchword in our ranks should be, NO UNION WITH CHAP. IV. 
SLAVEHOLDERS ! " l8 ^ 

The Executive Committee of the American Anti-Slavery 
Society lost no time in publishing a formal statement of 
the disunion position, in an Address to the Friends of Lib. 14:86. 
Freedom and Emancipation in the United States. This 
document, signed by Mr. Garrison as President, was 
mainly from his pen, with the probable collaboration of 
his co-signers, the Secretaries, Wendell Phillips and Mrs. 
Chapman. It drew justification for a measure confessedly 
revolutionary from the Declaration of Independence and 
the consequent revolt against the despotism of England. 
The far greater despotism of the existing national Gov 
ernment "a guilty compromise between the free and 
slaveholding States" was alleged and demonstrated. 

"II. The American Constitution is the exponent of the na- Lib. 14:86. 
tional compact. We affirm that it is an instrument which no 
man can innocently bind himself to support, because its anti- 
republican and anti-Christian requirements are explicit and 
peremptory 5 at least, so explicit that, in regard to all the 
clauses pertaining to slavery, they have been uniformly under 
stood and enforced in the same way by all the courts and by 
all the people j and so peremptory that no individual interpre 
tation or authority can set them aside with impunity. It is 
not a ball of clay, to be moulded into any shape that party 
contrivance or caprice may choose it to assume. It is not a 
form of words, to be interpreted in any manner, or to any 
extent, or for the accomplishment of any purpose, that indi 
viduals in office under it may determine. It means precisely ichat 
those who framed and adopted it meant NOTHING MORE, NOTHING 
LESS, as a matter of bargain and compromise. Even if it can be 
construed to mean something else, without violence to its 
language, such construction is not to be tolerated against the 
wishes of either party. No just or honest use of it can be made, 
in opposition to the plain intention of its framers, except to 
declare the contract at an end, and to refuse to serve under it. 1 

1 "Every man that is called upon to administer the Constitution of the 
United States, or act under it in any respect, is bound, in honor, and faith, 
and duty, to take it in its ordinary acceptation, and to act upon it as it was 
understood by those who framed it, and received by the people when they 



108 WILLIAM LLOYD GARKISON. (>T. 39. 

CHAP. IV. " To the argument, that the words slaves and l slaveholders 
1844 are n t to ^ e f un( l ^ the Constitution, and therefore that it 
was never intended to give any protection or countenance to the 
slave system, it is sufficient to reply, that though no such words 
are contained in that instrument, other words were used, intelli 
gently and specifically, TO MEET THE NECESSITIES OF SLAVERY ; 
and that these were adopted in good faith, to be observed until a 
constitutional change could be effected. On this point, as to the 
design of certain provisions, no intelligent man can honestly 
entertain a doubt. If it be objected, that though these pro 
visions were meant to cover slavery, yet, as they can fairly be 
interpreted to mean something exactly the reverse, it is allow 
able to give them such an interpretation, especially as the cause of 
freedom will thereby be promoted we reply, that this is to advo 
cate fraud and violence toward one of the contracting parties, 
whose cooperation was secured only by an express agreement and 
understanding between them both, in regard to the clauses alluded to; 
and that such a construction, if enforced by pains and pen 
alties, would unquestionably lead to a civil war, in which the 
aggrieved party would justly claim to have been betrayed and 
robbed of their constitutional rights. 

" Again, if it be said that those clauses, being immoral, are 
null and void we reply, it is true they are not to be observed ; 
but it is also true that they are portions of an instrument the 
support of which, AS A WHOLE, is required by oath or affirma 
tion ; and, therefore, because they are immoral, and BECAUSE OF 
THIS OBLIGATION TO ENFORCE IMMORALITY, no one can inno- 
cently swear to support the Constitution. 

"Again, if it be objected that the Constitution was formed 
by the people of the United States in order to establish justice, 
to promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of 
liberty to themselves and their posterity, and therefore it is to 
be so construed as to harmonize with these objects ; we reply, 
again, that its language is not to be interpreted in a sense which 

adopted it, and as it has been practised upon since, through all adminis 
trations of the Government " (Daniel Webster at Philadelphia, Dec. 2, 1846. 
Works, 2 : 312). "On the subject of our relations with the South and 
its slavery, we must as I have always thought do one of two things: 
either keep honestly the bargain of the Constitution, as it shall be inter 
preted by the authorities to whom we have agreed to confide its interpre 
tation, of which the Supreme Court of the United States is the chief and 
safest, or declare honestly that we can no longer in our consciences con 
sent to keep it, and break it " (George Ticknor to W. E. Channing, Apr. 20, 
1842. Life of Ticknor, 2 : 200). 



Mi. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 109 

neither of the contracting parties understoodj and which would CHAP. IV. 
frustrate the very design of their alliance to wit, union at I ^~ 
the expense of the colored population of the country. Moreover, 
nothing is more certain than that the preamble alluded to 
never included, in the minds of those who framed it, those ivho 
were then pining in bondage for, in that case, a general eman 
cipation of the slaves would have instantly been proclaimed 
throughout the United States. The words, ( secure the bless 
ings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, assuredly meant 
only the white population. * To promote the general welfare, 
referred to their own welfare exclusively. To establish justice/ 
was understood to be for their sole benefit as slaveholders 
and the guilty abettors of slavery. This is demonstrated by 
other parts of the same instrument, and by their own practice 
under it. 

" We would not detract aught from what is justly their due ; 
but it is as reprehensible to give them credit for what they did 
not possess, as it is to rob them of what is theirs. It is absurd, 
it is false, it is an insult to the common sense of mankind, to 
pretend that the Constitution was intended to embrace the 
entire population of the country under its sheltering wings ; 
or that the parties to it were actuated by a sense of justice and 
the spirit of impartial liberty; or that it needs no alteration, 
but only a new interpretation, to make it harmonize with the 
object aimed at by its adoption. As truly might it be argued, 
that because it is asserted in the Declaration of Independence 
that all men are created equal, and endowed with an inalien 
able right to liberty, therefore none of its signers were slave 
holders, and, since its adoption, slavery has been banished from 
the American soil! The truth is, our fathers were intent on 
securing liberty to themselves, without being very scrupulous as 
to the means they used to accomplish their purpose. They were 
not actuated by the spirit of universal philanthropy ; and though 
in words they recognized occasionally the brotherhood of the 
human race, in practice they continually denied it. They did 
not blush to enslave a portion of their fellow-men, and to buy 
and sell them as cattle in the market, while they were fighting 
against the oppression of the mother country, and boasting of 
their regard for the rights of man. Why, then, concede to them 
virtues which they did not possess ? Why cling to the falsehood, 
that they were no respecters of persons in the formation of the Gov 
ernment f Alas ! that they had no more fear of God, no more 
regard for man, in their hearts! i The iniquity of the house of Ezek. 9:9. 



110 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. |>T. 39. 

CHAP. IV. Israel and Judah [the North and the Sonth] is exceeding great, 
jjT. and the land is full of blood, and the city full of perverseness ; 
for they say, The Lord hath forsaken the earth, and the Lord 
seeth not. " 

This strict construction of which the South might 
have applauded the integrity and legality (but for the 
conclusion, deadly to slavery), and which it would now 
be obsolete and ridiculous to controvert was followed 
in the Address by a critical examination of the pro-slavery 
compromises of the Constitution. We pass, instead, direct 
to the closing passages : 

#. 14:87. "The form of government that shall succeed the present 
government of the United States, let time determine. It would 
be a waste of time to argue that question until the people are 
regenerated and turned from their iniquity. Ours is no anar 
chical movement, but one of order and obedience. In ceasing 
from oppression, we establish liberty. What is now fragmen 
tary shall in due time be crystallized, and shine like a gem set 
in the heavens, for a light to all coming ages. 

" Finally, we believe that the effect of this movement will be 

"First, to create discussion and agitation throughout the 
North ; and these will lead to a general perception of its gran 
deur and importance. 

" Secondly, to convulse the slumbering South like an earth 
quake, and convince her that her only alternative is to abolish 
slavery, or be abandoned by that power on which she now relies 
for safety. 

" Thirdly, to attack the Slave Power in its most vulnerable 
point, and to carry the battle to the gate. 

"Fourthly, to exalt the moral sense, increase the moral 
power, and invigorate the moral constitution of all who heart 
ily espouse it. 

" We reverently believe that, in withdrawing from the Amer 
ican Union, we have the God of justice with us. We know that 
we have our enslaved countrymen with us. We are confident 
that all free hearts will be with us. We are certain that tyrants 
and their abettors will be against us." 

The last battle-ground of the disunion doctrine was the 
New England Anti-Slavery Convention, whose sessions 



^ET. 39. J NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDEKS. Ill 

began in the Marlboro Chapel, Boston, on the 28th of z#.i 4 : 9 i. 
May. Quincy thus epitomized it for Webb : 

"The New England Convention was the best one we ever MS. June 
had the fullest attendance, the most spirited debates, the I4> l844 
most new faces among the members (the fruits of our spring 
conventions), and the most thorough action. The question of Ante, p. 97. 
the duty of withdrawing from the support of the U. S. Govern 
ment on account of its pro-slavery character, and of making 
the dissolution of the Union our main measure, was the ques 
tion of the Convention. The debates were very fine. That is, 
Garrison and Phillips did admirably, C. C. Burleigh very well 
indeed, on the one side, and Pierpont, Amasa Walker, Hildreth Rev. J. 
( Archy Moore *) did all that could be done on the other. But JH$ 
in fact there was but one side. The arguments in favor of act- Hildreth. 
ing under the existing Government, or, rather, the casuistry by 
which swearing to do wicked things which at the time you don t 
mean to do was justified, were enough to convince any reason 
able person of the truth of what they opposed. Pierpont s 
speech was the most extraordinary piece of Jesuitism that I 
ever heard. The world s people among the audience were 
shocked at it. An old president of a bank, no abolitionist, who 
was in from curiosity, told me that the business of the world 
could not go on for a day on his [Pierpont s] principles, if 
fairly carried out ; that they struck at the root of all human 
society, and would destroy all confidence of man in man. And 
yet this is the only process by which he [Pierpont] can recon 
cile his support of the Liberty Party with morality. 

" The vote surprised us all. At one time we thought it might 
not pass. Latterly we thought it would be earned by a small 
majority. But when the roll was called, it seemed as if there 
were no i nays at all, they came dropping in at such distant 
intervals. The vote stood 250 to 24. This was on the last day May 31, 
of the Convention, when very many had been obliged to go *%44- 
home, or the vote would have been much larger in favor of the 
resolutions. But those that remained were la crdme de la cr&me 
of the New England Abolitionists, and stood for the very bone 
and muscle of the cause." 

1 The first anti-slavery novel, by the future historian of the United States ; 
the sub-title being " The White Slave." It was published towards the close 
of 1836, and had a powerful effect (Lib. 7 : 35, 56.) Lacking the prepared 
soil on which Uncle Tom s Cabin fell, it failed of the vogue which its fine 
literary qualities merited ; yet in 1846 had reached a sixth edition (Lib. 
16 : 94), 



112 WILLIAM LLOYD GAEEISON. 

Ante, p. 101. William A. White was joined by Richard Hildreth in 
renewing his protest against the resolutions so trium- 

Lib. 14: i. phantly adopted. The general tenor of it was, that the 
proposed policy, besides being narrow and prescriptive, 
would make " no government " men of the abolitionists as 
a body, and would, in all consistency, preclude them from 
any use of the existing State and Federal machinery 
against slavery, as by petitions and the like. Practically, 
disunion would end either in forcible emancipation initi 
ated by the free States, or in a servile insurrection having 
their countenance. George Bradburn, with some qualifi- 

Lib. 14: 130, cation, but also with a peculiar bitterness to be more fully 

issiiseiigs! revealed ere long, assented to these objections his first 
step towards joining the Liberty Party outright. Among 

Lib. 14:95. the nays we remark further Maria, the sister of William 
A. White, and her affianced, James Eussell Lowell, though 
the latter had been moved at the Convention to compose 
verses of a stiffer tone on the main question, as thus : 

Lib. 14: 152. " Whate er we deem Oppression s prop, 

Time-honored though it be, 
We break, nor fear the heavens will drop 
Because the earth is free." l 

The conclusion of the struggle for the acceptance of the 
disunion policy was marked by a bit of scenic effect. On 
the evening of the last day of the Convention, C. C. Bur- 
leigh presented in its behalf to Mr. Garrison, as President 
of the American Anti-Slavery Society, a silken banner 
(still preserved), bearing on one side a satirical symbol of 
#.14:91. American oppression, the national eagle w r ith one foot 
on the Constitution and the other on a prostrate slave, 
with accessories, and on the reverse this inscription : 

l More pointedly, Whittier, stirred by the prospect of Texan annexation, 
had written, earlier in the year (Lib. 14 : 63) : 

" Make our Union-bond a chain, 
We will snap its links in twain, 
We will stand erect again." 

These lines, however, like the entire poem, " Texas," were much altered and 
weakened by the writer s second thought. 



JET. 39.J NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDEES. 113 

" Immediate and Unconditional Emancipation. Ameri- CHAP. iv. 
can Anti-Slavery Society formed Dec. 6th, 1833. No I &J 4 . 
Union with Slaveholders ! Mr. Garrison accepted it in 
a speech which, as Adin Ballon affirmed, " in grandeur Lib. 14 : 97. 
of moral sentiment and force of expression, was of tran 
scendent excellence;" and which one may read in Mrs. #.14:130. 
Chapman s report. His last words were caught up in 
song by the Hutchinson Family, 1 and the whole audience 
rose in enthusiasm. 

Banners multiplied in this year 1844, and became the 
visible token of the new crusade. In various places on 
the First of August, inscribed with Disunion sentiments, 
they were borne by men and women marching in thronged Lib. 14: 119, 
procession, under green arches, to the groves where they I2 >I2 7 I 3 I - 
were to celebrate West India Emancipation. One by one, 
more or less promptly and unconditionally, the several Lib. 14:35, 
Massachusetts town and county societies gave in their ^I ^i,?^. 
adhesion to their leader and became non-voters. Persua 
sion had overtaken the editors of the Pennsylvania Free- Lib. 14:103, 
man, and their conduct of the paper according to their 
new light was formally approved by the Eastern Pennsyl- Lib. 14: 135. 
vania Anti-Slavery Society, in Mr. Garrison s presence. 2 

1 These gifted natural singers had been discovered and proclaimed by N. 
P. Rogers, their fellow-citizen of New Hampshire, and, through his influ 
ence, had been led to join the anti-slavery to the temperance cause in their 
musical mission (Lib. 13 : 10, 19, 31, 32, 81). 

2 Aug. 4, 1844, E. Quincy writes to J. M. McKim, Philadelphia (MS.) : 
" The [Mass.] Board are in session at this time at Mr. Jackson s house, and 
we have succeeded in persuading Garrison to go to Norristown [Penn.]. 
We think his presence very important for the purpose of showing pre 
cisely where we stand on the Disunion Question. We wish to show that 
we are not bigoted or intolerant on the subject, and not in the least desirous 
of dragooning or browbeating abolitionists into the measure until they are 
ready for it. Garrison has been ready for the question these three years, 
and so has Phillips and the rest of what Elizur Wright calls the Boston 
Clique, but we have never urged it to a decision until the way had been 
fully prepared for it by full discussion. Garrison will be the very man for 
your meeting, if you wish to have the question fairly and clearly stated, and 
argued in a temperate and dispassionate manner, with the single desire of 
promoting the truth, and not of obtaining victory. You will find him an 
excellent auxiliary in your other business, and his influence out of the 
meetings will be very beneficial in disarming prejudice and comforting 
friends." 

VOL. III. 8 



114 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKBISON. [^T. 39. 



MS. By September 22, Quincy could write to Webb : " The 

Disunion doctrine obtains almost universally among the 

old-school abolitionists, 1 and is fast spreading. It is so 

marvellously plain that it is hard not to embrace it. What 

Thomas straits its opposers are reduced to you will see by Earle s 

articles in the Standard, ( The No-Voting Theory/ signed 

Lib. 14:137, <E./ and Gerrit Smith s tract, which you will find at 

154, 159. length in both Liberator and Standard." 2 Edmund Jack 

son, a brother of Francis, gave, in the Liberator, his 

Li6.i4-.io2. weighty assent to the doctrine in controversy, pointing 

out to those political abolitionists who urged rather 

amendment of the Constitution, that this was synony 

mous with dissolution, in fact and in the eyes of the 

MS., and South. 3 Francis Jackson himself resigned to the Gov- 

Lib. 14 : 125. 

1 Ohio was an exception. The State Anti-Slavery Society deprecated the 
new policy as narrowing the anti-slavery platform with a new " test," yet 
itself straightway erected a similar test by declaring it the duty of all aboli 
tionists to abstain from slave produce (-Lib. 14:105). Commenting upon 
this, in the vein of the New York and Boston protestants, Edmund Quincy 
showed in the Standard the inconsistency of going before a court whose 
records were kept on cotton paper, or judge ate slave-grown sugar ; or of 
using cotton bank-notes, etc. (Lib. 14 : 121). 

2 " The adherents of Liberty Party," wrote Mr. Garrison to H. C. Wright 
(MS. Oct. 1, 1844), " in order to justify voting, are impudently claiming the 
U. S. Constitution is, and was intended to be, by those who originally 
framed and adopted it, [anti-slavery] ! Even Gerrit Smith has stultified 
himself so far as to have written a long letter to John G. Whittier, main 
taining the same absurd doctrine. Nay, he has gone so far as to eulogize 
those diabolical provisions respecting the prosecution of the slave-trade for 
twenty years the putting down of slave insurrections by the Govern 
ment the three-fifths representation of the slaves through their masters 
as decidedly anti-slavery in their character and tendency ! He is now com 
pletely absorbed in electioneering in behalf of James G. Birney and the 
Liberty Party, and has consequently gone backward since you left for 
England. ... I wish, if you get time, you would address a letter to him 
on his new political career, and his strange interpretation of the Consti 
tution, reminding him of the awful responsibility he is thus taking upon 
himself, and of the concessions he has made to you, on various occasions, 
respecting the divinity of non-resistance. In his letter to Whittier, he per 
severes in calling the American A. S. Society a Non-Resistance Society, 
because it will not support a pro-slavery Constitution ! " See Gerrit Smith s 
letter in Lib. 14:137. 

3 So J. M. McKim, in the Pennsylvania Freeman, argued justly that the 
pretence that the Constitution was anti-slavery was a tacit admission that, if 
it were pro-slavery, dissolution would be a duty (Lib. 14: 105). 



^T. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDEKS. 115 

ernor of Massachusetts his commission as justice of the CHAP. iv. 
peace, regretting he had ever taken the oath to support ^44. 
the Constitution of the United States involved in the 
office, and giving public notice that he would never obey 
the Constitutional provision for the return of fugitive 
slaves. 

" To me," concluded his letter, " it appears that the virus of Lib. 14:126. 
slavery, introduced into the Constitution of our body politic by 
a few slight punctures, has now so pervaded and poisoned the 
whole system of our National Government that literally there is 
no health in it. The only remedy that I can see for the disease 
is to be found in the dissolution of the patient. 

" The Constitution of the United States, both in theory and 
practice, is so utterly broken down by the influence and effects 
of slavery, so imbecile for the highest good of the nation, and 
so powerful for evil, that I can give no voluntary assistance in 
holding it up any longer. 

" Henceforth it is dead to me, and I to it. I withdraw all 
profession of allegiance to it, and all my voluntary efforts to 
sustain it. The burdens that it lays upon me, while it is held 
up by others, I shall endeavor to bear patiently, yet acting with 
reference to a higher law, and distinctly declaring that, while I 
retain my own liberty, I will be a party to no compact which 
helps to rob any other man of his." 

Mr. Jackson also edited, in the Liberator, the extracts #.14:145. 

148, 149. 
from the Madison Papers, and from the debates in the 

State Conventions called to adopt the Constitution, which 

made the pro-slavery nature of that compact too clear for 

serious discussion. Wendell Phillips, in the Standard, #.14:117, 

ably defended the non- voting theory. Mr. Garrison, on 

his part, met the current objections to disunion from the 

side of the Liberty Party, not without a manly disgust 

at the casuistry relied upon by his opponents, who (like 

Gerrit Smith) in one breath maintained that slavery had #. 14:137, 

no lodgment in the Constitution, and proposed to amend 

it into an anti-slavery document : 

"We have a very poor opinion of the intelligence of any #.14:103. 
man, and very great distrust of his candor or honesty, who 
tries to make it appear that no pro-slavery compromise was 



116 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [-ET. 39. 



CHAP. IV. made between the North and the South, at the adoption of the 
I{ j~ Constitution. We cherish feelings of profound contempt for 
that quibbling spirit of criticism, which is endeavoring to ex 
plain away the meaning of language the design of which as a 
matter of practice, and the adoption of which as a matter of 
bargain, were intelligently and clearly understood by the con 
tracting parties. The truth is, the misnamed Liberty Party 
is under the control of as ambitious, unprincipled, and crafty 
leaders as is either the Whig or Democratic Party; and no 
other proof of this assertion is needed than their unblushing 
denial of the great object of the national compact, namely, 
union at the sacrifice of the colored population of the United 
States. Their new interpretations of the Constitution are a bold 
rejection of the facts of history, and a gross insult to the intel- 

Lib. 16:42. ligence of the age, and certainly never can be carried into effect 
without dissolving the Union by provoking a civil war." l 

Ante, p. 93. While the more advanced Whigs were boldly invoking 

MS. Sept. disunion in case Texas were annexed, Joshua Leavitt, in 

D?c$Ud his "precious paper," the Boston Morning Chronicle (a 

ZiT* %? short-lived adjunct of the Emancipator), refused to pledge 

cf. 17 :i4. himself or the Liberty Party to any such course. As a 

politician who preferred the election of a Democratic 

Lib. 14:142. President on an annexation platform to that of a Whig, 

he argued that annexation would do nothing to perpet 

uate slavery. Whatever may be thought of this editor s 

perspicacity, his position was, morally, quite as defensible 

Ante, pp. 93, as that of Giddings, Slade, and the Adamses, or of Chan- 

ning, or again of the latter s Unitarian confrere, the Rev. 

Orville Dewey. This divine was at great pains to draw 

Lib. 14 : 162. what Mr. Garrison termed a profligate distinction between 

recognizing slavery as it already existed, and legalizing 

it anew by extension of the slave territory. 2 In other 

1 Let posterity decide how far the South was screwed up to the civil war 
by this Liberty, Free-Soil, and Republican Party playing fast and loose 
with the language of the Constitution covering who could tell what 
intentions against "the compact" when once in power on the innocent 
pretext of checking the further spread of slavery ? 

2 Compare, in another denomination, this extract from a Phi Beta Kappa 
Address at Wesleyan College in 1850, by the Rev. D. D. Whedon: "Nor 
may you marvel, friends, if I, who was once noted here as the apologist 
of slavery [in 1835, namely, when he composed " A Counter Appeal to the 



-ET. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDEKS. 117 

words, all these moralists of the forum and the pulpit CHAP. iv. 

whom conscience constrained to draw the line at Texas, j^. 

thereby gave their complete sanction to the act of their 

forefathers in striking the inhuman alliance between free 

and slave institutions, called the Federal Constitution. 

Mr. Garrison and his disunion associates, on the contrary, 

put themselves where any of the statesmen of 1787 might 

have stood, in implacable opposition to the sacrifice (for 

the sake of Union) of the blacks, and to the guarantee of 

a slaveholding political supremacy. The deed having been 

done, a new Revolution was called for; 1 and the only 

wonder is, not that Mr. Garrison was the first to proclaim 

it, but that he should have waited so long to perfect his 

doctrine of immediate emancipation, by coupling it with 

an equally immediate policy of withdrawal from all part 

and parcel in the support of a blood-stained Government. 

In the domain of individual conscience, the success of 
both the doctrine and the policy was instantaneous. 
Nothing more remained to extinguish absolutely the 
responsibility of the Garrison ian abolitionists for the 
enslavement of their countrymen. They alone of the 
entire population of the United States had washed their 
hands of slavery, historically and in time present j at 
the South or at the North ; in the area cursed by it when 
the Revolutionary fathers made their compact, or in any 
subsequent or possible extension of it; intrenched in State 
and local legislation, or in the Constitution of the United 
States. All other considerations yielded to this religious 
purification of themselves before their Creator. 

But anti-slavery disunion is seldom weighed in its 

Ministers and Members of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the New 
England and New Hampshire Conferences,"] can now present myself its 
stern assailant. For its existence I did, and would, apologize ; but never 
for its extension. I would deal gently with the hereditary sin of its being ; 
but I abhor the stupendous volitional crime of its propagandism " (Whe- 
don s Essays, Reviews, and Discourses. New York, 1887, 1 : 28). 

1 " You that prate of Disunion, do you not know that Disunion is Revo 
lution ? asks Mr. Webster. Yes, we do know it, and we are for a revolu 
tion a revolution in the character of the American Constitution " (Speech 
of Wendell Phillips at Faneuil Hall, Dec. 29, 1846. Lib. 17 : 7). 



118 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. |>T. 39. 

own scales. Critics who waive the sub-sacredness of the 
#.14:45. Constitutional obligations, binding "in honor and in 
justice/ 7 to use Webster s words, and tolerate the revo 
lutionary view in order to expose its impracticability, 
deny that the agitation for peaceful separation could ever 
have attained its object. This prophecy for it is nothing 
more neglects altogether the role of the South in the 
settlement of the question ; and it is certainly conceiv 
able that the spread of disinterested abolitionism at the 
North might have induced the slaveholding States to 
withdraw without violence. Be this as it may, there was 
but one of two ways to purge the North of its complicity 
with slavery either to dissolve the Union as Mr. Garrison 
proposed, or to eradicate the pro-slavery compromises 
from the Constitution. The impossibility of the latter 
course has been forever settled by the fact of the Rebel 
lion, which was kindled long before there was the remotest 
possibility of disturbing the status quo of 1787. Moreover, 
no party ever seriously aimed to undo the compromises, 
so that still we may ask for a more practical policy than 
Mr. Garrison s, which in fact had no rival, being root- 
and-branch as no other was. Half-way measures, like 
half-way principles and men, abounded, but all came to 
naught. 

Substituting hindsight for foresight, we can now see 
that there was, in the very nature of the Government, an 
irrepressible conflict, tending to produce either rupture or 
a homogeneous public sentiment with regard to slavery, 
whether for or against. To a rupture it was to come, 
and the Garrisonian abolitionists must have the credit, as 
practical men, of being the first to put themselves in line 
with the inevitable. It has absurdly been said, in depre 
ciation of them, that they wished the North to withdraw 
in peace, whereas the South made a bloody exit j as if 
such evidence of the nature of the partnership did not 
justify their prevision and their mode of avoiding all the 
cost and misery of the civil war. But indeed on this head 
they stand in the peculiar position of being charged, both 



2ET.39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDER. 119 

at the North and at the South, with having criminally CHAP. iv. 
brought on the war, while the Republican Party (as heir l ^ 4 
and assign of the Liberty and Free Soil parties) assumes 
all the credit of putting an end to slavery, by arms. The 
pertinent question is, Which of the political party policies 
from 1844 to 1860 triumphed ? And the answer must be, 
None ; while the Garrisonian ideal of immediate emanci 
pation through the overthrow of the pro-slavery com 
promises call it disunion or a reconstruction of the old 
Union was that in whose realization the nation now 
rejoices with thanksgiving. In the meantime, the unas 
sailable logic of the abolition position made Mr. Garri 
son s " No Union with Slaveholders ! " the criterion of 
every party professing opposition to slavery. In this 
respect its value cannot be over-estimated, while we know See the s. 
that, in the desperate counsels of the Slave Power, the "dinwe of 
hopes of peace through fresh compromises, to be extorted Secesswn > 
by the threat of forcible disunion, were dampened by the 
spectacle of this "saving remnant" of irreconcilables 
whose leader was Garrison, and whose organs the Lib 
erator and the Standard. 

For the moment the consolidation of the abolitionists 
as disunionists made little sensation. The country was 
absorbed in a more than usually exciting Presidential 
contest, in which a vote for James K. Polk was equivalent 
to instructions for the admission of Texas, a vote for 
Henry Clay was no obstacle to the same consummation, 
and a vote for Birney was virtually a vote for Polk. 
Everywhere at the North, Democratic legislators who 
had joined in unpartisan protests against annexation, ^.14:102. 
were unblushingly retracting them. The Democratic 
press of the New England and Middle States had as a 
body gone over to the Administration on the subject of Lib. 14:173. 
Texas. Polk had been nominated expressly to finish the Lib. 14:94. 
task begun by Tyler, and received the endorsement of 
South Carolina, whose delegates took no part in the Con 
vention in order to reserve liberty of action in case Van 
Buren (a nominal anti-annexationist) should be chosen. "* 73. 



120 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



39. 



Lib. 14 195. The Upshur-Calhoun treaty with Texas, lost in the Senate, 
was to be reinstated at the polls. The monster mass 
meetings of both parties, all over the country, absorbed 
public attention, and caused the Massachusetts abolition- 
igtg to curta ii t h e i r labors in the field till after the election. 
In New Hampshire it was otherwise, but there an obstacle 
was encountered domestic to the abolition ranks. 



MS. Sept. 

^QtmAto 

R. D. Webb. 



MS. 



F. Douglass, 
P. Pillsbury, 
S. S. Foster, 

John M. 

Spear, C. L. 

Remand, W. 

A. White. 

N.P. 
Rogers. 

Ante, p. 23. 



Lib. 14: 159. 



J. R. 

French. 



Ably Kelley to W. L. Garrison. 

FRANKLIN, N. H., Sept. 26, 1844. 

You may not be aware of the fact that we are trying to upturn 
some of the hard soil of New Hampshire. Douglass, Pillsbury, 
Foster, Spear, Jane E. Hitchcock of Oneida, N. Y., and myself 
are in the field, and Remond and, perhaps, White will soon be 
here. The State has been most wofully neglected for some two 
years past, and this, with no-organization, has well nigh hedged 
up our way to immediate great usefulness. Bro. Rogers gives 
no word of cheer, blows no bugle rallying- cry for the efforts 
now being put forth. He cannot, with his views of carrying 
forward reforms. He don t like this coming forth as agents 
from a Board or Executive Committee. He thinks it will do but 
little if any good. This I presume is his feeling from what I 
have heard him say. It is on this ground that I account for 
his silence when we are striving to move the State. One clear 
note from his shrill clarion would thrill the State ; but as he 
gives it not, will not you notice the fact that we are here, and 
by that means remind him that he is silent ? Perhaps you may 
awaken him to do some little word. 

All the agents, I believe, are in the employ of the American 
Society. The New Hampshire Board for there is one, though 
Rogers and French wish to wink it out of sight have entered 
into an arrangement with the Executive Committee to supply 
the largest possible amount of funds to sustain the agency while 
in this State. We hope to meet the entire expense, though we 
shall find it difficult, as some of those who have stood in the 
forefront of the battle, are in sympathy with Bro. Rogers on the 
question of organizations. And, again, this affair of the Herald 
is a most trying and soul- sickening affair. It has been a long 
time kept dark by the Board, in hopes that French might be 
brought to do the fair and manly thing ; but after a year s trial 



^T. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDEKS. 121 

and effort on the part of the Board, they felt that to keep dark CHAP. IV. 
any longer would be treachery to the cause. A full statement I jT. 
of facts will be made in next week s Herald. It will ruin French, 
and Rogers will in vain try to shield him. Rogers and French 
have thrown the utmost contempt on the Board, which is made 
up of some of the best souls in the State some of the ablest 
men that take an anti-slavery position here. They call it " Fos 
ter s Board " " Foster s Committee." The Board does thus and 
so " to gratify a whim of Foster s." 

I understand you are to be at the Portland Convention, and 
that Bro. Rogers is also to be there. Can you not bring him to 
his senses ? Your influence over him is greater than that of any 
other, I think, except J. R. French. Still, he might print the 
Herald if he had any manhood. Tis marvellous that Rogers 
can be so under his power. I knew nothing of this affair when 
I came into the State, and was astonished at the developments. 
I wish it could be reconciled even at this late hour. This can 
be done if French will fulfil his contract with the committee 
appointed by the Board to publish the paper, though it will be 
necessary to give a statement of facts. But no more of this. 
You cannot judge in the case till you shall see the report of 
the Board. But, I pray you, give us a lift up here in this granite 
field : tis terrible to cultivate. 

Mr. Garrison was already implicated in the painful con 
troversy between the New Hampshire Society and his dear 
friend Rogers, whose sensitive nature he understood but 
too well. He had, on occasion of French s stopping the 
Herald of Freedom, in June, without warning to the Lib. 14:106. 
Society of which it was at once the property and the organ, Lib. 14 : 198. 
urgently bespoken for it the needed support, praising with 
his customary heartiness Rogers s editorial ability, and #.14:106. 
was rejoiced to announce at the same time that the re 
sumption of publication was ensured. A few weeks later, 
however, he felt compelled to notice Rogers s extraor- #.14:118. 
dinary comments on a meeting of the New Hampshire 
Society, at which the regular choice of officers was com 
plained of by the "no-organization" editor as business 
interrupting the current of anti-slavery discussion. With 
brotherly frankness, Mr. Garrison showed the impropriety Lib. 14: 118. 
of opposition in the Society s own paper to the steps 



122 



WILLIAM LLOYD GABKISON. 



. 39. 



CHAP. IV. 
1844. 

Lib. 14 : 1 60. 



MS. Oct. 

3, 1844, 

Rogers to 

F. Jackson. 

Lib. 14 : 179. 



MS. Oct. 

30, 1844, 

Rogers to 

F. Jackson. 



Lib. 14:191. 
Lib. 14 : 1 86. 



necessary to its regular maintenance, and asked, " Shall 
we disband?" Rogers replied, but did not abate his 
doctrine in the Herald of Freedom, and, later, advocated 
direct contributions to anti-slavery agents, rather than 
through the general treasury. In a word, the divorce in 
sympathy and cooperation bet ween himself and the Board 
of Managers (his employers) as a Board was complete. 1 
Meantime, his prospective son-in-law, John E. French, 
had set up a baseless claim to the ownership of the Herald, 
which Rogers espoused, and, pending the Society s endeav 
ors to assert its rights and recover control of its organ, at 
about the date of Miss Kelley s private letter Rogers fell 
deathly ill. Mr. Garrison s promptly expressed condolence 
was accompanied by his first reference in the Liberator to 
the difference between the Society and its printer, who, he 
said, was bound to refute the facts which the Board of 
Managers, through S. S. Foster, had presented without as 
yet eliciting any denial. Rogers, already wounded by the 
strictures on his no-organization views, saw in this impar 
tial and forbearing expression " suspicions " concerning 
himself, and called them " the fatal shot in the side of our 
struggling bark." French, on his part, defying the Board, 
took his appeal to the Society at its meeting in the autumn. 



MS., rough 
draft. 



Francis Jackson to N. P. Rogers. 

BOSTON, Nov. 6, 1844. 

That Herald difficulty, I fear, adds to your trouble. It troubles 
me, too and it troubles all our friends round about. There 

l "Dear Rogers is still driving his inimitable pen with railway speed, 
though I think he occasionally runs off the track, and sometimes mistakes 
a molehill for a mountain. He now avows unmitigated hostility to every 
organized society, and regards a president or chairman as an embryo 
Caligula or Nero " (MS. Oct. 1, 1844, W. L. G. to H. C. Wright). " Honest 
Francis Jackson, presiding over an anti-slavery meeting, is transformed in 
his eyes into a truculent slaveholder, with a scourge in one hand and a 
branding-iron in the other. The Mass. A. S. Society looks to him like the 
despotism of Nicholas or Dr. Francia. The church and clergy even are 
allowed to rest in comparative quietness while he follows his crusade 
against chairmen, business committees, and societies " (MS. Sept. 22, 1844, 
E. Quincy to R. D. Webb). 



. 39.] 



NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDER. 



123 



1844. 



is, in consequence of that perplexing matter, a large company CHAP. IV. 

of " comers-out" upon the anxious seat, waiting, watching, and 

wishing it ended somehow or other. But you will doubtless 

ask me how? I cannot answer: I don t know the facts, nor 

have I light or time or opportunity to get them j and yet I am 

just reckless enough in the dark to advise you, who know all, 

to do what lieth in you to have this matter settled without 

delay, and before your convention meets on the 20th. You 

have made many and heavy sacrifices, and I cannot find it in 

me to ask you to add to that long catalogue, and I hope it may 

not be necessary. It may be you cannot control it, but I beg 

that all your influence be given to [that end] . 

I have urged our noble friend G. to go up [as] soon as possible, Garrison. 
and I hope he will, and so has Quincy, Phillips, Mrs. Chapman, 
and others, to see all, hear all, and, if it be possible, settle all. 
We all intend to go up to the convention this month, when I 
most sincerely trust you will be well, and the Herald difficulty 
settled. 



N. P. Rogers to W. L. Garrison. 

PLYMOUTH [N. H.], Nov. 19, 1844. 

DEAR GARRISON : The air here so tends to revive me, they 
will not consent I should return yet to Concord. I hope this 
will reach you in season to prevent your riding there in expec 
tation of meeting me. I wanted to see you much. Your article 
on the attack of Foster, dear G., will have the effect to terminate 
the publishing of the Herald of Freedom. Poor John has had his 
hands full to worry along with it thus far. This will cripple 
him. His supplies will cease, and the paper stop. I regret it 
less than I should once, so far as I am concerned. It will be a 
relief to him, but cruelly furnished. I am sorry it comes from 
your hand. You could not intend it. But I cannot remark 
upon it. I only write to apprise you of my not returning to 
Concord. I am still very ill, but able to go out. 

Your affectionate friend, 

N. P. ROGERS. 



MS. 



Ante, p. 122 



Edmund Quincij to R. D. Webb. 

DEDHAM, Dec. 14, 1844. 

You will receive by this packet the public accounts of the sad 
business of the Herald of Freedom, and of the strange conduct 



MS. 



124 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. 



Cf. ante, 
2 : 34 2 . 343- 



CHAP. IV. of our friend Eogers. . . . We have watched this business 
1844. from the beginning with deep interest and apprehension, but 
abstained from noticing it or in any wise interfering until it 
became absolutely unavoidable. There was an important anti- 
slavery instrumentality, of no great money value in the market, 
to be sure, but of inestimable value as a means of getting at 
people s minds, which had always, since it was first acquired 
by it, been regarded as the property of the New Hampshire A. 
S. Society. Its ownership had never been questioned, and its 
name was always borne upon its face. About five months 
since, the printer of the paper removes the name of the Society 
and substitutes his own, refusing to give any reason for it, 
and treating the Board of Managers with the most supercilious 
contempt. The Board considered itself, as it was, the official 
depositary of the Herald, to whose care it was committed by 
the Society, and they expostulate and demand a restoration of 
the property, or a satisfactory reason why it should not be 
returned. No notice is taken of them, and abuse upon abuse 
is heaped, by both editor and printer, upon the devoted head 
of Stephen Foster, who acted only at the request and by the 
direction of the Board. 

We waited patiently the issue. Rogers became nervous and 
ill, and the Board, with great forbearance, forbore any action 
for a long time, out of consideration to him. At last they made 
their official statement, sustained by evidence. French made 
no other reply than " I am sorry that Stephen Foster has come 
to this ! " The inference was unavoidable that he had no answer 
to make. We all felt that the time was come for us to express 
our sense of the matter, and accordingly Garrison in the Lib 
erator and I in the Standard very briefly and kindly stated how 

Lib. 14:186. the thing appeared to us. What I said seemed to give them 
special offence, though it would be hard to see anything in it, 

Lib. 14 : 186. in spirit or expression, different from what Garrison said. Then 
came the special meeting to which French had expressed his 
readiness to refer the whole matter, and by the decision of 
which he had promised to abide. 

In all this matter, Rogers was no further mixed up than in 
standing by French and abusing Foster without mercy and 
without reason, and at last telling French not to regard the 
decision of the meeting. Nothing had been said, either by G. 
or myself, about him. When we went to the meeting, it was 
with the earnest wish and desire to accommodate matters, and 
to keep Rogers editor and French printer of the paper. We 



Garrison. 



-ET. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 125 

did not think that objection could be [made] to our attending CHAP. IV. 
the meeting, as all abolitionists are always considered as mem- lg ^ 4 
bers of every A. S. Society whose meetings they will take the 
trouble to attend, and especially in New Hampshire, as Rogers 
had always disclaimed any territorial divisions of Abolition, 
and, no longer ago than when French stopped the paper last 
June, had declared that Anti-Slavery knows no State lines, 
" Anti- Slavery knows no New Hampshire ! " So to the meet 
ing we went, and the result you will find in the Standard and Lib. 14:195, 
Liberator. . . . 198-205. 

We went home in hopes that Rogers would advise French to 
agree to the fair offers of the Board, which were, to place the 
paper on the footing on which it was always understood by 
everybody to stand, until he removed the Society s name from 
the imprint i. e., Rogers to be editor, he to be printer, the 
Society to be owner; the object of maintaining the ownership 
by the Board being to retain in the hands of the abolitionists 
of the State the appointment of editor, in case of Rogers s 
death or resignation this being a responsibility not to be left 
in the hands of an irresponsible young man, even if they had 
better reason to think well of his judgment than they had. 
There was no disposition to control R. while he remained Rogers. 
editor. These hopes have been disappointed, but we are 
satisfied that we have done all that could be done for the 
amicable adjustment of affairs. . . . 

All our sympathies and affections were with Rogers. The 
N. H. Board we did not personally know. Foster, though we 
thought well of him as a faithful abolitionist, was no pet 
and darling as Rogers had ever been. All our prejudices and 
feelings were in Rogers s favor ; and yet, in looking into the 
matter, we could come to but one conclusion, that he and 
French were entirely wrong in this matter, and Foster and Lib. 14:195, 
the Board entirely right. If the statement of this opinion has 
alienated Rogers from us personally, and made him abandon 
the cause, sorry as we are for it we cannot help it, and could not 
have done otherwise, could we have foreseen the end from the 
beginning. It was truly the cutting off the right hand and 
plucking out the right eye. 

Garrison has behaved nobly in this whole transaction. 
Though Rogers was dearer to him than a brother, still he has Lib. 14 : 199. 
not flinched from doing what duty seemed to require of him, 
and he has certainly done it in the tenderest and most forbear 
ing manner. He has felt deeply Rogers s taunts of his (G. s) Lib. 14:191. 



126 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. 



1844. 
Rogers ; 
French. 



Rogers; 
French. 



CHAP. IV. scuttling the Herald, &c., when his only purpose was to preserve 
it from being scuttled. Indeed, such reproaches do not very 
well become either E. or F v who seem determined that the 
Herald shall stop if it be not in their hands. . . . Foster 
had an excellent plan which might have been carried into 
effect, had it not been for the explosion. It was, that Pillsbury 
should be Editor, and Rogers Corresponding Editor, to furnish 
just as much editorial as he pleased, while Pillsbury provided 
the rest of the matter. All that R. and F. say about this move 
ment being made by the N. H. Board, or encouraged by us, for 
the purpose of turning them out, is most preposterously un 
founded. No such idea was in anybody s mind any more than 
of ousting Garrison. 

So was the idea that we wanted to be rid of him on account 
of his No -Organization notions. So far was this from being the 
case that we had scarcely alluded to the subject in our papers, 
for fear of hurting Rogers s sensitiveness. In fact, we have 
always handled him like a cracked tea-cup. I have not men 
tioned his name in the Standard in connection with his follies 
on that head, although I made one impersonal kind of a reply 
to some of them. And Garrison has only spoken of them twice. 
Those articles, few as they were, were enough nearly to silence 
Rogers. He can stand no fight at all, with friends, that is. 
We knew that if we were obliged to come out and reply to his 
position, a broadside apiece would be enough to silence his bat 
teries ; only we put it off till the latest moment, because we 
knew how badly it would make him feel. His No- Organization- 
ism was the original cause of all this trouble, but originating 
from himself and not from us. It was a remark in one of Gar- 
Lib. 14:106. rison s articles on the inconsistence of Rogers s position as a 
deadly foe to organization, with his position as editor of the 
organ of an A. S. Society, which gave rise to it all. In the 
very next paper the flag of the Society was struck, and that of 
French run up in its stead. . . . 

There is a great similarity in R. s case and character with 
Mrs. s, if I had time to run the parallel. Rogers is essen 
tially feminine in his character and temperament, and these in 

exaggeration, as in Mrs. s case, become womanishness. 

They both required to be petted and caressed and kissed and 
sugar-plummed into being good. And as soon as there was 
anything that they falsely construed into neglect, or deservedly 
found to be blame, they fell into a huff, and wreaked their 
vexation on the cause. How different a character is Garrison ! 



. 39.] 



NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. 



127 



He takes blame and advice as kindly as he does panegyric, CHAP. IV. 
and, what is more, he profits by it. 1 X JT\ 

Postscript ~by Maria W. Chapman. 

"We expect Rogers to-day j he is to pass the week of the Fair 
among us all, and I hope we shall not lose him. We have all 
felt grief indeed, as you may suppose. I wish we had the means 
of sending him to England for health. Your kind sympathy in 
his best feelings, and forbearance with his incidental and con 
stitutional temporary sensitiveness, would be a cordial to him. 
I hope he will be able to receive ours, but as we are obliged by 
sense of duty to take sides against his recent course, we cannot 
do it so fully, I fear. We shall soon know, for to-day he comes. 



N". P. Rogers to Elizabeth Pease. 

Here a break-off again, and it is now Dec. 23, 1844, and I am 
at Francis Jackson s in Boston, just creeping up from a three- 
months sickness, with system irrecoverably broken up. Herald 
of Freedom stopped by the violence of Foster, one of my old 
coadjutors. He is backed up by Garrison himself, by Quincy, 
Mrs. Chapman, Wendell, and I don t know by whom else of 
those once my lovers. They know nothing about the merits of 
the case, which was merely this. Foster got a notion the pub 
lisher of the paper, John R. French, was receiving too many 
donations, and himself too few which [last was] true enough, 
though he was so rudely radical and so offensive nobody could 
fancy him enough to sustain him much. French was publish 
ing the paper nominally for the N. H. Society, but actually not. 
[He was] publishing it in fact dependent on donations and the 
subscribers to the paper. He was not, therefore, accountable 
to the Society, and the Society so consider it. But Foster got 
himself appointed, with some others of the same feeling towards 
the publisher, on the Society s Executive Committee. Most of 
the Society, by the way, do not vote, and did n t care to have 

1 With reference to Rogers s sensitiveness to criticism, Mr. Garrison 
wrote to R. D. Webb on Mar. 1, 1845: " Certainly, we ought to remember 
that, in every strife, there are blows to take as well as blows to give ; and 
we ought to receive them in good temper and with manly endurance. 
Especially should we receive with patience and kindness the admonitions 
of OUT friends, and love them all the more cordially for their rare fidelity ; 
for, alas ! how prone are friends to wink at each other s failings, under cir 
cumstances that require a prompt and frank rebuke ! " (MS.) 



MS. begun 
Apr. 4, 1844, 
in Concord, 
N. H., re 
sumed July 

25, and 
finished in 
Boston. 
Frag 
mentary. 
W. Phillips. 



S. S. Foster. 



128 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 

CHAP. IV. any such committee ; having come to the opinion that the 
movement went on best without. Foster then interferes with 
the publication, and the publisher felt insulted and was of 
fended, and a quarrel ensued. 

My part in it was to say to the Committee that they had no 
right to interfere, except as individuals, and no occasion, so far 
as I knew. They persisted. The Standard and Liberator friends 
became alarmed at my notions about organization, and espoused 
Foster s side of the small, local quarrel made it a great one 
and now it is all abroad, and you will have the pain and morti 
fication of hearing about it, and the enemies here and every 
where will rejoice. If I were well and disposed to quarrel, it 
might lead to a revolution in the movement here. But I am 
sick, and shall leave the friends to do me any injustice their 
position may lead them to. Their mistake is in maintaining, in 
their moral movement, the forms and usages and principles of 
politics! It will assuredly prostrate them, Garrison and all, if 
they do not forsake it. Garrison, I think, would, 2 but his city 
associates could not join him in it. I feel anxious that the 
friends abroad who have loved me should n t be misinformed 
and led to mistake my position. I wish, therefore, they would 
ask me to explain anything they may think needs it, in my do 
ings or the publishing of the Herald. I think we were both 
doing worthily and disinterestedly in endeavoring to keep it 
clear from the destructive control of the nominal Committee of 
the Society. 

Lib. 15 : 66, The British friends of the cause had no difficulty in 
arriving at a clear judgment of the issue raised in New 
Hampshire ; 3 but not so a portion of the abolitionists (in 

Lib. 14:207. Rhode Island particularly) whose personal attachment to 
Rogers was very warm. These not even the refusal of 

Lib. 14: 199. French to print in the Herald the overwhelmingly adverse 

1 Compare Rogers s resolution at the annual meeting of the Mass. A. S. 
Society in January, 1844: "No military, judicial, legislative, political, or 
other brute-force instrumentality can rightfully be resorted to in the ac 
complishment of the anti-slavery enterprise " (Lib. 14 : 19). 

2 A purely gratuitous assumption. 

3 " We were much pleased to find," wrote Quincy to R. D. Webb, on Jan. 
30, 1845, " that you agreed so entirely with us about the Rogers business. 
Your idea of French and his having behaved like spoiled children is exactly 
correct " (MS.). Webb, the writer goes on to note, had formed his opinion 
from the printed controversy before Quincy s private version reached him. 
Of. Lib. 17 : 1. 



-T. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDEES. 129 

decision of the Society, nor his abrupt discontinuance of Lib. 14:199. 
the paper and refusal to surrender the subscription lists, 
following Leavitt s Emancipator example, could disen 
chant. A new schism resulted, of limited extent though 
marked by bitter feeling, and was fostered by the New- 
Organization and Liberty-Party spirit, ever intent on Lib. 15:55, 
profiting by dissensions in the abolition ranks. Further 7 ?8 
details of the controversy belong to a history of the anti- 
slavery movement. Mr. Garrison s connection with it, as 
shown above, cost him not only his standing in Rogers s 
disordered estimation, but a fresh measure of abuse from 
the latter s sympathizers and abettors. 

Hard enough was the office task of the editor of the 
Liberator in this crowded year 1844, when the press of Lib. 14:207. 
matter claiming admission to his columns was full beyond 
precedent. The disunion campaign ; the hot Presidential 
canvass, ending in the election of Polk and the national Lib. 14:183. 
confirmation of Tyler s Texan policy ; Tyler s extraordi- Li ^ . 8 
nary appeal from the Senate, rejecting his treaty, to the I02 - 
House, for which John Quincy Adams would have had Lib. 14:98. 
him impeached, as endeavoring to declare a foreign war 
without the consent of the Senate ; Tyler s message at the Lib. 14:197. 
next session, pointing to the plebiscit in his favor, and 
urging an act of annexation j McDuffie s resolution to this Lib 14:202. 
end all this was but a part of what our chronicler of 
the time had to record as fully as possible, let alone the 
voluminous documents in the Rogers affair. The year 
opened with Congressional debates over the Massachu 
setts resolves in favor of abrogating the three-fifths slave- Ante, pp. 92, 
representation clause in the Federal Constitution a 
premium, as Charles Francis Adams rightly affirmed, on Lib. 14:37. 
the perpetuation of slavery, and, as the elder Adams and 
Giddings showed (in a minority report on the resolves), Lib. 14.69. 
the foundation of a privileged order of citizens, a slave- 
holding oligarchy, tending infallibly to absorb the leading 
offices of the Government as well as of the Slave States. 
By votes of 121 to 18 and 127 to 41 the House adopted Lib. 14:51. 
Dromgoole s resolutions declaring the three-fifths com- 
VOL. III. 9 



130 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [^T. 39. 

CHAP. iv. promise sacred, and its abolition not to be entertained. 
I8 ^ 4> This irrefragable argument for disunion demonstrated 
Lib. 14:9, likewise the essential barrenness of the final victory of 
[9> i 3 98. 39> Mr. Adams s contention for the rescinding of the gag-rule 
against anti-slavery petitions to which South Carolina 
Lib. 14:206. responded that if Congress should next attempt anti- 
slavery legislation, the Federal compact would be at an 
end. 

She was already proving it at an end, as far as Northern 

#.14:202; rights were concerned. The State of Massachusetts had 

15:71 26 - 27t sent one of its most respectable citizens, Samuel Hoar of 

Concord, a lawyer and ex-Congressman, to Charleston, to 

Lib. 15:7; test in the Federal courts the validity of the South Caro- 

ante,p. 92. ^^ lftw of D ecem ^ er 19^ ig35 ? providing for the jailing 

of colored seamen arriving at her ports. The transmis 
sion of Mr. Hoar s credentials by the Governor of South 

Lib. 14:198, Carolina to the State Legislature produced, in the Senate, 
resolutions pronouncing the mission a gross insult, and 
promising resistance to an adverse decision of the Federal 
courts. The press reverberated with like menaces, in- 

Lib. 14 : 198. timating that South Carolina would anticipate a conflict 
with the United States by making one directly with Mas 
sachusetts "the Fort Moultrie State" against "the 
Bunker Hill State." Calhoun s organ, the South Carolin 
ian, hoped no lawyer would take a fee from Mr. Hoar. 

Lib. 14:202. Both branches of the Legislature called upon the Governor 

Lib. 14:202. to expel him ; and, this patriotic duty having been begun 

Lib. 15:9. by his hotel-keeper, nothing remained for Mr. Hoar but to 

flee the State, which he did, under escort the company 

of his daughter more than the gray hairs of this man of 

sixty-six insuring him from summary violence. " I am 

MS. Dec. in hopes," wrote Edmund Quincy to Richard Webb, " that 

14, 1844. Massachusetts will at last be kicked into some degree of 

spirit. I don t know that anything is left for her but 

reprisals. 1 But slavery has n t left her pluck enough for 

that, I fancy " the melancholy truth. 

1 Mr. Hoar himself, in a letter on the Latimer case in 1842 (ante, p. 66), 
referred to the law of Louisiana ordering the arrest of any colored man 



-ET. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDER. 131 

Other Massachusetts citizens were equally in need and 
equally devoid of protection at this moment. There was Lib. 14:147- 
honest Jonathan "Walker of Harwich, sea-captain, caught 
in July, 1844, by the U. S. steamer General Taylor, with Lib. 14:127, 
sundry slaves aboard as voluntary passengers from the ^ .^^g! 
Federal Territory of Florida to the Bahama Islands ; taken 
back in irons to Pensacola and there jailed, chained to a 
ringbolt for fifteen days ; afterwards put in the pillory for 
an hour, and pelted with rotten eggs j finally, by order 
of a Federal court, branded on the right hand with "S. Lib. 15 = 115, 
S." for slave-stealer lucky to escape at length with his 
life. There was also the Rev. Charles T. Torrey, who, two 
years before, being a newspaper correspondent in Wash 
ington, had exercised his Constitutional right to visit 
Annapolis to report a slaveholders convention, was recog- Jan. 12, 
nized, nearly lynched, and, upon his room at the tavern ufeof*Tor- 
being searched, arrested for his temporary security, but 7or^t2?~ 
on trial was released on bail. This treatment led him to I2 : 10 - X 4- 
engage in several hazardous attempts to run slaves off 
from the border States, and in June, 1844, he was again LifeofTor- 
in a Maryland jail this time in Baltimore on a charge iS .^-.ia}, 
that shut out every prospect of local mercy or Federal 
intervention. 

Mr. Garrison, on the happening of this fatal misfortune 
to his old enemy, banished all resentment, remembering 
those in bonds as bound with them all the more because 
the same prison had once held himself. He professed his Ante, i : 174. 
readiness "to espouse his [Torrey s] cause as though he Lib. 14:119. 
were my bosom friend," helping pecuniarily with his mite, 
and by arousing public sympathy and indignation. He tf. 14:126. 

entering the State from another State, and asked, why, then, might not 
every free State imprison every incoming native of a slaveholding State 
(Lib. 12 : 177). He reached Charleston on Nov. 28, 1844 ; his colleague, 
Henry Hubbard of Pittsfleld, Mass., delegated to Louisiana, arrived in 
New Orleans Dec. 1, and was likewise expelled, but less fiercely (Smith s 
History of Pittsfield, p. 405 ; and Lib. 15 : 2, 9, 14, 17, 25). See the law 
enacted by the South Carolina Legislature to prevent the recurrence of like 
missions : An Act to provide for the punishment of persons disturbing the 
peace of this State, in relation to slaves and free persons of color " (Lib. 
15 : 14 ; 18 : 65), and a similar one by Louisiana (Lib. 15 : 17, 25). 



132 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. 

CHAP. iv. was as good as his word. On August 19, 1844, Torrey 
1844. wrote from Baltimore jail to Elias Smith, 1 saying, " To 

#.14:147. Mr. Garrison, personally, I feel greatly indebted for the 
magnanimous part he has taken " ; and on November 29 
to J. Miller MeKim of Philadelphia, the medium of gifts 
in money from the colored and white people of that 
vicinity : 

MS. Nov. " I have been thinking, all summer, of addressing Garrison 
29, 1844. a i on g letter for the Press, and I communicated my intention 
to our Boston friends. They urged, that I might revive old 
sores, now healed ; that my private intercourse might do all the 
good such a letter could ; and that, in prison, I ought not to risk 
the recurrence of unpleasant feelings among my friends, of 
either the * Old or New organizations, some of whom, on 
both sides, would needs be offended by the views of one who 
told both plainly their faults faults that pride, still, might make 
a few leaders loath to acknowledge. 2 And then, as my views 
Ante, 2: 31%. on the confounded woman question are materially modified, 
so far as it is connected with our cause, I might hurt the feelings 
of my personal friends. These ideas made me delay. Then 
came my two months prostrating sickness, and now, my trial, 
in which I suppose you and all my kind friends in Philadelphia 
feel a deep interest." 

1 A former Methodist minister, at this time an anti-slavery lecturer, and 
very intimate with Mr. Garrison, to whom he wrote from Galveston, Texas, 
July 13, 1866, apropos of the fund then being raised for the latter s support : 
" My dear old friend, I have nothing to give, but I have the memory of 
obligations for kindnesses received at your hands which, if I had thousands, 
I could scarcely repay. When an exile from my home, more than twenty- 
three years ago, and living temporarily in Cambridgeport, you were a friend 
and brother most precious. You sympathized in my misfortunes and 
poverty ; and, later, in Boston, you sheltered my little family in your own 
house, while I struggled, as I never did before, to find them bread. You 
shared with us your own bounty, and your excellent and noble wife was a 
companion and friend to mine. Your patience and kindness to all who 
sought your door for relief your open-handed, large-hearted charity 
your gentleness in the family, and your cheerful song as you came in and 
went out before us, are, and ever will remain, green in my memory. Alas ! 
how little the world knew of the heart of that man whom they reviled as the 
offscourings of all things ! " (MS. ) 

2 Compare the letter to Elias Smith cited above. Torrey was well-advised, 
considering how far his old associates lagged behind the Garrisonian aboli 
tionists in exciting public sympathy on his behalf, or in turning his case to 
anti-slavery account (Lib. 14: 147). 



JEr. 39.] NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDEKS. 133 

Mr. Garrison s activity as a speaker, from Maine to CHAP. iv. 
Pennsylvania, was very great in the year under review, I ^ 4- 
until the trouble in his side compelled him to withdraw #.14:170; 
temporarily from the lecture field. As usual, slavery was It ig^f 
not his sole topic, but, as occasion offered, he gave addresses ^jj ? 
on Peace, Worship, the Church, the Ministry, the Sabbath, Wright. 
the Condition and the Rights of Woman. He took part 
in the Sunday lectures at Amory Hall, Boston, which Lib. 14:19, 
were a sort of adjourned Chardon-Street Convention, hav 
ing among his colleagues E. W. Emerson, 1 Adin Ballou, 
Charles A. Dana, and Mrs. Ernestine L. Rose. He spoke 
with Wendell Phillips before a legislative committee at Lib. 14:23. 
the State House in favor of the abolition of the death 
penalty, and again at a special meeting in Boston in Lib. 15:3. 
December. He was cheered by the memorable split in Lib. 14 : 58, 
the Methodist denomination, on the question of episcopal 9 i2s, 4 i34 3 
slaveholding, when, in the language of Governor Ham- J - ^ ^ d am ~ 
mond of South Carolina, the "patriotic Methodists of the Lib. 14:201. 
South dissolved all connection with their brethren of the 
North" a foreshadowing of the greater disunion in store 
for the two sections. 

Towards the close of the year, the Garrison family was 
blessed with a girl, 2 much longed for by her parents. 

1 This year witnessed a closer connection than hitherto between Emerson 
and the abolitionists. We read in Cabot s Memoirs of him (2 : 430) the fol 
lowing extract from his Journal for 1844: " The haters of Garrison have 
lived to rejoice in that grand world movement which, every age or two, 
casts out so masterly an agent for good. I cannot speak of that gentleman 
without respect. I found him the other day in his dingy office." To which 
his editor adds : " He went to Garrison s office, perhaps, to concert for a 
meeting which the abolitionists held in the Concord Court-house on the 1st 
of August in this year (1844) to celebrate the anniversary of the liberation 
of the slaves in the British West Indies. Emerson delivered the address." 
See Lib. 14 : 127, 129, 146. No church was to be had for this humane service. 

2 Helen Frances Garrison, born Dec. 16, 1844, and named for her mother 
and paternal grandmother. "You know they have a little daughter," 
wrote Ann Phillips to Elizabeth Pease. " Garrison is tickled to death with 
it " (MS. Jan. (?), 1845). " We shall demand for her the rights of a human 
being, though she be a female," wrote the happy father to Mrs. Louisa 
Loring (MS. Jan. 11, 1845). 



CHAPTER V. 
TEXAS. 1845. 

FORMAL assent to the Disunion doctrine was given, 
with a will, by the Massachusetts An ti- Slavery 
Jan. 24-26, Society at its annual meeting in January, 1845. As a 
l845 consequence of this action, Ellis Gray Loring resigned 
his place on the Board of Officers. "Poor Garrison," 
Lib. 15:19. exulted the Boston Post, "who appears to be broken 
down, mentally and physically, has taken such a rabid 
course that he is driving from him some of those who 
have heretofore been his most active supporters." Mr. 
Loring hastened to notify this Democratic sheet that the 
alienation was not personal : 

Lib. 15 : 19. " Not concurring in the disunion doctrines adopted by the 
Society, I thought I should misrepresent it by remaining an 
officer; but it is painful to me to have it intimated that an 
honest difference on a single point of duty could drive Mr. 
Garrison and me asunder. On other points we cooperate ; and 
never, during the fourteen years in which I have been honored 
by his friendship, have I felt for him a deeper attachment and 
respect. 1 I cannot accept even an implied compliment at the 
expense of one whose past services and present value to the 
cause of human freedom I feel to be unequalled." 

Elsewhere, the Liberator s cry, "No Union with Slave 
holders ! " (now printed weekly at the head of the paper) 
was caught up and re-echoed in the abolition ranks by 
Feb. 5-7, the Western New York Anti-Slavery Society, in Febru- 
1 15:33 ar y ky a vast majority of the Eastern Pennsylvania 

1 On Jan. 11. Mr. Garrison acknowledged a New Year s gift of twenty 
dollars from Mrs. .Loring, renewing one of the year before (MS.). 

131 



-Ex. 40.] TEXAS. 135 

Anti-Slavery Society at Kennett, in August. In Ohio, the Aug. 11-13 ; 
Anti-Slavery Bugle was founded as the disunion organ of J * *^, I3: 
the Ohio American Anti-Slavery Society. Lit. 15:109. 

The levers of disunion ready to the hands of the Massa 
chusetts abolitionists were the recent expulsions of the Ante, pp. 
State s delegates from South Carolina and Louisiana, 
and the impending annexation of Texas. At the annual 
meeting just referred to, Wendell Phillips reported re- Lib. 15:19. 
solves that the Governor should demand of the Federal 
Executive an enforcement of the Constitution, and the 
maintenance of Mr. Hoar s right to reside in Charleston j 
in default of which the Legislature should authorize the 
Governor to proclaim the Union at an end, recall the Con 
gressional delegation, and provide for the State s foreign 
relations. This was the logic of the situation. So far as 
Massachusetts (or any free State) was concerned, South 
Carolina had dissolved the Union : Federal rights were 
disregarded in her borders, the Federal laws were subor 
dinate or inoperative, Federal protection could have been 
exercised only by force and at the cost of a civil war. 
There could be no better occasion for weighing the value 
of the Union, or for taking the initiative in peaceable 
separation as advocated by the abolitionists. But no 
other class or party in the State was equal to this simple 
and manly procedure. Governor Briggs s messages in Lib. 13:7, 
regard to Messrs. Hoar and Hubbard were unexception 
able in tone and temper, rhetorically considered ; but they 
meant nothing and could effect nothing, since disunion 
was the only remedy. The Legislature did, indeed, pass 
the equally unexceptionable joint resolves prepared by Lib. 15:25. 
Charles Francis Adams, suggesting retaliation with refer 
ence to South Carolina ; but no enactment followed, nor, 
notoriously, could any such have been sustained in the 
Federal courts. 

The same paralysis befell \\\Q political opposition to the 
annexation of Texas. Governor and Legislature pledged Lib. 15 : 6, 
Massachusetts anew to the position that annexation would 26> 3I< 
have no binding force on her. But how would it have no 



136 WILLIAM LLOYD GABKISON. [^T. 40. 

CHAP. v. binding force? Texas once in the Union, would laws 

1845. passed by the aid of her representatives be resisted ? No 

one not an abolitionist ever advocated any measure of 

irreconcilability so to call it except Henry Wilson 

Wilsons in the Massachusetts Senate. His proposal, to "provide 

Fail of slave by law that the moment a man held as a slave in Texas 



b. stepped upon the soil of Massachusetts, his liberty should 
15:39. 77- be as sacred as his life," and to "make it a high crime to 
molest him," fell dead, and was, in fact, though well 
meant, absurd, either as a practicable mode of opposition 
or as a quid pro quo, even supposing the whole North to 
have taken this stand along with Massachusetts. The 
truth was, slavery was dragging the country down an 
inclined plane, and there was no escape but by cutting 
the rope that bound the North to the South. The 
impracticable politicians of all parties, therefore, who 
struggled against the inevitable, while refusing to look 
facts in the face, filled the year at which we have now 
arrived with the emptiest of empty words. 

Lib. 15 : is. On January 29, an Anti-Texas Convention was held in 
Faneuil Hall. 1 Edmund Quincy, writing the next day to 
Richard Webb, said of it : 

MS. Jan. " It was called by political gentlemen, mostly Whigs, not by 

30, 1845. abolitionists. It was very fully attended, and the galleries were 

Lib. 15 : 23. crowded. Garrison was made a delegate from his ward by the 

w. Phillips, influence of F. Jackson. Phillips could not be elected, to our 

Lib. 15:22. great grief. The Convention only put forth an Address, pro 

testing against annexation, and appointed a Committee of 

Correspondence j on the ground that they would not suppose 

i"Mr. Webster united in the Convention," and "consulted with and 
assisted Stephen C. Phillips, Charles Allen, and Charles Francis Adams, in 
preparing the Address of the Convention an address filled with noble 
sentiments of hostility to slavery domination" (Henry Wilson in the 
Massachusetts Senate, 1852; Lib. 22:41). "I remember that when, in 
1845, the present leaders of the Free Soil Party, with Daniel Webster in 
their company, met to draw up the Anti-Texas Address of the Massachu 
setts Convention, they sent to abolitionists for anti-slavery facts and 
history, for the remarkable testimonies of our Revolutionary great men 
which they wished to quote " (Wendell Phillips, speech before the Mass. 
A. S. Society, Jan-. 27, 1853 ; Lib. 23 : 26). See Chas. Sumner s Life, 2 : 331. 



40.] 



TEXAS. 



137 



the possibility of annexation until it was done, and that then CHAP. V. 
would be soon enough to take further measures. If they do ^ 
this, it will be well j if not, the Convention will be a farce. 

" The anti-slavery spirit of the Convention was surprising. 
The Address and the speeches of the gentlemen, not abolition 
ists, were such as caused Garrison to be mobbed ten years ago, 
and such as we thought thorough three or four years ago. There 
were no qualifications, or excuses, or twaddle. What it is a sign 
of, I don t know, but it must be of good in some way. I send 
you a paper or two containing the account of the Convention. 
Garrison was received with more enthusiasm than any man, on 
his first appearance, and carried the house with him while he 
spoke, though they would not accept his proposition." 



MS. Feb. 
24, 1845. 



So Wendell Phillips, writing to Elizabeth Pease : 

" Well, Texas, you 11 see, is coming in. We always said it 
would, and were laughed at. Garrison grew popular and was 
chosen a delegate to the Convention here, quite unanimously 
in his ward made a great speech created the most stir in 
the whole matter was rapturously applauded. The fact is, 
there were many abolitionists in the body, and when men get 
together, however little they may desire to act themselves, they 
do relish strong talk. 1 

So Charles Sumner, writing to Judge Story : 

" The debates in the Convention were most interesting. I 
never heard Garrison before. He spoke with natural eloquence. 
Hillard spoke exquisitely. His words descended in a golden 
shower j but Garrison s fell in fiery rain. It seemed doubtful, 
at one time, if the abolitionists would not succeed in carrying 
the Convention. Their proposals were voted down ; though a 
very respectable number of the Convention were in favor of a 
dissolution of the Union in the event of the annexation of 
Texas." 

Mr. Garrison s share in the proceedings was effective in 
two particulars. He secured for the Convention a chance 
to criticise the address before it was issued, and he had 
the Committee of Correspondence enlarged so as to include 
members of, the Democratic Party. His speech, delivered 
in the evening, was to second a motion made in the after- Lib. 15:18. 
noon by the Eev. Joseph C. Lovejoy of Cambridge (a 



Feb. 5, 1845. 

Life of 
Sumner, 
2:331. 
G. S. Hil 
lard. 



138 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. {^T. 40. 

CHAP. v. brother of the martyr), of this tenor : that the threatened 
18^5. extension of the area of slavery would release the North 
from all obligations to that piratical institution, whether 
to return fugitive slaves or to suppress insurrections. He 
was received, on rising, with " deafening cheers," and 
offered an additional resolution, in these words : 

Lib. 15:18. " That, in view of the fact that two branches of the Govern 
ment have already declared their wish and concurrence in the 
project of annexation, we deem it our duty distinctly to declare 
what ought to be, and what we have faith to believe will be, the 
course of Massachusetts, should the infamous plan be consum 
mated. Deeming the act utterly unconstitutional and void, we 
declare that the people of this Commonwealth will never submit 
to it as the law of the land, but look upon the Union as dis 
solved, and proceed to form a new government for herself and 
such of the free States as will aid her in carrying out the great 
purposes of our fathers in behalf of civil liberty. And we call 
upon the several towns of the Commonwealth, whenever the 
President shall announce that Texas is annexed to this Union, 
immediately to assemble and choose delegates for a second 
session of this Convention, which shall take measures for the 
formation of a new Union with such States as do not tolerate 
domestic slavery the Union of 1789 having then ceased to 
exist." 

The mover sustained this resolution with unpremedi- 

Lib. 15:23. tateu remarks which the daily press pronounced treason 
able. He recalled a similar convention on the admission 
of Missouri, whose protest was embodied by Webster in 
an address. " That movement ended in words, words. Did 
they mean," asked Mr. Garrison, " to act that farce over 
again?" Charles Francis Adams objected to jeoparding 
united action by any such radical proposition, and both 

#.15:18. the Lovejoy and Garrison resolutions were laid on the 
table. 

Months passed, during which inaction on the part of the 

Lib. 15 : 82. North paved the way to the catastrophe, and sapped the 
courage of the resistants the political and " practical " 
resistants. William H. Seward, in a public letter to Salmon 

#.15:113. P. Chase, submitted in advance to the inevitable annex- 



-3ET. 40.] TEXAS. 139 

ation of Texas, repudiating disunion. His counter measure CHAP. v. 
was to enlarge the area of freedom as if the South did x ^ 
not provide for that by coupling the admission of a slave 
State with that of a free State. Already, in February, 
Florida had been thus admitted into the Union, paired with Lib. 15 : 34, 
Iowa, in spite of the intense Northern feeling against 
more slave States aroused in the case of Texas ; in spite, 
too, of the Florida Constitution making slavery perpetual, Lib. 15 : 39. 
and authorizing the Legislature to forbid the landing of Lib. 15 : 54. 
any colored seaman the toleration of which by Congress 
was a virtual approval of the action of South Carolina 
towards Mr. Hoar. Yet still Mr. Seward contended 
" We must resist unceasingly the admission of slave Lib. 15:113. 
States, and demand the abolition of slavery in the District 
of Columbia " ; and he even dreamed, when one indepen 
dent Congress had been elected, that the " internal slave- 
trade may be subjected to inquiry. Amendments to the 
Constitution will be initiated." Robert C. Winthrop made 
his surrender on the Fourth of July, and in Faneuil Hall, 
toasting, in famous words, " Our country . . . how- #.15:118. 
ever bounded ; ... to be cherished in all our hearts, 
to be defended by all our hands" an abasement which 
accepted war with Mexico, along with that spread of slave 
territory which he had hitherto strenuously opposed^ In 
the same hall of heroic memories the Whig State Conven 
tion in October withdrew from the opposition, and left Lib 15:162, 
the Constitutional question to the Supreme Court of the 
United States ! Governor Slade of Vermont could no 
longer urge his State to take, unsupported, an unrelent 
ing attitude, and sought comfort in the illusion that Lib. 15 : 170. 
the entrance of Texas into the Union would make slav 
ery a national institution as never before, and expose it 
to attack as such. Webster, accusing the Liberty Party Lib. 15:182. 
(by its defeat of Clay) of having procured annexation, 
hoped, or professed to hope, the consummation might 
yet be averted; as Charles Francis Adams, seeing noth- #.15:185; 
ing further left, and disregarding the example of Florida, ^ 2 
vainly looked for some modification of the pro- slavery 



140 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [^T. 40. 



CHAP. v. Constitution of Texas. Abbott Lawrence and Nathan 
I 8^ s . Appleton, ex-members of Congress, not only desisted 

from opposition 1 to a deed actually accomplished, but 
Lib. 15:194. rebuked those of their colleagues whose conscience and 

zeal outran their discretion as " practical men." 
Lib. 15:146; Meantime in Massachusetts a mass meeting for Middle* 
i845 22 sex County had been called at Concord to consider the 

encroachments of the Slave Power. Hardly a Liberty 
Lib. 15 : 154. Party man was present, but Mr. Garrison again endeav 

ored to inspire his Whig political associates with his 

doctrine of action to proceed as if they meant it when 

they declared the admission of Texas would be the disso 

lution of the Union : 

Lib, 15:158. " Sir," he said, " I know how nearly alone we shall be. An 
overwhelming majority of the whole people are prepared to en 
dorse this horrible deed of Texan annexation. The hearts of 
the few who hate it are giving way in despair ; the majority 
have got the mastery. Shall we therefore retreat, acknowledge 
ourselves conquered, and fall into the ranks of the victors ? 
Shall we agree that it is idle, insane, to contend for the right 
any longer ? 

" Sir, I dreaded, almost, when I heard this Convention called. 
I will be frank with you. I am afraid you are not ready to do 
your duty ; and if not, you will be made a laughing-stock by 
tyrants and their tools ; and it ought to be so. 

" I have nothing to say, Sir nothing. I am tired of words 
tired of hearing strong things said, where there is no heart to 
carry them out. When we are prepared to state the whole truth, 
and die for it, if necessary when, like our fathers, we are pre 
pared to take our ground, and not shrink from it, counting not 
our lives dear unto us when we are prepared to let all earthly 
hopes go by the board then let us say so ; till then, the less 
we say, the better, in such, an emergency as this. 



March 25, 1837, Mr. Lawrence wrote to his constituents: "The 
independence of this infant nation [Texas] has already been recognized by 
our Government. The next movement of the friends of Texas will be its 
annexation to the United States. . . . Should their object be attained, 
where will be the patronage and Executive power of the Government? 
Will it not be gone, forever departed, from the free States ? Let us main 
tain the Constitution in letter and spirit as we received it from our fathers, 
and resist every attempt at the acquisition of territory to be inhabited by 
slaves" (Hill s Me.moir of Abbott Lawrence, p. 21). 



-ET. 40.] TEXAS. 141 

* t But who are we, will men ask, that talk of such things? CHAP. V. 
Are we enough to make a revolution ? No, Sir j but we are I ^ s< 
enough to begin one, and, once begun, it never can be turned 
back. I am for revolution, were I utterly alone. I am there 
because I must be there. I must cleave to the right. I cannot 
choose but obey the voice of God. Now, there are but few who 
do not cling to their agreement with hell, and obey the voice of 
the devil. But soon the number who shall resist will be multi 
tudinous as the stars of heaven. 

" In the beginning, what a gross absurdity did our fathers 
exhibit! trying to do what is not in the power of God to 
reconcile the irreconcilable to make Slavery and Freedom 
mingle and cohere! It can never be. Look at the lover of 
freedom and the advocate of slavery, the slaveholder and the 
abolitionist, at this day. Do they acknowledge the same God ? 
Do they worship at the same shrine ? A government composed 
of both is impossible ; and he who would pass for a lover of 
freedom, should have found it out. Do not tell me of our past 
union, and for how many years we have been one. We were 
only one while we were ready to hunt, shoot down, and deliver 
up the slave, and allow the Slave Power to form an oligarchy 
on the floor of Congress ! The moment we say no to this, the 
Union ceases the Government falls. 

" The question now is, Shall there longer remain any freemen 
in this country ? for, of course, if we continue with the South, 
standing with her and by her, in her aggressions upon Mexico ; 
if we see her taking foreign territory to herself, and yet aid her 
in retaining it ; we are as bad as she betrayers of our sacred 
trust of freedom, and forgers of our own chains. 

" I thank God that, as has been stated by you, Sir, we stand 
on common ground here to-day. I pray God that party and 
sect may not be remembered. I trust the only question we 
shall feel like asking each other is, Are we prepared to stand 
by the cause of God and Liberty, and to have NO UNION WITH 

SLAVEHOLDERS ? " 

The meeting was adjourned to Cambridge, where it Oct. 7. 
attracted a small popular attendance, and again adjourned Lib. 15: 163. 
till October 21. Mr. Garrison spoke on both occasions, Lib. 15 : 163, 
and on the latter the following resolution, of his moving, 
was adopted: 

" That should the perfidious and illegal act of Texan annex- Lib. 15:174. 
ation be consummated at the next session of Congress, it will 



142 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. [^T. 40. 

CHAP. V. be the constitutional duty of the Legislature of Massachusetts 
j^"- promptly to declare, in the name of the people, that such act is 
null and void, and can never receive their sanction, be the con 
sequences what they may." 

Lib. 15:177. Mr. C. F. Adams again objected to such an affirmation 
on the part of the meeting, because it could not unite all, 
though the resolution merely echoed his own utterances 
in the Legislature, and that body s agreement with him. 
He confessed sadly to have learned that the people at 
large were not behind him, that they were divided, and 
that a low tone must be adopted towards them. In other 
words, a right public sentiment had to be created, and to 
that end Wendell Phillips, while approving his friend s 
resolution, at the same time urged that a committee be 

Lib. 15:177. formed. "As to disunion, 7 * he remarked, "it must and 
will come. Calhoun wants it at one end of the Union 
Garrison wants it at the other. It is written in the coun 
sels of God. Meantime, let all classes and orders and 
interests unite in using the present hour to prevent the 
consummation of this annexation of Texas." 

Lib. 15 : 178. A State Anti-Texas Committee resulted from a mass 
meeting held in Faneuil Hall on November 4, with Charles 
Francis Adams in the chair ; the stirring resolutions being 
offered by John G. Palfrey, the Massachusetts Secretary 
of State. At the head of this committee stood Mr. Adams, 
and Mr. Garrison was among Ms colleagues, consenting 

Lib. 16: 19. " to become a member of the Committee as an experiment, 
and to help more clearly to demonstrate the futility of any 
and every attempt to assail slavery in its incidents and 
details. The SLAVE POWER must be attacked and 
vanquished openly, as such, and no quarter given to it 
either in the gross or in part. To this conclusion, we are 

Lib. 16:17. happy to say, the Committee unanimously came ; and this 
is a sign of the times of no ordinary significance. In what 
mode it is best to assail that power, the Committee could 
not as unanimously agree ; but we are every hour more 
deeply convinced that there is but one mode and one 
alternative presented to the people of the free States, and 



^T. 40.] TEXAS. 143 

that is, to have NO RELIGIOUS, NO POLITICAL CHAP. v. 
UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS. On this ground x s . 
we stand ready to unite again with Whigs, Democrats, 
and Liberty men ; but on nothing short of this can we 
see any utility in attempting to make effectual resistance 
to the encroachments of Slavery." 

Senate and House at Washington had, on the last day of Lib. 15 : is, 
February, 1845, agreed upon the joint resolution prescrib 
ing the terms of admission for Texas ; Tyler sped the news Mar. 3, 
with indecent haste, considering the nearness of his sue- z ^-^2. 
cessor in office ; the Mexican minister at the capital with- Lib. 15:43, 
drew ; the new President, Polk, made his disposition of 
forces by land and sea to deter Mexico from asserting in Lib. 15:197. 
arms her claims to the territory of Texas, and at the same 
time began to negotiate for the purchase of California. 
When Congress assembled, the House was in no humor Lib. 15: 
to entertain memorials against the admission of Texas, 
nor was John Quincy Adams disposed to struggle against 
a foregone conclusion. Stephen A. Douglas s resolution 
to admit Texas was promptly passed by a majority of five Lib. 15:206. 
to two, and the Senate confirmed it (on Forefathers Day) DeCf 22 
by a majority of nearly three to one. The year closed I8 * S 6 .^ 
amid general despondency at the North in all anti-slavery 
breasts except those of the abolitionists. " Apparently," MS. Mar. 
wrote Mr. Garrison to Richard Webb, with reference to 
annexation, "the slaveholding power has never been so 
strong has never seemed to be so invincible has never 
held such complete mastery over the whole country 
has never so successfully hurled defiance at the Eternal 
and Just One as at the present time ; and yet never has 
it in reality been so weak, never has it had so many un 
compromising assailants, never has it been so filled with 
doubt and consternation, never has it been so near its 
downfall, as at this moment. Upon the face of it, this 
statement looks absurdly paradoxical ; but it is true, never 
theless. We are groping in thick darkness $ but it is that 
darkest hour which is said to precede the dawn of day." MS Mar 
And Edmund Quincy notified the same correspondent in 29, 1845. 



144 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [^T. 40. 

regard to Garrison " He is in good spirits, . . . as he 
Eliza Lee always is, and as we aU have a trick of being. Mrs. Follen 
Foiien. gavg tlia t w h en ghe wan ts to be put in spirits, she goes 
among the abolitionists, and there she is sure to find cheer 
fulness, wit, humor, and fun. And who should be cheer 
ful and merry, in this country, except the abolitionists ? " 
There can be no doubt that the acquisition of Texas 
hastened the overthrow of the Slave Power, by making 
it over-confident, by fostering dreams of an indefinite 
Southern expansion in case of separation from the North, 
by training the hot youth of the South to arms when 
Mexico was invaded and reduced yet training not only 
Jefferson Davis, Lee, "Stonewall" Jackson, the two John 
stons, and so many other future chiefs of the Confederate 
army, but also Grant, Thomas, Meade, Hancock, and their 
fellow-emancipationists of the Federal army; above all, 
by enlarging with the national domain the points of con 
tact between free and slave institutions, involving fresh 
conflicts and compromises perpetual irritation of the 
national sore. 1 It also surely effected the division of the 
North into two political camps, by the open, shameless 
and final alliance of the Democratic Party with the Slave 
#.15:42. Power, for the sake of "an unchanging ascendancy" in 
national politics. For some time yet the Whig label 
would not necessarily connote a supporter of slavery; 
but with the Democratic label it was otherwise. From 
1845 it meant nothing but complete subserviency to the 
mandates of the Southern oligarchy. 

True to his instincts as a universal reformer, Mr. Gar- 
Lib. 15 : 27, rison had varied his anti-slavery discourse with speeches 
3X1 158 92 before legislative committees and before conventions or 
L II ^e 43 s i m pl e meetings against capital punishment; or in favor 
Lib. 15:47. of temperance and peace; on the Sabbath and on public 
worship. His progress towards greater theological enlight- 

1 Thomas Corwin correctly predicted that, "in the event of a cession of 
territory by Mexico to the United States, the question of the further exten 
sion of slavery must arise in a form which would necessarily array the 
North and the South against each other," and ultimately lead to a disso 
lution of the Union (Letter of Sept. 23, 1847 ; Lib. 17 : 169). 



-ET. 40.] TEXAS. 145 

enment was manifested in his treatment of Theodore CHAP. v. 
Parker s heresies, at a time when the preacher s own de- I 8^ 5> 
nomination could not even tolerate a Unitarian clergy- #.15:55. 
man who would exchange pulpits with him. Mr. Garrison 
was not shocked by the denial of a superhuman nature or 
attributes to Jesus. The pother, he declared, was caused 
by Mr. Parker s disbelief in the miraculous ; yet, " surely, Lib. 15: 55. 
the obligations and duties of man to his fellow-man and 
to God are in no degree affected by the question whether 
miracles were wrought in Judea or not, with whatever 
interest that question may be invested." Later in the 
year, the publication of a Boston edition of the theologi 
cal works of Thomas Paine brought the volume to him 
for review. His reception of it was characteristic : 

" Until it was put into our hands a few days since, it had so Lit. 15 : 186. 
happened that we had never perused a single page or paragraph Ante, i : 219. 
of all the writings of Mr. Paine, whether theological or political. 
We were educated to regard him as a monster of iniquity, and 
were therefore intimidated in early life from seeking an ac 
quaintance with his opinions and doctrines as expressed by 
himself, without priestly distortion or caricature. Since we 
have been delivered from the thraldom of tradition and author 
ity, we have had no opportunity to examine any of Mr. Paine s 
sentiments respecting the Bible and Christianity, until the 
present time. His works are before us ; we have given them 
a candid and careful perusal j and, though it may not be politic 
for us to do so, we feel in duty bound to state the impressions 
we have received." 

To the length of a full column of the Liberator Mr. 
Garrison proceeded with his judgment of Paine (whose Ante.i-.zig. 
anticipation of his favorite motto was still unknown to 
him), finding in him a great intellect and reasoning power, 
who attacked the marvellous in the Bible rather than its 
morality $ an honest man, having the courage of his con 
victions ; one who always addressed the reason and never 
the fears of his audience as would appear from sundry 
citations. 

" Of the millions who profess to believe in the Bible as the Lib. 15:186. 
inspired word of God, how few there are who have had the 
VOL. III. 10 



146 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [JET. 40. 

CHAP. v. wish or the courage to know on what ground they have formed 
j^~- their opinion! They have been taught that, to allow a doubt 
to arise in their minds on this point, would be sacrilegious, and 
to put in peril their salvation. They must believe in the plenary 
inspiration of the l sacred volume, or they are infidels, 1 * who 
will justly deserve to be cast into the lake of fire and brim 
stone. Imposture may always be suspected when reason is 
commanded to abdicate the throne j when investigation is made 
a criminal act ; when the bodies or spirits of men are threatened 
with pains and penalties if they do not subscribe to the popular 
belief j when appeals are made to human credulity, and not to 
the understanding. 

" Now, nothing can be more consonant to reason than that 
the more valuable a thing is, the more it will bear to be exam 
ined. If the Bible be, from Genesis to Revelation, divinely 
inspired, its warmest partisans need not be concerned as to its 
fate. It is to be examined with the same freedom as any other 
book, and taken precisely for what it is worth. It must stand 
or fall on its own inherent qualities, like any other volume. To 
know what it teaches, men must not stultify themselves, nor be 
made irrational by a blind homage. Their reason must be 
absolute in judgment, and act freely, or they cannot know the 
truth. They are not to object to what is simply incomprehen 
sible because no man can comprehend how it is that the sun 
gives light, or the acorn produces the oak j but what is clearly 
monstrous, or absurd, or impossible, cannot be endorsed by 
reason, and can never properly be made a test of religious 
faith, or an evidence of moral character. 

Cf. Lib. " To say that everything contained within the lids of the 
Bible is divinely inspired, and to insist upon the dogma as 
fundamentally important, is to give utterance to a bold fiction, 
and to require the suspension of the reasoning faculties. To 
say that everything in the Bible is to be believed, simply be 
cause it is found in that volume, is equally absurd and perni 
cious. It is the province of reason to search the scriptures, 
and determine what in them is true, and what false what is 
probable, and what incredible what is historically true, and 
what fabulous what is compatible with the happiness of man 
kind, and what ought to be rejected as an example or rule of 
action what is the letter that killeth, and what the spirit that 
maketh alive. When the various books of the Bible were writ 
ten, or by whom they were written, no man living can tell. 
This is purely a matter of conjecture; and as conjecture is not 



JET. 40.] TEXAS. 147 

certainty, it ceases to be authoritative. Nor is it of vast conse- CHAP. v. 
quence, in the eye of reason, whether they to whom the Bible jjTl 
is ascribed wrote it or not j whether Paul was the author of the 
Epistle to the Hebrews, or of any other Epistle which is attrib 
uted to him whether Moses wrote the Pentateuch, or Joshua 
the history of his own exploits, or David the Psalms, or Solomon 
the Proverbs ; or whether the real authors were some unknown 
persons. What is writ, is writ, and it must stand or fall 
by the test of just criticism, by its reasonableness and utility, 
by the probabilities of the case, by historical confirmation, by 
human experience and observation, by the facts of science, 
by the intuition of the spirit. Truth is older than any parch 
ment, and would still exist though a universal conflagration 
should consume all the books in the world. To discard a 
portion of scripture is not necessarily to reject the truth, but 
may be the highest evidence that one can give of his love of 
truth." 

Towards midsummer the art of phonography alighted 
in Boston, with Andrews and Boyle for its apostles and Stephen 
teachers. It found a cordial welcome in the Liberator. 



Mr. Garrison recalled his first visit to England in 1833, Lib. 15:110. 
and his regret that his ignorance of any language but 
his own overruled his desire to cross to the Continent; 
how, on his second visit, in 1840, the need of a universal 
language for mankind was again impressed upon him at 
Bowl-ing s table, when he could hold no conversation di- Ante,z\yfi. 
rectly with Isambert and the other French delegates to 
the World s Convention, so that at the Crown and Anchor Ante, 2:384. 
soiree lie had to " testify against the existing diversity of 
tongues among mankind," to him so " unnatural, fraudu 
lent, afflictive, insupportable." Phonography seemed a 
long stride towards the desideratum, as promising to 
"render each national dialect simple and exact," and 
make easy " the transition from many rectified languages 
to one pure language." With millennial hopefulness, he 
repeated his belief that some then living would witness a 
world s convention " either to devise a common language, 
or to provide ways and means for the universal propaga 
tion of such a language." 



148 WILLIAM LLOYD GAEKISON. [^T. 40. 

CHAP. v. The fancied every-day uses of the art he thus pictured 
i84~ 5 . in a letter to S. J. May : 

MS. July " My attention has recently been drawn to the subject of 
17, 1845. Phonography and Phonotypy, and I want you, as a friend of 
universal reform, to look into it ; for I am persuaded you will 
be delighted with it, as I have been. It is a new system of 
writing and printing, invented by Mr. Isaac Pitman, a teacher 
in Bath, England, by which the ignorant masses may be taught 
to read and write in an almost incredibly short space of time 
compressing the labor of months into weeks, and of years into 
months. As a teacher and a scholar, you know how monstrous 
and endless are the absurdities and perplexities of English or 
thography, and how laborious is the ordinary mode of writing. 
But here is a system devised which brings order out of chaos, 
makes everything plain, simple, consistent, and infallibly sure, 
surpasses stenography in the rapidity of writing, and is perhaps 
next in importance to the discovery of printing in the fifteenth 
century. It is making great progress in England, and is receiv 
ing in this quarter a strong impetus. Several hundred persons 
in this city (a large number of school-teachers included) have 
already taken lessons in it, among whom I am one. Our teacher 
is Mr. Augustus F. Boyle, an English young gentleman, who 
has been teaching the French language for the last three years, 
and who enters into this new reform with zeal and spirit. He 
will probably hand this letter to you, as he leaves immediately 
to attend a convention of teachers which is to be held in a few 
days in Syracuse. As he will be able to give you all the infor 
mation you may desire in regard to this matter, I need not 
Cyrus add any more. I understand Mr. Peirce, of the Normal School, 
Feme. j g muc ] 1 interested in it. This evening we meet to form an 
American Phonographic Society." 

Lib. 15 : 132. Of this Society Mr. Garrison became an officer, and his 
Lib. 15 : 140. friend May was quickly made president of the branch 
organization established in Syracuse. Anyone who has 
ever attempted phonography will correctly surmise that 
Mr. Garrison, with his multiplicity of cares and engage 
ments, and his rigid and laborious, if elegant, penman 
ship, never acquired the art he dabbled in. Its utility to 
the abolition cause was the one thing that escaped his 
prophetic vision. It enormously increased the audience 



-ET. 40.] TEXAS. 149 

of every anti-slavery speaker whose words were worth CHAP. v. 
quoting verbatim. An orator like Wendell Phillips 1 18^5. 
quickly appreciated the fact that he was addressing, not 
merely the little handful of the faithful who were gathered 
before him, but a bench of reporters for the local daily 
press, in addition to the official phonographer of the Lib 
erator and the Standard. 2 These reports the telegraph by 
and by dispersed to all the newspapers in the country. 

iSee the first phonographic report of a speech by Mr. Phillips, taken 
down by Henry M. Parkhurst in Boston, Dec. 29, 1846 (Lib. 17 : 7), and the 
orator s testimony to the superiority of the new method of reporting (Lib. 
17 : 83). 

2 The official report soon became a necessary self-defence against sys 
tematic caricature or neglect on the part of a hostile press. See Lib. 20 : 
95, 96, 98. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THIRD MISSION TO ENGLAND. 1846. 

CHAP. vi. AT the annual meeting of the Massachusetts Anti- 
j8^6. -"^- Slavery Society on January 30, 1846, the following 
resolution, of Mr. Garrison s moving, was adopted : 

Lib. 16:22. " That the special thanks of this Society are proffered to our 
untiring coadjutor, Henry C. Wright, for the fidelity with which 
he has unmasked the vaunted Free Church of Scotland for con 
niving at the great iniquity of American slavery, by soliciting 
and receiving its pecuniary assistance and religious cooperation ; 
for all his labors abroad, to secure in aid of our anti-slavery 
enterprise the generous sympathies and Christian cooperation 
of the good and philanthropic in England and Europe ; and, in 
particular, for the revelation which he has made to them as to 
the guilty compromises of the American Union thus invoking 
their moral abhorrence of such an unholy compact, and secur 
ing their righteous testimony against it." 

The secession of the Free Church of Scotland from the 
Established Church was consummated in May, 1843. The 
grounds of separation involved the voluntary abandon 
ment of State support for the ministers of the denom 
ination, and made necessary the raising of a Sustenta- 
tion Fund. Before the date in question, therefore, Dr. 

Rev. Tkos. Chalmers had arranged for an oecumenical collection, of 
which the American contingent was not to be despised. 
Charleston, the cradle of lovers of freedom "in the 
abstract" was very prompt to respond to this appeal. 

Lib. 14:57. Seven different "Evangelical" denominations begged the 
Rev. Thomas Smyth, D. D., to preach a sermon on it and 
pass the contribution box in his Presbyterian church, 

150 



-ET.41.J THIRD ENGLISH MISSION. 151 

which he did, with many touching references to " tyranny CHAP. vi. 
and oppression," and many tropes in which Liberty cut a jjj^. 
pretty figure. This discourse had the desired effect in 
raising a sum of money, to which the mayor of the city 
contributed his mite and his name. And so pleased was 
the schismatic pastor of Free St. David s, Glasgow, that 
he reprinted the Rev. Dr. Smyth s unmoral rhetoric, with 
a prefatory note. To his surprise, however, a well- 
informed, but irreverent, Glasgow editor exposed "the Lib. 14:57. 
flashy, high-sounding, unmeaning words " of the Charles 
ton divine; and, hoping that the money had not yet 
arrived, looked to see the Free Church treasurer send it 
back by return of steamer, as blood-stained, together with 
a sermon " suited to the circumstances of slaveholders," 
for the special benefit of the Rev. Dr. Smyth. 

The poor editor found his excuse, perhaps, in the fact 
that religious Scotland was just then greatly exercised 
by the news that a South Carolina judge had passed sen- Lib I4:34> . 
tence of death on a Northern man, John L. Brown, for 51.62,66,67. 
aiding the escape of a female slave. The incident, ex 
cept among abolitionists, 1 created no excitement in this Lib. 14:67. 
country. In England it was pathetically commented on 
in the House of Lords by Brougham and by the Lord Lib. 14:67, 
Chief -Justice Denman, who spoke, as William Ashurst 2 
wrote to the Liberator, "in the name of all the Judges of Lib. 14:87. 
England on this horrible iniquity." O Connell thundered 
against it before the British and Foreign Anti-Slavery #.14:102. 
Society. A memorial to the nonentity known as the 
Churches of Christ in South Carolina, " as representing 
those of other provinces, confederated in the United 
States of America," was drawn up and signed by more Lib. 14:67. 
than 1300 "ministers and office-bearers of Christian 
churches and benevolent societies in Lancashire, London, 
and elsewhere in England." Hardly was this surpassed 
by the Scotch conscience, which called great meetings 

1 See Whittier s poem and prefatory note on this incident on p. 89, vol. 3, 
of his Writings, ed. 1888. 

2 Under the nom de guerre of " Edward Search." 



152 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKBISON. [^T. 41. 

Lib. 14 : 66, some under the lead of the Glasgow Emancipation Society, 
but vigorously supported by the clergy ; one, a town meet- 

#.14:67. ing, at Edinburgh, summoned by the Magistrates and 

Lit. 14 : 77. Council. What more natural than to couple Brown s 

case with the action of the Free Church in accepting 

contributions from American slaveholders and South 

Carolinian in particular ? 

The British protest O Conn ell s above all, the Southern 

John Beiton judge bearing an Irish name 1 was heard and felt in South 

#!^?i / i Carolina ; and, whether or not it was heeded, Brown s sen 
tence was commuted to whipping. The Free Church was 
less sensitive, and its collecting agents, already landed in 

Lib. 14:66. America, were guided neither by the home feeling nor by 
the timely admonition of the abolitionists. From the 
Tappans and their associates of the American and Foreign 
Anti-Slavery Society they received in silence a long and 

#.14:65. solemn warning not to prosecute their tour through the 
South, since it would inevitably commit them to the 
palliation of slavery. They were also fully advised, in 
the same communication, of the pro-slavery character of 
the Presbyterian organization in this country. 

This letter, dated April 2, 1844, was followed by one 

#. 16:73. privately addressed on April 27 by Mr. Garrison to the 
Eev. William Chalmers, one of the Commissioners, invit 
ing him to be one of the speakers at the approaching 
anniversary of the American Anti-Slavery Society in 
New York. Mr. Chalmers, however, was not prone to 
make entangling alliances. He had happened to be in 
New Bedford on April 13, 14, when Mr. Garrison was 
lecturing on Non-Resistance, the Sabbath, the Ministry, 
and the Church ; and though he took good care not to 
go and listen to him, he prudently preserved the placard 
announcing the lectures, and carried it to Scotland, that 
it might serve to explain the difficulties of the American 
churches with reference to the anti-slavery movement. 
Not only was he shocked by the subjects presented, and 

1 " How he [O Connell] abhorred him for his name ! Let his O be blotted 
out at any rate, and then nail the rap to the counter" (Lib. 14 : 102). 



^ET. 41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 153 

the reported views advanced by the lecturer, but his keen CHAP. vi. 

eye detected on the placard a sneer at the Sabbath, which I ^6. 

had not been designated by its holy name, but simply as 

" the next day" to Saturday ! So on May 1 he sat down 

and declined the invitation on the ground of conflicting 

engagements not, however, withholding the pointed 

remark to Mr. Garrison, that, while having his own views 

as to slavery, he did not itemize Sabbath, Ministry, and 

Church among the sum of all villanies. Then, on the 

good advice of a shrewder friend, he pocketed the letter 

instead of mailing it, and gave it to the light through a Lib. 16:73. 

Scotch paper a year later meantime having, with his 

colleagues, picked up some twenty thousand dollars of MS. Jan. 

American money as the reward of discretion on the con- 

tro verted topic of slavery. * F 

Nevertheless, the cry of the Glasgow Emancipation So- Lib. 14:206. 
ciety, " Send back the money! " was not relaxed. Henry 
C. Wright, who had survived the rigors of the water-cure 
at Graef enberg and returned to Scotland, gave a power- Lib. 15 : 66, 
f ul reenf orcement to the movement, to which rallied also, 
across the border, Clarkson and George Thompson, and Lib. 15 : 83. 
the Chartist leader, Henry Vincent. To their aid came Lib. 15 : 135. 
over ocean, in the autumn of 1845, James N. Buffum of 
Lynn, and Frederick Douglass, who first took Ireland in Lib. 15: 178, 
their way, and then lent a hand in the agitation, till, in 
January, 1846, the latter could report, " Old Scotland MS. to F. 
boils like a pot ! " The most extraordinary popular dem 
onstrations were made against Free Church edifices of 
course without the instigation or sanction of the aboli 
tionists proper. The slaves blood was realistically imi- ^.16:53, 
tated with splotches of red paint on walls or steps, with 
or without the corresponding legend ; and " Send back the 
money ! " was placarded all over Auld Reekie. Not a 
newspaper in Scotland could abstain from the melee, at Lib. 16 : 87. 
the height of which Thompson was presented with the 
freedom of the city of Edinburgh. 

The thoughts of the American group naturally turned 
to their old leader at home, as if his presence might give 



154 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. |>ET. 41. 

CHAP. vi. the coup de grdce. The disunion doctrine political non- 
1846. fellowship with American slaveholders had been vigor 
ously expounded by Henry C. Wright, and coupled with 
the burning and related doctrine of ecclesiastical non-fel- 

Lib. 16:35, lowship; and a tract of his on the former subject was 
circulated by the thousand. The Free Church leaders, 
bent on retaining the American contributions, passed 

Lib. 15:1, from general apologies for slaveholding to attacks on 

73, 85, 102*. the Old Organization, and in especial 011 Wright and Gar 
rison for their Sabbatarian heresies. On April 21, this 
phase of the controversy was dwelt upon by Mr. Wright 
at a great meeting of the Emancipation Society at the 
City Hall in Glasgow ; and George Thompson, after pay- 

Lib. 16 : 86, ing a most sincere and feeling tribute to his transatlantic 
friend, offered on behalf of the Society a resolution of 
sympathy with Mr. Garrison and his co-workers, and an 
invitation to come over and help the cause in Great Brit 
ain with particular reference to an anti-slavery confer 
ence to be held in London in August. These proceedings 
were published in the Liberator of May 29. 

The proposal was very tempting. The opening year 
had found Mr. Garrison in poor health and much pecuni 
ary embarrassment arising from the financial condition 
of the Liberator. Generous friends could and did grate 
fully relieve the one ; * and all knew the truth of what 

MS. July Wendell Phillips expressed in writing to Mrs. Garrison of 
her husband : " I think his health needs, every few years, 
that he should throw completely off the burden of the 
paper." On the other hand, the country was now plunged 
in the Mexican War ; never had there been a more signal 
occasion for impressing upon the popular conscience the 

l MSS. Jan. 1, 1846, W. L. G. to Mrs. Louisa Loring ; Jan. 6, Ann and 
Wendell Phillips to W. L. G. and wife ; Jan. 12, W. L. G. to F. Jackson ; 
Jan. 21, S. Philbrick to W. L. G. Mr. Phillips wrote: "I owe you, dear 
Garrison, more than you would let me express, and, my mother and wife ex- 
cepted, more than to any other one. Since within the sphere of your influ 
ence, I trust I have lived a better man. I rejoice to say this here, because 
the very intimacy of our relation has always made me delicate of saying it 
in public, though -I am glad to feel that most men know it to be true." 



^T. 41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 155 

national guilt towards slavery ; the abolition corps was CHAP. vi. 
already weakened by the absence of Wright, Douglass, and I ^6. 
Buffum. Could the chief himself be spared ? The New 
England Convention first, and afterwards the Executive Lib. 16:90, 
Committee of the American Anti-Slavery Society, unani 
mously answered yes, and a call for funds was immedi 
ately made. There remained the editorial conduct of the 
Liberator, of which Quincy, Phillips, Charles K. Whipple, Lib. 16:114, 
and Mrs. Chapman offered to assume the not light burden. 
To part with wife and children was hard, all the more 
because, as in 1840, there was a prospective increase of ^^,2:363. 
the family. Mrs. Garrison, with her customary self-abne 
gation, interposed no obstacles. In short, Mr. Garrison 
yielded, and sailed from Boston in the steamship Britan- Lib. 16:114. 
nia on July 16, 1846 : 

" I do not go," he said in his valedictory to his readers, " to Lib. 16: 114. 
natter England, or to disparage my native land, but to protest 
against the foul deed of the Free Church of Scotland, in putting 
into its treasury the price of blood, and giving for it the right 
hand of Christian fellowship to the American slaveholder ; l 
to enlist for the overthrow of slavery, by moral instrumentali 
ties, all that is disinterested, humane, and free ; to vindicate 
the American Anti-Slavery Society and its kindred auxiliaries 
from the aspersions of their betrayers and detainers, and as 
worthy of the most entire confidence and the most liberal 
encouragement ; to avow principles which lay the axe at the 
root of all injustice, oppression, and war; and to labor for the 
overthrow of whatever stands opposed to the kingdom of peace 
and holiness." 

This programme was carried out to the letter ; but, as 
in both his previous visits to England, the main object #.17:13. 
was overruled and became subordinate. 

l " Her representatives are blameworthy, not because they got money in 
the Southern States, but because they got it most foully by keeping silence 
on the subject of slavery. ... If they had obtained it after having 
uttered a faithful testimony in the ears of the South, every slave would 
say, Keep it" ("W. L. G. to the colored people of Boston, at the farewell 
tendered him by them at Belknap-Street Church, July 15, 1846, reported 
by Mrs. Chapman in Lib. 16 : 118). Cf. Lib. 17 : 70, in which Mr. Garrison 
justifies the reception of money from the South towards the relief of the 
famine-stricken population of Ireland. 



156 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKEISON. [^ET. 41. 



Lib. 16 : 123. Shipwreck, from striking on a reef while making Halifax 

harbor in a fog, was narrowly avoided, and the voyage 

completed in a leaking vessel. Richard Webb, the last 

Ante, 2: 404; to bid him adieu in 1840, was waiting anxiously at Liver- 

Lib. 16:146. p 0ol to greet kj s return, 1 and with him Henry C. Wright. 

Their happy reunion took place on July 31, and, after a 
Aug. 3, few days rest, the three friends went up to London, where 

George Thompson met them and took the two Americans 
NO. 6. to his own home in Waterloo Place, some three miles from 

the heart of the city. Mr. Garrison wrote to his wife : 

MS. Aug. " To be once more with George, is a revival of days gone by. 

i, 1846. g e ^ g g ^j j. ue same loving, faithful friend the same playful, 

too early mirthful, entertaining companion the same modest, unpre 

tending man the same zealous and eloquent advocate the 

same warm and sympathizing friend of suffering humanity 

that he was eleven years ago, when he was in our country. I 

do not perceive that either time, or Ms immense labors, have 

made any striking change in his personal appearance. He looks 

about as young as he did in the U. S." 

The first attraction and occupation for Mr. Garrison 
was the World s Temperance Convention, held on August 
4 at the London Literary Institution. Though not a 
delegate, he had well-nigh the same title, of pioneer, to 
be the chief transatlantic figure in its proceedings that 
he had in the World s Anti-Slavery Convention of 1840. 

1 Webb had been remembered by his faithful correspondent, Edmund 
Quincy, who wrote by the hand of Garrison (MS. July 14, 1846) : You will 
be glad enough to see the bearer of this, that is, if he don t forget to deliver 
it to you or post it to you. The Pioneer may be depended upon in many 
capacities, but I am not quite sure of him as a two-penny postman. I can 
not but think that he will do a good service to the cause on your side. At 
any rate, he must do your hearts and his own health good. We are sorry 
to part with him, but think it will be for the best. We think pretty well of 
him here, though he has one swingeing fault. It is a horrid trick he has 
of being right. Nothing illustrates the Christian character of the Cab [the 
cabfiil of old organizationists ?] more than their willingness to forgive him 
for this vice. It is generally supposed that he rules us with a rod of iron, 
and that we can t call our souls our own ; whereas, he is more often over 
ruled on points of difference, and we have almost always had to acknowl 
edge, in the end, that he was right and we were wrong. Now this you 
must allow to be very provoking and hard to bear. Still, I don t wish to 
prejudice you against the man. I only wish to put you on your guard." 



^T. 41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 157 

But that distinction was reserved for the Rev. Dr. Lyman 
Beecher, who was introduced and often referred to as Lib. 16 : 
" the father of the temperance movement in America. 7 



W. L. Garrison to Ms Wife. 

LONDON, August 4, 1846. Lib. 16:147. 

This day the World s [Temperance] Conventiou began its 
sessions. The cause which it seeks to promote being the first 
that I ever publicly espoused, I went to the meeting for the 
purpose of observing its proceedings. It was held in a com 
paratively small room, and the public were not allowed to listen 
to the discussions. Though not a delegate from any temper 
ance society at home, I was politely furnished (with others) 
with a ticket, which admitted me as a member of the Conven 
tion ; but I soon perceived that the same spirit which controlled 
the Anti- Slavery Convention in 1840, had entire mastery over 
this. In the course of the afternoon session, the Rev. Mr. Kirk Edward N. 
of Boston incidentally defended the American slaveholder, and Kirk 
eulogized the Sabbath as worthy of being maintained by pains 
and penalties, " not in the name of the Lord, but on the ground 
of expediency." As soon as I could, I rose to reply, and was at 
first received with very great applause ; but the moment I began 
to rebuke Kirk for his conduct, sundry individuals raised the 
cry of personality, and protested against the discussion of 
extraneous topics ! Great excitement followed, and the result 
was that Kirk took back his pro-slavery sentiment, not to 
repudiate it, but to avoid the issue and escape censure. Every 
thing in the Convention is under the most stringent regulations. 
As for free discussion, its toleration is out of the question. I 
do not think, after the treatment that I have received, that I 
shall attend another session. Not that the Convention at all 
sympathized with Kirk, for they did not ; but they were afraid 
of giving offence, or of getting into a controversy on another 
topic, aside from the object which had specially brought them 
together. Still, they behaved quite unfairly, and are under too 
much " management " to suit me though Henry Clapp, 1 not 
withstanding his horror of an organized meeting on our side 

1 Editor of the Pioneer (lately the Essex Co. Washingtonian, owned by 
Christopher Robinson) at Lynn, Mass., and one of the most virulent of 
Rogers s supporters (Lib. 14 : 206 ; 15 : 2, 23, 42 ; MS. Dec. 14, 1844, Quincy 
to R. D. Webb). 



158 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. [,T. 41. 

CHAP. VI. of the Atlantic, can act as Secretary, and discover nothing to 
jjjTg dislike or censure ! 

The temperance cause in this kingdom has made very lit 
tle progress, especially among the " respectable " and " good 
society " folks. Almost wherever I go to partake of the hos 
pitalities proffered to me, decanters of wine are on the table, 
and not to take a glass of this poison is an act of singularity 
which immediately excites notice and observation. 

One can imagine how much Mr. Garrison would have 
disturbed the harmony of the proceedings on the fifth 
day, had he not been better employed elsewhere. A 
resolution having been offered that it was essential to the 
reformation to " abstain from giving, as well as taking, 
Lib. 16: intoxicating liquors," " Dr. Beecher (United States) 
frso]. recommended the terminating the impolitic suggestion by 
the previous question. If persevered in, the attempt at 
dictation would alienate their allies in America." The 
gag was accordingly applied, though the Convention 
unanimously agreed that it was a very naughty thing to 
manufacture and sell intoxicating drinks. 

Lib. 16:146. Mr. Garrison lost no time in seeking introductions to 
the conductors of the leading press of the metropolis. He 
had a very gratifying interview with Douglas Jerrold, 
who promised to aid the anti-slavery cause in his Weekly 
Newspaper j and presently reprinted several articles from 
the Liberator. He was well received by Dickens s locum 
tenens on the Daily News, the chief being at that time on 
the Continent. He opened relations with John Saunders, 
of the People s Journal, and renewed his friendship with 
yr? William and Mary Howitt, now connected with this 
periodical. 1 The Nonconformist, edited by the Rev. 

l On Sept. 10, 1846, Mr. Garrison wrote to his wife (MS.) : "MaryHowitt 
has completed her autobiography of me for the People s Journal." The 
solecism was felicitous, for the sketch which appeared in No. 37 of that 
magazine, accompanied by a villanous portrait on wood (Lib. 18 : 22), was 
based on data furnished by him, and is fairly to be called autobiographic. 
It has been already cited (ante, 1 : 13-15). It was copied in part in the 
National A. 8. Standard (1 : 96, 100), and in full in the Pennsylvania Free 
man of Mar. 25, 1847. Readers of the first two volumes of the present 
work will notice some slight discrepancies in Mrs. Hewitt s narrative, as 



&T. 41.] THIED ENGLISH MISSION. 159 

Edward Miall, was also approached. Dr. Bowring re 
ceived him, with his old genuine cordiality, at breakfast Ante, 2 1378. 
with Thompson and Douglass. Ashurst welcomed him Lib. 16:146. 
anew to Muswell Hill, and there made him acquainted Ante, 2: 377. 
with W. J. Fox, the eminent Unitarian preacher, and Lib. 16: 
with the exiled Mazzini. He came to know and to esteem LM S $ : .6i. 
" William Lovett and Henry Vincent, the leaders of the Lib. 16 : 
moral-suasion Chartists ["as opposed to the violent course 
of Feargus O Connor"] the friends of temperance, peace, Lib. 16: 146. 
universal brotherhood. They are true men," vouched 
Mr. Garrison, " who will stand by us to the last men 
who have been cast into prison in this country, and con 
fined therein (the former one year, the latter twenty At Newport, 
months), for pleading the cause of the starving operatives 1839-40. 
in this country, and contending for universal suffrage. 
Such men I honor and revere." l 

On the 10th of August, everything was in readiness for 
the formation of an Anti-Slavery League, to cooperate 
with the American Anti-Slavery Society. This took Lib. 16 : 146. 
place at the Crown and Anchor Tavern. The preamble 
of union expressly indicated its transatlantic affiliation 
and was followed by these articles : 

" 1. That slaveholding is, under all circumstances, a sin of Lib. 16 : 
the deepest dye, and ought immediately to be abandoned. 
" 2. That the members of this League shall consist of all per- 

was to be expected under the circumstances. At the home of the Howitts, 
at Clapton, Mr. Garrison met the German poet of freedom, Ferdinand 
Freiligrath, then a refugee, and was " delighted with the modesty of his 
deportment and the beauty of his character" (Lib. 18 : 110). 

l Lovett, in his Life and Struggles (London, 1876), speaking of his new 
American acquaintances in 1846, says, p. 321 : "During our friends visit, 
I recall to memory a very delightful evening spent with them and other 
friends, at the house of Mr. J. H. Parry [Lib. 17 : 51]. On that occasion 
we had not only a very interesting account of the anti-slavery movement 
and its prominent advocates in America, but our friend Douglass, who had 
a fine voice, sang a number of negro melodies, Mr. Garrison sang several 
anti-slavery pieces, and our grave friend, H. C. "Wright, sang an old Indian 
war song. Other friends contributed to the amusement of the evening, 
and among them our friend Vincent sang The Marseillaise. " At Henry 
Vincent s home at Stoke Newington, Mr. Garrison spent a memorable day 
in company with "Wright, Douglass, and James Haughton of Dublin one 
of the stanchest and most influential Irish abolitionists (Lib. 16 : 146). 



160 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. 



[JET. 41. 



CHAP. VI. sons subscribing to the foregoing principles, without respect of 
i8~6 country, complexion, or religious or political creeds. 

" 3. That the sole object of the League shall be the over 
throw, by means exclusively moral and peaceful, of slavery in 
every land, but with special reference to the system now existing 
in the United States." 

The League s first public demonstration was in its own 
behalf and in furtherance of Mr. Garrison s mission, a 
Lib. 16:146. meeting being held on the just-mentioned premises on 
the evening of August 17, 1846. The audience was large, 
" most intelligent, respectable, and enthusiastic." As Mr. 
Garrison wrote to his wife 

MS. Aug. " It was a real old-organized anti- slavery meeting, such as 
18, 1846. was never before held in this metropolis. George Thompson 
was in the chair, and made a brief but earnest speech, in which 
Lib. 16:157. he referred to me in a very kind and complimentary manner. 
Lib. 16:157. Henry C. Wright made the opening speech, and it was a 
scorcher, and received great applause. I followed him and, 
on rising, was received by the assembly with a tempest of 
applause, they rising from their seats, swinging their hats, and 
Lib. 16:157. cheering loudly. I made a long speech, which elicited the 
F.Douglass, strongest marks of approbation. Douglass was received in a 
Lib. 16 : 157. similar manner, and made one of his very best efforts. I never 
Lib. 16 : 157. saw an audience more delighted. Henry Vincent made the 
closing speech, which was eloquently uttered and warmly 
Lib. 16 : 157. cheered. James Haughton, at the commencement, presented 
a resolution, welcoming us all to England, &c., &c. Rev. Mr. 
E. N. Kirk. Kirk of Boston was in the meeting, but he found the atmos 
phere too warm for him at last, and left the room. We began 
at half -past 6 P. M., and did not adjourn till 12 o clock, very 
few having left at that late hour. Everything was encouraging 
in the highest degree." 

A few samples of Mr. Garrison s remarks will show 
alike his tact and his method in addressing foreign 
auditors : 

London Uni- " He was received with enthusiastic cheering, hundreds rising 

^28^1846^ from their seats. He wished to know if they were in earnest 

Lib. 16 : 157. when they gave him that reception ? Were they disposed to 

regard him as the friend of universal liberty I Then he begged 



<ET. 41.] THIRD ENGLISH MISSION. 161 

to tell them, that if they went over to America they would be CHAP. VI. 
deemed fit subjects for Lynch law. (Laughter and cheers.) ^ 6 
What ! were they in earnest ? were there no apologists for 
slavery there? none to applaud those ancient slaveholding 
patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob ? none to talk of send 
ing Onesimus back to his master because he was a slave ? Were 
there none to apologize for those pious men who plundered 
cradles of babes, tortured women by the slave-driver s lash, 
and sent men to the auction-block ? * Why, then, said 
Mr. Garrison, here s my hand for every one of you, and 
here s a heart that beats in unison with your own. (Great 
cheering.) 

" t It is no common conflict in which we are engaged, because, 
whatever forms of political oppression you may have here, or 
in Europe, or in the world besides, there is no power so dread 
ful and exterminating as American slavery. It began with the 
very beginning of the Union (hear), and it has grown with our 
growth until it now holds complete mastery over the whole 
country, so that the two great political parties are eager to do 
its bidding, and religious sects bow before it and do it homage : 
in one word, it has completely subjected church and state. 
Above all, we are against church and state because they are 
on the side of slavery, and they shall go down together. (Great 
applause.) It is said that the abolitionists are assailing the 
American church : it is true. It is said they are assailing the 
American clergy in [as] a body: it is true. It is said that 
they are assailing the Government under which they live : it is 
true. It is said that they are seeking the dissolution of the 
Union : it is true. Why do I say this ? Because the church is 
the stronghold of the system; because the clergy are active 
defenders of the system ; because the Government was origin 
ally so constructed that it gives its entire support to slavery, so 
long as the slaveholder shall desire it. 

" Now, to come to facts, and to show you that I do not 
exaggerate in what I state, I will read for you a few extracts, 
giving you the very words of the abettors of slavery in the 
church. . . . 

" i Such is slavery in America ! And yet the abolitionists are 
stigmatized as infidels because they would have no such Chris 
tianity or republicanism as sanctioned such atrocities. Slavery 
is a curse wherever it is found. It not only smites with barren 
ness the most fertile soil in the world, but it makes human life 
cheap, and, in fact, of no value at all. (Cheers.) A year ago 

VOL. III. 11 



162 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [^T. 41. 



CHAP. VI. I thought I would collect from the newspapers all the horrible 
1846. details of killing, maiming, &c., connected with slavery, and 
put them in my paper. My collection was imperfect, for I had 
no Southern papers, for they will not send papers to me from 
the South. I took the Northern papers, and took out of them 
the most bloody deeds. They are very few indeed, but they 
show the state of society there, and a state of insecurity for 
human life such as can nowhere else be found. 1 The list was 
begun a year ago, and this paper is full of short paragraphs. 
[Here Mr. Garrison unrolled a paper, the width of one of our 
columns, made up of short accounts of murders, etc., and 
unrolled it from end to end. It was above 12 yards long. 
There were calls for a few to be read. Mr. Garrison then read 
two or three, and then continued.] And yet there are those 
who attempt to excuse this state of things. I am sorry that 
there are Englishmen disposed to apologize for these American 
Christians who keep bloodhounds ! They say, they are under a 
great mistake they are in error, but you must call such 
Christians no hard or bad names. But I say the American 
people are excluded from apology. They hold the Declaration 
in their hand that all men are equal j then they enslave their 
brother, and whip him, and hunt him with bloodhounds, and 
profess the gospel of Christ. Now, no man can be excused for 
enslaving another, whether he be savage or civilized. (Great 
applause.) God has put a witness in every man s breast which 
protests against man holding a man in bondage. I never debate 
the question as to whether man may hold property in man. I 
never degrade myself by debating the question, " Is slavery a 
sin ? " It is a self-evident truth, which God hath engraven on 
our very nature. Where I see the holder of a slave, I charge 
the sin upon him, and I denounce him. . . . 

" Now, what have we American abolitionists a right to ask 
of you Englishmen I You ought not to receive slaveholders as 
honest Christian men. You ought not to invite them to your 
pulpits, to your communion tables. Will you see to it that they 
never ascend your pulpits ? If you will, then the slave will 

l See the rubric " The Bloody and Oppressive South," in Lib. 15 : 20, 32, 
and. passim in the volumes for 1845, 1846, etc., usually on the fourth page of 
the paper. This curse of slave society has long survived the abolition of 
slavery. See H. V. Redfleld s Homicide, North and South (Philadelphia, 
1880), and the fusillade of satire directed against Southern public sentiment 
concerning passionate and cold-blooded murder, in the N. Y. Evening Post 
and Nation in 1882-84. 



Mn. 41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 163 

bless you, and thanks from the American abolitionists will come CHAP. VI. 
over in thunder tones for your decision, and you will give a blow z ^ 6 
to slavery from which it will not recover. We ask another 
thing of you. Send us no more delegates to the States, or, 
if you do, let there be no divinity about them. Nothing but 
common humanity can stand in the United States. (Cheers.) 
Send us no more Baptist clerical delegates, or Methodist, or 
Presbyterian, or Quaker clerical delegates. They have all 
played into the hands of slavery against the abolitionists. 

(Cheers.) From Dr. C down to the last delegation, they Rev. F. A. 

have all done an evil work, and have strengthened slavery Co *!^* e 
against us. Like the priest and the Levite, they have passed 
us by and gone on the other side. They found the cause of 
abolitionism unpopular. The mass of society were pro-slavery, 
so they went with them, and we have gone to the wall. Send 
us no more, if you please. (Cheers.) We have had to say, 
Save us from our English friends, and we will take care of our 
enemies. There have been those who have gone over to 
America, and who have nobly stood their ground. They have 
passed through the fire, and no smell of it has been found on 
them. That man (pointing to the chairman, Mr. Thompson) has 
gone through it. (Immense cheering, continued for some time.) 
Though rising on the topmost wave of popularity at home, he 
consented to aid us, where he was sure to be mobbed and 
scouted. But he never blenched. He was not afraid to make 
himself the friend and companion of the negro ; and if he had 
remained, his life would have been taken. If we had desired 
it, he would have remained and hazarded his life ; but we said, 
Go. Now, I don t know if he had been divine he could have 
stood it. While a man remains common humanity, I can trust 
him ; but when he gets up into the air, where there comes some 
thing superhuman about him, I am afraid of him. (Cheers.) 

" Another thing don t do. Send no more men to the South 
to get money. The Free Church of Scotland is, like democratic 
America, stained with blood. It has the price of blood in its 
treasury. Oh ! that Free Church of Scotland ! I am for free 
dom everywhere, and rejoice that that church is a free one ; but 
it has received a paltry bribe, and abetted slavery. I have no 
idea they will send back the money. The laity I believe would 
send it back, but the divinity prevents it. " 

Thompson had a speedy opportunity to turn the tables 
on his friend, without prejudice to the common cause : 



164 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKEISON. [.Err. 41. 

Lib. 16:162. " The chief business we have had to do, recently," he wrote 
Sept. 18, to Quincy, " has been to rescue the anti-slavery cause from the 
hands of your pro-slavery American divines, whose principal 
occupation for some weeks has been to hoodwink, deceive, and 
corrupt those with whom they have come in contact. Such 
men are a moral pestilence. Into whatsoever society they enter, 
they misrepresent the abolitionists of America j they cover up 
the most frightful features of slavery j they extenuate the 
criminality of all slaveholders, and boldly justify the conduct of 
such as belong to their own churches, and labor to destroy the 
hitherto sound views of the people of this country respecting 
the essential sinfulness of manstealing; and yet, they are as 
much opposed to slavery as any human beings in the world ! 
and yet, they are the friends of the slave, and we are the slaves 
worst enemies ! Can you not keep such men at home "? If you 
cannot, why then we must try what we can do to unmask them. 
I do trust we shall soon create a public sentiment here which 
will be such as will lead them to travel in any direction rather 
than towards the shores of Great Britain." 

The allusion in this passage was to the great meeting of 

the newly formed League, in Exeter Hall, to review the 

proceedings of the Evangelical Alliance. This was another 

World s Convention, or rather Conference, convoked in 

Lib. 16: October, 1845, on a sectarian basis, in which Methodists 

[154]. 198- an( j p ree Church men preponderated, and which met 1200 

Aug. 19, strong in London, in mid- August, full of great expectations, 

18461 yet not without apprehensions of discord. A preliminary 

British conference had been held at Birmingham, attended 

Lib. 16 : 67. by Scotch members who had already given public notice 

that slaveholders must be excluded from the London 

Rev. Robert gathering. Dr. Candlish, an eminent Free Church leader, 

s. Candlish. craf tilv prociire( j t he adoption of a policy of " not invit- 

Lib. 16:93, i n " slaveholders, which was thus delicately formulated : 
98, 198. 

Lib. 16:98. " That, while this Committee deem it unnecessary and inex 
pedient to enter into any question, at present, on the subject of 
slaveholding, or on the difficult circumstances in which Christian 
brethren may be placed in countries where the law of slavery 
prevails, they are of opinion that invitations ought not to be 
sent to individuals who, whether by their own fault or other- 



-ET. 41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 165 

wise, may be in the unhappy position of holding their fellow- CHAP. VI. 
men as slaves." lg ~ 6 

This resolution neither precluded the discussion of 
slaveholding at the London Conference, nor propitiated 
the American brethren; the New School Presbyterian #.16:198. 
General Assembly at Philadelphia making it the express 
ground of a refusal to send delegates. On the 27th of 
August, the Conference passed from the smooth waters of 
" singing and canting " to breakers on a lee-shore threat- Lib. 16:198. 
ening instant shipwreck. A motion was made to add to Lib. 16: 
the declaration of the objects of the Alliance "Facts 
relating to slavery and the condition of our brethren in 
bonds in every part of the world." This proved very 
obnoxious, especially to the American delegates, the Rev. 
E. N. Kirk saying, with perfect truth, that it would hazard 
the very existence of the Alliance. It was accordingly 
withdrawn ; but the next day the Rev. J. Howard Hinton, 
editor of the Anti-Slavery Reporter, moved the exclusion 
of slaveholders from the Alliance, and one voice from 
across the water was heard to second it, that of J. Y. Lib. 16 : 
Himes, whose sympathizers in the American delegation t 154 ^ 85 
numbered less than half a dozen. Great was the excite- Lib. 16:165. 
ment produced in this delegation, with all their efforts 
to be calm. During the recess, the discussion went on Lib. 16: 
informally, but with added earnestness. One overheard 
" an American patriarch (Beecher), whose eyes are moist Lyman 
with tears " but not for the slave saying : " Brethren, 
you are too warm. Remember the work you have to do, 
and be wise." Worldly-wise they were in going without Lib. 16 : 
their dinners and retiring to pray, with the reward of "-^J. ** 
seeing the motion temporarily withdrawn. However, the 
Rev. F. A. Cox, trusting to his transatlantic experience Ante, 1:480. 
in trimming, thought to ease matters by proposing that 
the Hinton resolution and others on the same subject be 
referred to a committee, on which, of course, America was 
well represented. On August 29, they reported, through 
the Rev. Samuel Hanson Cox, who had long since aban- Ante, 1:461, 
doned the abolition ranks in the time of the sectarian 



166 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. 



41. 



Lib. 16 : 
[154]. 



Lib. 16: 
[154]. 

Lib. 16 : 162, 
198. 



division. 1 They commended to the consideration of the 
several branches of the Alliance social evils like the prof 
anation of the Lord s Day, intemperance, duelling, and 
the sin of slavery, with the hope that no branch would 
admit slaveholders " who, by their own fault, continue in 
that position, retaining their fellow-men in slavery from 
regard to their interests ! n Mr. Hinton, who had made 
one of the Committee, moved the adoption of its report, 
and the Conference gladly accepted the seeming settle 
ment of the vexed question. 

Two days later, at Freemasons 7 Hall, protests from the 
American delegates were presented, a reconsideration 
forced, and the action of the Conference rescinded, amid 
unanimous public condemnation. The Anti- Slavery 
League at once saw its opportunity, and called a great 
meeting in Exeter Hall to review the " Evangelical " pro 
ceedings. 



Sept. 14, 
1846. 



W. L. Garrison to Ms Wife. 

MS. MUSWELL HILL, near LONDON, Sept. 17, 1846. 

On Monday, Thompson and myself busied ourselves in some 
little preparation for the Exeter Hall meeting which we were 
to hold that evening, with special reference to the course pur 
sued by the Evangelical Alliance on the subject of American 
F.Douglass, slavery. Frederick joined us in the afternoon, having left 
Sheffield in the morning. Our meeting was a very triumphant 
one. The vast hall was densely crowded, and presented a 
brilliant spectacle. The interest and feeling manifested by the 
vast audience were of no ordinary character. Many of the 
friends, and some of the members, of the Alliance were present, 
some of them in no very amicable state of mind towards us. 
None of the American delegation showed their heads. 

I spoke first, after some excellent prefatory remarks from the 
chairman, the Rev. John Burnet, a very able and independent 



#.16:165 

London 

Patriot, 

Sept. 17, 

1846. 



1 See his resentment (before the New School General Assembly at Phila 
delphia in June, 1846) at the republication of a letter of his dated Auburn, 
N. Y., Feb. 10, 1836, and addressed to a brother minister, in which he 
hesitated "not a moment to say that, other things being equal, a slave 
holder of any description ought to be excluded from the communion of the 
churches " (Lib. 16 : 185 ; Penn. Freeman, June 11, 1846, p. 2). 



^T. 41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 167 

man. My speech was frequently interrupted by a certain por- CHAP. VI. 
tion of the audience, in a rowdyish manner, something after the z ^ 6 
pattern we occasionally exhibit in Boston and elsewhere. My 
remarks frequently stung to the quick, and the snakes hissed 
and twisted as though they felt that the hour of doom had come. 
Still, the applause overpowered all the opposition but the 
interruption was very considerable, and made my speech less 
consecutive than it otherwise would have been. Knowing that 
Thompson and Douglass were to follow me, I had more to say 
about the sectarian character of the Alliance than about its pro- 
slavery action ; and this it was that called down upon my head 
the special " blessings " of the priests and their tools in the vast 
assembly. 

Thompson, though quite poorly all day, acquitted himself 
with more than ordinary ability, and made so powerful an 
impression that he swept away all symptoms of opposition j so 
that, when the resolutions were presented for adoption, only 
three or four hands were raised in opposition to them ! * 
Douglass followed in a very effective speech, and was warmly 
applauded. We regard the result of the meeting as a great 
triumph, and as giving a staggering blow to the Alliance at the 
very moment most opportune. 

My manner of expressing my thoughts and feelings is some 
what novel, and not always palatable, in this country, on 
account of its plainness and directness 5 but it will do more 
good, in the end, than a smoother mode. At least, I think so, 
and will "bide my time." I am led to be more plain-spoken 
because almost every one here deals in circumlocution, and to 
offend nobody seems to be the aim of the speaker. If I chose, 
I could be as smooth and politic as any one ; but I do not so 
choose, and much prefer nature to art. 

The Alliance died by its own hand, though Mr. Garri 
son could rightly claim its demise as one of the results of Lib. 16 : 198. 

1 The last of the resolutions read as follows : " That the conduct of the 
Evangelical Alliance recently held in this city, first, in adopting a proposi 
tion, declaring that men might be slaveholders without any fault of their 
own, and from disinterested motives ; and then, to gratify the pro-slavery 
spirit of the American delegates, erasing from their proceedings all refer 
ence to the subject of slavery, in order to prevent an explosion, was at 
variance with the uncompromising spirit of Christian truth, and a virtual 
approval of the acts of those who, while they profess to be the followers of 
the great Redeemer, make merchandise of slaves and the souls of men " 
(Lib. 16 : 166). 



168 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



. 41. 



CHAP. VI. 
1846. 

Lib. 16:198. 



Lib. 16 : 167, 
199, 201. 



Lib. 16 : 170, 

173; 18 : 29; 
London 
Patriot, 

Oct.-L, 1846; 

Life of 

Douglass, 

1882, p. 246. 



his English mission. The public sentiment aroused by 
the Exeter Hall meeting, and by similar demonstrations 
all over the United Kingdom up to his sailing for home 
on November 4, admittedly constrained the British branch, 
when organizing at Manchester on that very date, to 
exclude slaveholders from membership albeit leaving 
their personal Christianity an open question. 1 Meantime, 
more than fifty withdrawals had been reported to the 
Provisional Committee. In short, the effort to rehabili 
tate in Great Britain the spurious Christianity of the 
American Churches, by a guilty confederacy in silence or 
apology on the subject of slavery, was signally and finally 
defeated. Moreover, so little did the Free Church leaders 
prevail in their own section that, early in the summer, 
the Synod of the United Secession Church (one of the 
largest religious bodies in Scotland) committed to James 
N. Buff urn, on his return to America, a " Memorial and 
Remonstrance respecting Slavery, to the Churches of the 
United States of America," and renounced fellowship with 
any church that sanctioned slavery. 

In the interval between the two meetings of the League, 
Mr. Garrison had begun the whirl of journeying, lecturing, 
and visiting, which was not to cease while he remained in 
the United Kingdom. On August 20, in company with 
Thompson and Douglass, he was most affectionately 
received by the aged Clarkson at Ipswich, whom he 
found weak in body but active in mind, and who gave 
him, on parting, a paper, " Hints for the American People 
in the Event of a Dissolution of the Union" a consum 
mation which he welcomed as a means to the abrogation 
of the legal sanction of slavery. " I consider, then," he 
wrote, "the dissolution of the Union, by affording the 

l Ashurst expressly declared of this Manchester resolution : " We owe this 
check to their backsliding to you. No one mixed up with them in daily 
intercourse would have been so free from restraining influences as yourself 
and friends, nor, but for your mission, should we have had the necessary facts 
as to the American priests upon authority ; and upon personal questions 
this is essential. Therefore, again thanks to you and your friends for the 
mission and the missionary " (Lib. 16 : 199). 



^ET. 41.] THIRD ENGLISH MISSION. 169 

opportunity of making such a change, among the great- CHAP. vi. 

est blessings; and, in all probability, nothing but a ^g. 

dissolution of the Union could produce such a glorious 

opportunity." The paper was incomplete, and he reserved 

the privilege of perfecting it. On August 25 he wrote to 

say that he was very ill, was probably inditing his last 

note, and that the paper must be considered concluded. 

On September 26 the great abolitionist passed away, 

affording the singular parallel with Wilberforce that ,4^,1:357- 

each died while Mr. Garrison was in England, after 36 ^ 7 g 65 

recent interviews with him, and after publicly assenting 

to his most advanced strategy for the destruction of 

slavery. 1 " It is a fact for a poet to celebrate," wrote 

S. J. May to his friend on his return, "that you should Lib. 16:194. 

have been in England to attend the burial of Clarkson, 

as you were of his co-worker Wilberforce." But in this 

particular only the parallel fails, as Mr. Garrison was 

denied the privilege of following Clarkson s remains to 

the grave. On October 1, in " beautiful and affecting " Glasgow 

terms, at a public meeting in Glasgow, he took notice of A ^ s ^ t . 

his venerated predecessor s 

" Repose at length, firm Friend of human kind." 

A few days after their last meeting at Playford Hall, 
Mr. Garrison, with Douglass for his companion, betook Aug. 24-28, 
himself to Bristol and Exeter. At the former place 
he was the guest of John Bishop Estlin, an eminent 47 Park St. 
surgeon and oculist. 

W. L. Garrison to H. C. Wright. 

BRISTOL, August 26, 1846. MS. 

Yesterday afternoon, we had a public meeting at the Victoria 
Rooms (a splendid building), which was attended by a most 

i To disunion Clarkson gave ready assent as soon as it was presented to 
him by Henry C. Wright (MS. April 23, 1845, Clarkson to Wright). The 
noble old man wrote to this American friend on Oct. 24, 1845, when he had 
been for nearly a year confined to his bedroom "Never mind wearying 
me consider what a glorious cause we have" (MS.). See the resolution 
offered by Edmund Quincy in Faneuil Hall on Mr. Garrison s return, 
touching these coincidences of Clarkson and Wilberforce (Lib. 16 : 202). 



170 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. 



41. 



1846. 



CHAP. VI. select assemblage, the Mayor of the city presiding on the occa 
sion, who introduced us in a very handsome manner. The hall 
was filled a considerable part of the assembly being members 
of the Society of Friends, of the affluent class. Very marked 
attention was paid to our remarks, and all seemed to be highly 
gratified j but, to me, it was anything but an animated time. 
So much formality and selectness takes all the warmth out of 
me ; and I felt as dull and flat as though I had neither percep- 
F. Douglass, tion nor instinct. Frederick seemed to labor under embarrass 
ment, but he did much better than myself. I thought he would 
greatly disturb the Mayor and our cautious and considerate 
friend Mr. Estlin the former, by his severe remarks upon 
slaveholders as "vagabonds" and " villains" (for you will 
recollect that Bristol is the headquarters of the West India 
planters in this kingdom, and it was bringing up old reminis 
cences not the most pleasant to them and their friends) and 
the latter by his " indiscriminate " assault on the American 
church and clergy. How the Mayor really felt at such plain 
talk, I cannot say ; but he concluded the meeting with some 
commendatory remarks, and, to my surprise, Mr. Estlin took 
exception at nothing that was said, but seemed to be very 
much pleased, and declared that he believed a very salutary 
impression had been made. The more I see of him, the more I 
am satisfied that he means to be a true friend of the cause, and 
that he is the main spoke in the anti-slavery wheel in all this 
region. 

Last evening, we had a large circle of persons, of various relig 
ious denominations, convened at friend Estlin s, and a most ani 
mating conversation followed, on a variety of topics, but chiefly 
on non-resistance when I gave them all my heresies on that 
point. I wish you could have seen us yes, and been one of 
the group. I had half a dozen opponents, ministers, lawyers, 
merchants, etc.; but they were so effectually answered that 
they knew not which way to turn. The discussion, however, 
was very amicably conducted. 

Some would say, that it was very poor policy to be talking 
about such subjects, if I wished to secure aid to the anti-slavery 
cause, and to make my mission a successful one. Thank God ! 
it is not policy, but principle, by which I mean to be governed 
in my intercourse with my fellow-men ; and while I desire at 
all times to be governed by a sound judgment, and not to be 
guilty of rashness, I will not desist from declaring "the whole 
counsel of God," as opportunity may offer, whether men will 



^ET. 41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 171 

hear or forbear. As Wendell Phillips once finely remarked CHAP. VI. 

" God has not sent me into the world to abolish slavery, but to l{ J7 6 

do my duty." It seems to me that our intercourse with our 

fellow-men will be to little benefit if we confine ourselves to 

the consideration of topics about which we are already agreed, 

or which are of a trivial character. Phrenologically speaking, 

my caution is large, and my combativeness not very active; 

and as I pay no regard whatever to the question of numbers, 

but everything to the question of right, I am not very forward 

in the work of proselytism. 

I have received a very kind note from Francis Bishop, of Rev. F. 
Exeter, in which he says, in relation to the coming of Douglass Bishop. 
and myself to that place "I have spoken to several friends on 
the subject, and they all agree that a public meeting is most 
desirable. We have accordingly decided on having such a 
meeting on Friday evening, in the largest and best public Aug. 28, 
room in Exeter. The people only want to know the facts of l84<5 
American slavery, to be heart and soul with you. I trust we 
shall form an auxiliary to the League in Exeter." We are to 
meet with a select number of friends at Bishop s residence, to 
morrow (Thursday) evening. Thus, you see, our way is fully Aug. 27, 
prepared before us. l84<5- 

Mr. Estlin thinks there ought to be an auxiliary to the League 
in Bristol. This will probably be agreed upon at the close of 
our meeting this evening. Thus far, everything here looks 
auspiciously. 

Among other friendships cemented in Bristol on this MS. Sept. 
visit was that with Mary Carpenter, the philanthropic c arpmierio 
daughter of the Eev. Lant Carpenter, famous in English ^"i6-^ 
Unitarian annals. To mingle much with this denomina 
tion abroad was a novel experience for Mr. Garrison. On 
September 10, 1846, he wrote to his wife : " Unitarianism MS. 
is as odious in this country as ( infidelity is in ours ; but, 
thus far, those who have most zealously espoused my 
mission have been the Unitarians." 1 

1 To S. J. May Mr. Garrison wrote from Boston on Dec. 19, 1846 (MS.) : 
" I am under great obligations to Francis Bishop, William James, H. Solly, 
Philip Carpenter, George Harris, and other Unitarian clergymen, and have 
formed for them a strong personal friendship, which they appear heartily 
to reciprocate. By a letter just received from my dear friend Bishop, he 
informs me that, since I left, his wife has given birth to a daughter, whom 
they have named Caroline Garrison Bishop. This is an indication of their 



172 WILLIAM LLOYD GARBISON. [^T. 41. 



At Exeter, Mr. Garrison was received, at a meeting in 
Lit.i6:i66. the Subscription Rooms, "with enthusiastic shouts of 
welcome." His personal appearance was thus described 
in a local paper : 

Lib. 16:166. " He is an extraordinary man no one could even casually 
look at his grave and thoughtful countenance, beaming with 
love, and tinctured with a shade of profound melancholy, with- 
Under 41. out feelings of the deepest interest. Although under 40, his 
head is quite bald, and he bears strong traces on his counte 
nance of the severe intellectual labor he has gone through. . . . 
His voice is clear, calm, and moderate, in the most harmonious 
tone, and inspired a feeling in his hearers of veneration and 
awe. It may be said of him that he has the courage of a hero, 
the fortitude of a martyr, the piety of a saint, and the zeal of 
an apostle." 

Returning to London, Mr. Garrison was plunged into 
fresh activity. 

W. L. Garrison to Ms Wife. 

Lib I6: LONDON, Sept. 3, 1846. 

Procrastinating, as usual, here I am at the desk of George 
Thompson, at the last moment before the closing of the mail for 
Boston, with pen in hand to send you a few words of greeting, 
with assurances of my health, which never fails to be excellent 
in this climate. 1 My cheeks are quite ruddy, and I have little 

personal regard for me. James Martineau was absent from Liverpool when 
I was there, and I did not see him. I was told that he is considerably preju 
diced against the true anti-slavery band in this country, and sympathizes 
with such men as Drs. [Orville] Dewey and [Francis] Parkman. I meant 
to have visited Harriet [Martineau], at Ambleside, before my return ; but 
she left for Egypt a few days before I sailed, and I missed the coveted 
opportunity. I saw her mother and sister at Newcastle [Lib. 16 : 187]." As 
to the second of the American divines here mentioned, the Rev. Samuel 
May, jr., wrote to Mary Carpenter on July 15, 1851 (MS.) : "Years ago, Dr. 
Parkman declared to me, and others, that no resolution, or action of any 
kind, about slavery, should ever go forth from the American Unitarian 
Association. None ever has. He has carried his point and made good 
his word, and the Unitarian Association is a lifeless, soulless thing, having 
but a name to live." 

1 " The climate of Old England is much more congenial to me than that of 
New England. It affects my voice and lungs much more to give one lecture 
here than it did to deliver half-a-dozen abroad " (MS. Boston, Mar. 1, 1847, 
W. L. G. to H. Q. Wright). 



^T. 41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 173 

doubt that, on my return home, you will find me in a much better CHAP. VI. 
bodily condition than when I left you. That word home excites ^5 
a yearning sensation within me j but I must not think too much 
about it, or I shall be quite unfitted to discharge the duties of my 
mission. . . . 

In addition to addressing a large meeting at the Crown and 
Anchor, I have spoken at a public meeting in regard to the 
atrocious case of the afflicted Rajah of Sattara (of which com 
paratively little is known in America). 1 I was cheered to the 
echo, not so much in consequence of what I said, though that 
was warmly responded to, but because Thompson told them a 
few particulars of my labors in the anti-slavery cause in America. 
Last evening I addressed a large meeting of the Moral Suasion Sept. 2, 
Chartists, for the space of two hours, in the National Hall, l846 
George Thompson in the chair, and, of course, warmly commend 
ing me to the affection and cooperation of the workingmen 
of England. I wish you could have been present to see the 
enthusiasm that was excited. When I rose to address them, 
the applause was long protracted and overpowering. Peal 
after peal, like a thunder-storm, made the building quake ; and, 
at the conclusion of my remarks, they gave me nine hearty 
cheers, and adopted by acclamation a highly flattering resolu 
tion. I did not appear before them in my official capacity, or 
as an abolitionist, technically speaking, but on my own respon 
sibility, uttering such heresies in regard to Church and State 
as occurred to me, and fully identifying myself with all the 
unpopular reformatory movements in this country. This will 
probably alienate some " good society folks " from me, but no 
matter. I know that the cause of my enslaved countrymen 
cannot possibly be injured by my advocacy of the rights of all 
men, or by my opposition to all tyranny. 

I have done a good deal in private as well as in public to 
advance the great object I have in view ; and though with me 
day is turned into night, and night into day, I continue to keep 
in good health which fact will give you as much comfort as 
any that I could possibly send you. 

The next excursion was to Birmingham, with Thompson Sept. 4, 
and Douglass, where, besides a good public meeting, there l846 

1 This anti-slavery prince was one of the victims of the East India Com 
pany. Thompson had been his advocate and champion against the Court 
of Directors for the past seven years, and was at this time in the thick of the 
conflict in London (Lib. 16 : 74, and MS. Sept. 23, 1846, Thompson to W. L. G.). 



174 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. [JET. 41. 

CHAP. vi. was a memorable breakfast with Joseph Sturge, on his 
!^6. invitation. " In the presence of a considerable number 
MS. Sept. of his relatives/ 7 wrote Mr. Garrison to his wife, " for 
5/5!%^ more than an hour, I had a very plain and faithful con- 
^R o webb versa ticm with him, in regard to his treatment of me 
p. s. by G. personally as an abolitionist, and to the unfair and dis 
honorable course of the London Committee towards the 
American An ti- Slavery Society. I have not time to give 
you the particulars of the interview j but it was one of 
confusion to himself, and it deepened my conviction that 
he is anything but a candid, straightforward man. My 
facts he did not attempt to invalidate, but he shuffled in a 
manner truly pitiable." At Sheffield, on September 10, 
the three orators again met in public at the Friends 7 
MS. Sept. Meeting-house " the first one that has yet been offered 
W. L. *G .to to us in this country, and I presume [it] will be the last; 
H. . G. f or j-ke opposition to us, in this country, runs almost 
exclusively in the channels of Quakerism, in consequence 
of the poisonous influence exerted by the Broad-Street 
Committee in London, of which Joseph Sturge is a mem- 
MS. Sept. ber." The poet Montgomery was present, and was deeply 
James Mont- affected by the proceedings. Another auditor was the 
f/"35? ex-Methodist Rev. Joseph Barker, whom Mr. Garrison 
Brady. na( j j us t visited expressly at Leeds, at the instance of his 
MS. Sept. Unitarian friends Mr. Barker having recently gone 
w^L^. to over to that body, to the great scandal of his former 
H. . G. cosectaries. This able but shifting character was well 
calculated to impress Mr. Garrison as one of the most 
remarkable men he had yet met. With eager sympathy 
MS. Sept. the American surveyed his host s printing-office, and " set 
W\ L. G. to some types, just to see how natural it seemed," and lis- 
R. D. Webb, tened to Barker s glowing exposition of the wonders he 
Seethe was about to accomplish in the direction of cheap lit- 

Barker Li- -. , . -r-r-n 

brary, etc. ; erature, by means of ms new power press. Who more 
Lib. 17:57. na tu r ally than this pioneer should be chosen printer of 

the Anti-Slavery League s contemplated organ ? 

Ante, p. 166. A few days after the Exeter Hall meeting, Mr. Garrison 

Sept. is. ka^ good-bye to London, and began his North British 



^T. 41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 175 

tour, reaching Glasgow on September 19, by way of New- CHAP. vi. 
castle and Berwick. His perfervid Scotch friends gave ^e. 
him even less rest than he had snatched in England. On 
October 3, he wrote from Belfast of the past fortnight : 
" I have been hurried from place to place, and held meet- Lib. 16:174. 
ing after meeting, and turned day into night and night 
into day, and spoken in public, and talked almost inces 
santly in private, and come into contact with all sorts of 
minds, so that it is a marvel to me that, mentally, I am 
not in a fever, and, physically, entirely prostrated." Add 
to this the heavy correspondence which his mission 
entailed. In Glasgow he was the guest of Andrew Paton, Sept. 21, 
and at a social tea renewed his friendship with the mem 
bers of the Emancipation Society. A visit to John Murray 
at Bowling Bay and meeting at Greenock were followed Sept. 22. 
at Paisley by the most crowded and enthusiastic meeting Sept. 23; 
he had yet seen on that side of the water; but even for Lt6 - l6:l 74- 
this there were climaxes in store. Thence he passed to Sept. 24. 
Edinburgh, making numerous addresses j to Dundee, a Sept.s&. 
stronghold of the Free Church, where, nevertheless, a 
large impromptu audience gave him hearty applause. 
Again in Edinburgh, where he especially enjoyed the Sept. 29. 
warm hospitality of the Rev. James Robertson, Secretary Lib. 16:174; 
of the Scottish Anti-Slavery Society, a farewell tea-party 
sped him on his way to Glasgow. Here fresh labors, under 
the most cheering auspices, won him a public breakfast at 
the Eagle Hotel, overpowering to his feelings as a testi- Oct. 2, 1846. 
monial of affectionate regard. 

Mr. Garrison s next destination was Belfast, where he 
landed on October 3, to find that sectarianism had, through 
a portion of the press of that city, been raising against 
him the cry of Infidel, with the customary misrepresenta 
tions and fictions. This cost him, however, neither an 
audience nor its approbation. "In fact," he recorded, Lib. 16:174. 
" I have never had any difficulty, either in America or in 
this country, in commending the cause which I plead, and 
the doctrines which I enunciate, to any audience that will 
give me a candid hearing." The journey by stage from LU>. 16: 187. 



176 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. 



. 41. 



CHAP. VI. 

1846, 



MS. Oct. 13, 
1846, R. D. 

Webb to 
W. L. G. 



Lib. 17:11. 



Oct. 14, 
1846. 

Lib. 16:187. 



Ante, p. 175. 



Lib. 16:187; 

MS. Oct. 

24, 1846, 
W. L. G. to 
R.D. Webb. 



MS. Oct. 29, 
W. L. G. 
to Webb. 

Oct. 22, 24, 
26. 

Lib. 1 6 : 205 ; 

Edinburgh 

Chronicle, 

Oct. 24. 



Belfast to Drogheda was through a district already show 
ing the effects of the incipient famine, and Mr. Garrison 
was melted to tears by the frequent sight of human 
wretchedness and suffering along the road. Arrived in 
Dublin on October 5, he rejoined Henry C. Wright at the 
home of the Webbs, who could ill reconcile themselves to 
his limited stay in Ireland. Only one public meeting 
could be arranged, but his review of the Evangelical 
Alliance raised a salutary storm in the Pharisaism of 
Dublin. 1 

Thompson and Douglass greeted him on October 10 in 
Liverpool, and took him directly to Wrexham, in Wales, 
to meet an engagement at the Town Hall, which was 
packed till midnight. At the Free Trade Hall in Man 
chester, on October 12, a glorious gathering of four 
thousand people next awaited him. A short respite 
permitted him to visit Elizabeth Pease in Darlington, 
and gratified him with the personal assurance of her 
improving health. At Newcastle, on October 16, the 
Mayor presided at a meeting which effaced the impres 
sion made at Paisley, and this was succeeded by a public 
breakfast. Liverpool was again reached (by way of Dar 
lington), and, with no thanks to the philanthropists 
of the great port, a meeting at Concert Hall went off 
famously, with Thompson in the chair as President of 
the League. 

Scotland was again royally scoured, in parts already 
gone over (with a superlative occasion at Glasgow in the 
City Hall, lasting five hours on October 28), and also at 
Kirkcaldy, Perth, and Aberdeen. But the most interest 
ing incident of all was the presentation to Mr. Garrison, 
on October 21 (the anniversary of the Boston mob), of 

1 It was during this visit to Dublin that Mr. Garrison sat for the daguerre 
otype which furnished the frontispiece of the present volume. A son of 
Mr. Webb s accompanied him. " While we waited at the artist s we looked 
out of the window. It was a stormy day. The wind blew off a man s hat, 
and he had a stiff race after it, and I remember the shock to my feelings 
that such a great and good man as your father should remark, that he 
always enjoyed seeing a man running after his hat ! " (MS. June 19, 1883, 
Alfred Webb to F. J. G.) 



.T. 41.] THIED ENGLISH MISSION. 177 

a silver tea-service, elaborately chased and properly CHAP. vi. 
inscribed, together with a silk purse containing ten ^e. 
sovereigns, by the anti-slavery ladies of Edinburgh, in 
the Brighton-Street Church. " Such tokens," wrote the 
recipient to Richard Webb, " while they are cheering to MS. Oct. 
me at the present crisis, when such malignant efforts are 24> I 46 
making to cover me with popular odium, 1 make me feel 
as though I had yet to perform much, fully to deserve 
them." 2 

On November 4, Mr. Garrison sailed from Liverpool on 
the Acadia. A large party of friends representatives #.16:201. 
of the three kingdoms who had gathered the night 
before expressly to bid him farewell at the house of 
Richard Rathbone, waved him their long adieus. The 
voices of Thompson and Webb and H. C. Wright swelled 
the cheering led by Frederick Douglass. More than 
twenty years would elapse before the voyager s eye 
should again behold the pleasant English shores now 
vanishing behind him. From Halifax on the eleventh MS. NOV. 
day he pencilled a line to Elizabeth Pease, informing 
her of the smooth and safe passage, attended, neverthe 
less, with more than the ordinary discomforts for his 
overtaxed system. 3 On November 17, he landed in 

1 Speaking in the City Hall at Glasgow with reference to the underhand 
calumniation of himself and his associates, Mr. Garrison " solemnly de 
clared, after an eighteen years anti-slavery experience in the United 
States of America, that he had seen nothing more wicked or malicious, 
more wanton and cruel, than he had beheld within the last three or four 
weeks emanating from the apologists of the Free Church and the Evangel 
ical Alliance " (Glasgow Argus, Oct. 29, 1846; and see, in the Argus for Oct. 
15, Mr. Garrison s dissection of a hostile article in the Scottish Guardian. 
Further, for charges of infidelity by Dr. Campbell in his Christian Witness, 
see Lib. 17:5, 21, 121 ; and by Dr. Cunningham, Lib. 17 : 9). His clerical 
traducers never faced him in public. 

2 A breakfast by invitation with George Combe, perhaps on Oct. 22, in 
company with Thompson, Douglass, and Buffum, was another pleasurable 
incident of this visit to Edinburgh ( Life of Douglass, ed. 1882, p. 245). 

3 On December 11, 1846, Mr. Garrison wrote to Geo. W. Benson (MS.) : 
" The Garrisonian ranks are filling up. This morning, dear Helen presented 
me with a new-comer into this breathing world, a daughter, and the 
finest babe ever yet born in Boston ! " On Dec. 19 he informed S. J. May 
(MS. ) that the little girl had been named Elizabeth Pease. Wendell Phillips 

VOL. III. 12 



178 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKBISON. 



. 41. 



CHAP. VI. 

1846. 

Lib. 16: 191, 
194, 202. 



Lib. 17 : 6, 

and MS. 



Jas. Miller 

McKim. 

The letter is 

post-marked 

Dec. 27, 

1846. 



Boston, having just rounded the fourth month of his 
absence. 

We pass over the receptions given to him by the 
colored people at Belknap- Street Church j in Salem j in 
Faneuil Hall. Rather let us look in, with a poet s eye, 
on the reunited abolitionists at the Anti-Slavery Bazaar, 
opened in the same hall on December 22. Never was 
more humor combined with a finer discernment of char 
acter and more exquisite portraiture than in these lines, 
written as a " Letter from Boston " to the editor of the 
Pennsylvania Freeman, by James Russell Lowell : 

Dear M., 

By way of saving time, 
I 11 do this letter up in rhyme, 
Whose slim stream through four pages flows 
Ere one is packed with tight-screwed prose, 
Threading the tube of an epistle 
Smooth as a child s breath through a whistle. 

The great attraction now of all 

Is the " Bazaar " at Faneuil Hall, 

Where swarm the An ti- Slavery folks 

As thick, dear Miller, as your jokes. 

There s Garrison, his features very 

Benign for an incendiary, 

Beaming forth sunshine through his glasses 

On the surrounding lads and lasses, 

(No bee could blither be or brisker,) 

A Pickwick somehow turned John Ziska, 

His bump of firmness swelling up 

Like a rye cupcake from its cup. 

And there, too, was his English tea-set, 

Which in his ear a kind of flea set, 

His Uncle Samuel for its beauty 

Demanding sixty dollars duty, 

( T was natural Sam should serve his trunk ill, 

For G., you know, has cut his uncle,) 

wrote to her namesake on Jan. 31, 1847 (MS.) : " Garrison s child is a nice, 
healthy, dark-eyed little thing, much like his other little one, Helen. I am 
glad he has called it E. P., for you will feel more fully than ever convinced 
that the best ones on your side the water do not love and value you more 
than the best one here does." 



JET. 41.] 



THIED ENGLISH MISSION. 



179 



Whereas, had he but once made tea in it, 
His uncle s ear had had the flea in it, 
There being not a cent of duty 
On any pot that ever drew tea. 1 

There was Maria Chapman, too, 
With her swift eyes of clear steel-blue, 
The coiled-up mainspring of the Fair, 
Originating everywhere 
The expansive force without a sound 
That whirled a hundred wheels around, 
Herself meanwhile as calm and still 
As the bare crown of Prospect Hill ; 
A noble woman, brave and apt, 
Cumsea s sybil not more rapt, 
Who might, with those fair tresses shorn, 
The Maid of Orleans casque have worn, 
Herself the Joan of our Ark, 
For every shaft a shining mark. 

And there, too, was Eliza Follen, 
Who scatters fruit- creating pollen 
Where er a blossom she can find 
Hardy enough for Truth s north wind, 
Each several point of all her face 
Tremblingly bright with the inward grace, 
As if all motion gave it light 
Like phosphorescent seas at night. 

There jokes our Edmund, plainly son 
Of him who bearded Jefferson, 

1 The tea-set was appraised at 40. Mr. Garrison s protest to the Col 
lector of the port of Boston, on the ground of the obvious uncommercial 
nature of the entry, was disregarded (Lib. 16 : 206 ; 17 : 6). Had the service 
been imported (say) by Daniel Webster, under like circumstances, it is in 
credible that the duty would not have been remitted (Lib. 17 : 122). The 
sum extorted was refunded to Mr. Garrison by his female friends, through 
the exertions of Mrs. Eliza F. Meriam, daughter of Francis Jackson. In 
thanking one of the donors, Mr. Garrison wrote : "Next to a fort, arsenal, 
naval vessel, and military array, I hate a custom-house not because of 
the tax it imposed on the friendly Scottish gift, but as a matter of principle. 
I go for free trade and free intercommunication the world over, and deny 
the right of any body of men to erect geographical or national barriers in 
opposition to these natural, essential, and sacred rights" (M.S. July 30, 
1847, to Mrs. Louisa Loring). 



CHAP. VI. 
1846. 



Somerville, 
Mass. 



E. Quincy. 



180 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



[>T. 41. 



CHAP. VI. 
1846. 



W. Phillips. 



A non-resistant by conviction, 
But with a bump in contradiction, 
So that whene er it gets a chance 
His pen delights to play the lance, 
And you may doubt it or believe it 
Full at the head of Joshua Leavitt 
The very calumet he 7 d launch, 
And scourge him with the olive -branch. 
A master with the foils of wit, 
T is natural he should love a hit ; 
A gentleman, withal, and scholar, 
Only base things excite his choler, 
And then his satire s keen and thin 
As the lithe blade of Saladin. 
Good letters are a gift apart, 
And his are gems of Flemish art, 
True offspring of the fireside Muse, 
Not a chip-gathering of news 
Like a new hopfield which is all poles, 
But of one blood with Horace Walpole s. 

There, with one hand behind his back, 
Stands Phillips buttoned in a sack, 
Our Attic orator, our Chatham ; 
Old fogies, when he lightens at em, 
Shrivel like leaves ; to him t is granted 
Always to say the word that s wanted, 
So that he seems but speaking clearer 
The tiptoe thought of every hearer ; 
Each flash his brooding heart lets fall 
Fires what s combustible in all, 
And sends the applauses bursting in 
Like an exploded magazine. 
His eloquence no frothy show, 
The gutter s street -polluted flow, 
No Mississippi s yellow flood 
Whose shoalness can t be seen for mud ; 
So simply clear, serenely deep, 
So silent-strong its graceful sweep, 
None measures its unrippling force 
Who has not striven to stem its course ; 
How fare their barques who think to play 
With smooth Niagara s mane of spray, 



41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 181 

Let Austin s total shipwreck say. Jos. T. Aus 



tin; ante, 
2 



He never spoke a word too much 
Except of Story, or some such, Joseph 

Whom, though condemned by ethics strict, #. 12^74. 

The heart refuses to convict. 

Beyond, a crater in each eye, 

Sways brown, broad-shouldered Pillsbury, 1 

Who tears up words like trees by the roots, 

A Theseus in stout cowhide boots, 

The wager of eternal war 

Against that loathsome Minotaur 

To whom we sacrifice each year 

The best blood of our Athens here 

(Dear M., pray brush up your Lempriere.) 

A terrible denouncer he, 

Old Sinai burns unquenchably 

Upon his lips ; he well might be a 

Hot-blazing soul from fierce Judaea, 

Habakkuk, Ezra, or Hosea. 

His words burn as with iron searers, 

And nightmare-like he mounts his hearers, 

Spurring them like avenging Fate, or 

As Waterton his alligator. Chas. Wa- 

terton. 

Hard by, as calm as summer even, 

Smiles the reviled and pelted Stephen, s. S. Foster. 

The unappeasable Boanerges 

To all the Churches and the Clergies, 

The grim savant who, to complete 

His own peculiar cabinet, 

Contrived to label with his kicks 

One from the followers of Hicks j Elias Hicks. 

1 Parker Pillsbury, though a native of Massachusetts, became identified 
by his home life and anti-slavery labors principally with New Hampshire. 
He succeeded to the editorship of the Herald of Freedom when N. P. Rogers 
broke with his old associates. His autobiography is to be gathered from 
his Acts of the Anti-Slavery Apostles. " Could you know him and his 
history, you would value him," wrote "Wendell Phillips to Elizabeth Pease, 
Jan. 10, 1853 (MS.). * Originally a wagoner, he earned enough to get edu 
cated. When just ready to be settled, the Faculty of Andover Theological 
Institution threatened him that they would never recommend him to a 
parish unless he gave up speaking in anti-slavery meetings. He chose us, 
and sacrificed all the benefits (worldly and pecuniary) of his hard-earned 
education. His course since has been worthy of this beginning." 



182 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKEISON. 



. 41. 



CHAP. VI. 
1846. 



I.e., the 

clergy. 



Abby Kelley 
Foster. 



Who studied mineralogy 

Not with soft book upon the knee, 

But learned the properties of stones 

By contact sharp of flesh and bones, 

And made the experimentum crucis 

With his own body s vital juices : 

A man with caoutchouc endurance, 

A perfect gem for life insurance, 

A kind of maddened John the Baptist, 

To whom the harshest word comes aptest, 

Who, struck by stone or brick ill-starred, 

Hurls back an epithet as hard, 

Which, deadlier than stone or brick, 

Has a propensity to stick. 

His oratory is like the scream 

Of the iron horse s phrenzied steam 

Which warns the world to leave wide space 

For the black engine s swerveless race. 

Ye men with neckcloths white, I warn you 

Hdbet a whole haymow in cornu. 

A Judith, there, turned Quakeress, 

Sits Abby in her modest dress, 

Serving a table quietly, 

As if that mild and downcast eye 

Flashed never, with its scorn intense, 

More than Medea s eloquence. 

So the same force which shakes its dread 

Far-blazing locks o er ^Etna s head. 

Along the wires in silence fares 

And messages of commerce bears. 

No nobler gift of heart and brain, 

No life more white from spot or stain, 

Was e er on Freedom s altar laid 

Than hers the simple Quaker maid. 

These last three (leaving in the lurch 
Some other themes) assault the Church, 
Who therefore writes them in her lists 
As Satan s limbs and atheists ; 
For each sect has one argument 
Whereby the rest to hell are sent, 
Which serves them like the Graiee s tooth, 



41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 183 

Passed round in turn from mouth to mouth ; CHAP. VI. 

If any ism should arise, j^7 6 

They look on it with constable s eyes, 

Tie round its neck a heavy athe-, 

And give it kittens hydropathy. 

This trick with other (useful very) tricks 

Is laid to the Babylonian meretrix, 

But t was in vogue before her day 

Wherever priesthoods had their way, 

And Buddha s Popes with this struck dumb 

The foUowers of Fi and Fum. 

Well, if the world with prudent fear 

Pays God a seventh of the year, 

And as a Farmer, who would pack 

All his religion in one stack, 

For this world works six days in seven 

And on the seventh works for Heaven, 

Expecting, for his Sunday s sowing, 

In the next world to go a-mowing 

The crop of all his meeting-going ; 

If the poor Church, by power enticed, 

Finds none so infidel as Christ, 

Quite backward reads his Gospel meek, 

(As t were in Hebrew writ, not Greek,) 

Fencing the gallows and the sword 

With conscripts drafted from his word, 

And makes one gate of Heaven so wide 

That the rich orthodox might ride 

Through on their camels, while the poor 

Squirm through the scant, unyielding door, 

Which, of the Gospel s straitest size, 

Is narrower than beadneedles eyes, 

What wonder World and Church should call 

The true faith atheistical ? 

Yet, after all, twixt you and me, 
Dear Miller, I could never see 
That Sin s and Error s ugly smirch 
Stained the walls only of the Church ; 
There are good priests, and men who take 
Freedom s torn cloak for lucre s sake, 
I can t believe the Church so strong, 



184 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAERISON. 



. 41. 



CHAP. VI. 
1846. 



Lib. 16:82, 
167. 



Geo. N. 

Briggs, 

Wm. Slade. 

Lib. 16:87, 
90, 91, 113. 

Ante, p. 139. 

MS. Sept. 

30, 1846, 

F. Jackson 

to W. L. G. 



Lid. 16:182. 



Lib. 16 : 194. 



Lib. 16 : 194. 



As some men do, for Right or Wrong. 

But for this subject (long and vext) 

I must refer you to my next, 

As also for a list exact 

Of goods with which the Hall was packed. 1 

The author of the Biglow Papers had already begun 
that inimitable satire of the national crime against Mexico, 
marked, so far, by Taylor s military successes at Mata- 
moras and Monterey. The demoralization which war 
immediately produces as a mere status, was lamentably 
shown by the compliance of the Whig governors Briggs 
and Slade (of Massachusetts and Vermont respectively) 
with the President s request for a State call for volunteers. 
This action did not prevent the party from renominating 
Briggs, nor did Robert C. Winthrop s acceptance of the 
war afford a sufficient handle to the Conscience Whigs (as 
Charles Francis Adams denominated those who were not 
Cotton Whigs) to deprive him of a renomination. The 
Cotton Whigs swept the State. One heard Daniel Web 
ster proclaim in Faueuil Hall : " I am for the Constitution 
as our fathers left it to us, and standing by it and dying 
by it." But also one heard John Quincy Adams, from his 
home in Quincy, deny that there was anything left to 
stand by : " The Constitution of the United States stat 
magni nominis umbra." This quotation, said the editor of 
the Liberator, " indicates pretty clearly the position and 
feelings of this venerable statesman in regard to the 
American Union. . . . Then if it be only a shadow 
that is left to us, it is at best but a mockery, and ought 
not to be treated as a reality. . . . Let Daniel Webster, 
the greatest and meanest of his countrymen, exhaust his 
powers of eulogy upon it, if he will : the effort will but 

1 Referring to her husband s Hudibrastic production, Maria Lowell wrote 
from Cambridge to Maria Mott Davis (MS. Jan. 8, 1847) : " I wonder if you 
enjoyed his description of the Fair as much as I did. I saw Garrison the 
other day, and he seemed to be especially pleased with it, and the account 
of Stephen Foster delighted him. Of that and Maria Chapman he spoke 
most particularly. Miller made one error, and only one, in his copy, and 
that was sweet instead of swift eyes. Mrs. Chapman s eyes are not 
sweet, but swift expresses exactly their rapid, comprehensive glance." 



^T. 41.] THIKD ENGLISH MISSION. 185 

render his character base and contemptible with posterity. CHAP. vi. 
What the people need is a new government a free gov- ^g. 
ernment no slavery no guaranties to men-stealers 
<NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS! " 

We might end here, if it were not instructive to remark 
on Liberty Party endorsement of the Mexican War, even Lib. 16:115; 
Gamaliel Bailey, in his Philanthropist, praying for the 
safety of the " noble " Taylor and his " brave army." 
There were other proofs that the party was in a bad way. 
In the spring of 1846 one of its thirty organs affirmed that 
"its present position is inaction a perfect standstill." Lib. 16:57. 
Almost " at a dead stand n was William Goodell s report 
of progress, speaking both for New York and for Massa 
chusetts. In Maine the State Convention admitted that 
the party there merely held its own, and looked forward 
to " certain death " for the party at large if the stationary 
stage were not quickly escaped Joshua Leavitt himself Lib. 16:57. 
being present, and discounting the impending catastrophe 
by denying that the party and the ballot-box were the sole cf. ante, 
means of abolishing slavery. Bailey gave a discouraging 
account of the Ohio section, and predicted that all would 
be over with it if it manifested no strength in the coming 
gubernatorial election. Gerrit Smith lamented in New Lib. 16:77. 
York a falling away on all sides, and W. L. Chaplin and 
J. C. Jackson confirmed his statements. Only one dollar 
was raised to ten formerly. Edmund Quincy judged it at Lib. 16: 174, 
this time to be on its last legs j and the fall elections 
showed that it could send only five Representatives out of Lib. 16 : 194. 
232 to the Massachusetts lower House, polling a total vote 
of about 10,000. In New York it cast but 12,000 votes, Lib. 17:11. 
against 16,000 in 1844. Quincy was quite right in assur- Lib. 16:194. 
ing Webb that 

** There are many more A. S. Whigs and Democrats than MS. Mar. 
Third Party men, and many more Whig papers, especially, ^ f 1 ^ 
which are more thoroughly anti-slavery than any of the Third 17:170. 
Party ones. There is not a Third Party paper that compares in 
thoroughness and usef ulness with the Boston Whig, or even the 
N. Y. Tribune. And they have not a man who comes near Charles 



186 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [^T. 41. 



CHAP. VI. F. Adams (son of J. Q. A.), editor of the Whig, Charles Sunmer, 
I8 ~ 6 J. G. Palfrey, S. G. Howe, Stephen C. Phillips, and others of the 
A. S. Whigs, in point of character, talent, or social standing. 
These gentlemen are high-minded, honorable, well-educated 
men, who would compare favorably with any public men you 
have in Parliament. And they have actually sacrificed political 
prospects and caste by their A. S. course, which is more than can 
be said of a single Third Party man because I know of none 
who had anything of the sort to lose. Yet we cannot admit 
these men though so much better abolitionists, and so many 
more of them to be the real thing, any more than the Third 
Party men, as long as, like them, they are ready to swear to 
support the U. S. Constitution and to perform its pro-slavery 
provisions." 



CHAPTER VII. 
FIRST WESTERN TOUR. 1847. 

EARLY in 1847, Mr. Garrison was solicited by the MS. Mar. 
abolitionists of Ohio to visit their section of the 
country ; and in the Liberator of March 19 he gave notice G 

that he would spend the month of August in that State. Lib - 17=46- 
This decision led to numerous invitations from friends in 2 8, 1847, 
Central New York, as well as in Pennsylvania, along the 
two lines of Western travel. The programme, as finally 
made up, chose the Southern route for the outward trip, A. 
and the Northern for the homeward. #. 17-122. 

The intervening months were spent in the usual manner 
in editorial drudgery, in occasional lecturing, in attend 
ance at the three great anniversaries in Boston and New 
York. Opposition to the Mexican War, and reiterated Lib. 17 -.2, 
appeals for a peaceable dissolution of the Union, were the ^ ^ , 46! 
regular anti-slavery work of the year, to which was added 
support of the Wilmot Proviso, or the attempt in Congress Lib. 17: 193. 
to ensure freedom to the territory certain to be acquired, 
by force or purchase, of Mexico. In Massachusetts, little 
was needed to maintain the Legislature in its attitude of Lib. 17:14, 
aversion to the war, or to procure its endorsement of the 
Proviso; but to disunion it of course turned a cold Lib. 17:58. 
shoulder. 

As usual, too, Mr. Garrison s lecture topics embraced 
religion and peace as well as abolition ; and in the philan 
thropic anniversary month we have a glimpse of him amid 
kindred spirits. The Rev. Samuel May, Jr., 1 writes to 
Mary Carpenter from Boston, May 29, 1847 : 

iMr. May a Unitarian clergyman residing at Leicester, Mass., and uni 
versally esteemed and beloved in his own denomination ; a cousin of S. J. 

187 



188 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. [^T. 42. 

MS. li We had an exceedingly interesting meeting yesterday after 

noon and evening, at the house of Eev. Theodore Parker, in 
this city. He styled it, in his notes of invitation, a l Council of 
Reformers, and the object was to discuss the general principles 
of Reform, and the best means of promoting it. Let me give 
you the names of some of those present Ralph Waldo Emer 
son, Amos B. Alcott, William Henry Channing, James F. Clarke, 
William Lloyd Garrison, Wendell Phillips, Edmund Quincy, 
Mrs. M. W. Chapman, Mrs. Follen, James and Lucretia Mott 
and daughter of Philadelphia, Caleb Stetson, John L. Russell, 
Francis Jackson, Charles Sumner, Samuel G. Howe, E. H. 
Chapin, Joshua P. Blanchard, Samuel E. Coues of Portsmouth, 
Elizur Wright, Jr., Walter Channing. I have not yet given all 
the names. It was a matter of deep interest even to see this 
collection of the men alive of our neighborhood and day. From 
4 to 10 P. M., with a short interval for tea, a most spirited con 
versation was held on all the great Reform subjects of the day. 
I am more than ever convinced that the Anti-Slavery Reform 
carries all others with it, and that its triumph will be theirs." 

Mr. Garrison set out from Boston on the 2d of August, 

Lib. 17: 122. 1847. With the utmost disinterestedness, Edmund Quincy 

had again assumed the charge of conducting the Liberator 

in his absence, neither of them foreseeing how long a time 

would elapse before the editor could resume his chair. 

May, and worthy to be such ; a graduate of Harvard College in the class of 
1829 with Wm. Henry Channing, J. F. Clarke, and other men of national 
and world- wide reputation had now become the General Agent of the 
Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society (Lib. 17 : 94). This position he filled, 
with the greatest fidelity and self-abnegation, to the close of the anti-slavery 
struggle, to which no one brought richer gifts of integrity, humanity, cul 
ture inherited and personal. " I was," he wrote to Miss Carpenter, July 
15, 1851, "a birthright Unitarian grew up to think their ministers 
faultless men, almost honest and fearless seekers for the truth and the 
right. I was for many years their fellow-laborer, admirer, and defender, 
and devoted to the Unitarian cause. My eyes opened very slowly to the 
defection and decline of the early Unitarian spirit. Many preceded me in 
their witness against the bigotry, narrowness, and worldliness which crept 
into and subjected the Unitarian body till now, in its organized move 
ment at least, it has become what I have already expressed [" a lifeless, 
soulless thing "]. It was with a great price at a great sacrifice of feeling, 
ease, and social consideration (I may say this to you, which I would not wish 
to dwell upon at all) that I purchased my freedom from those chains of 
sectarianism ; which I would not reassume this hour, if the whole world s 
wealth were the bribe to do so. I look now upon those chains with some 
thing like loathing " (MS.)- 



JET. 42.] FIRST WESTERN TOUR. 189 

Nor, happily, could Mrs. Garrison realize that her husband, 
whose health latterly had been far from good, was taking MS. June 
leave of her at a risk surpassing that of the voyage to "w, L 4 G. 
England the year before. The progress of his tour, in ** 
which he was to have the companionship of Frederick 
Douglass, can best be shown from his letters to her : 

W. L. Garrison to his Wife. 

PHILADELPHIA, Aug. 3, 1847. MS. 

A year ago, this day, I arrived in London, and was, there- Anfe,j>.i$6. 
fore, at a distance of three thousand miles from you. Now I am 
in Philadelphia, some three hundred miles away. So far as 
separation is concerned, it is the same whether we are hundreds 
or thousands of miles apart ; but then, as a matter of speedy 
return, it is a matter of very great consequence as to what the 
relative distance may be. I could be with you in less than 
twenty-four hours, if necessary that is comforting. . . . 

Our trip from Norwich to New York was as serene and quiet Aug. 2-3. 
as possible, where we arrived at 5 o clock. At 9 o clock, I Aug. 3. 
crossed the ferry and took the cars for Philadelphia arriving 
at 2 o clock, J. M. McKim being at the wharf to escort me to the 
dear home of our beloved friends, James and Lucretia Mott, 
who gave me a warm reception, of course. 

August?. MS., and 

Our three-days meeting at Norristown closed last evening, 
and a famous time we have had of it. Every day, two or three I0 g& annual 
hundred of our friends from Philadelphia came up in the cars, j? ee p"nf t 
and the meetings were uniformly crowded by an array of men A. S. S. 
and women who, for thorough-going anti-slavery spirit and 
solidity of character, are not surpassed by any in the world. 
Douglass arrived on the second day, and was justly the " lion" Aug. 5. 
of the occasion, though a considerable number participated in Lib. 17:137. 
the discussions ; our friend Lucretia Mott speaking with excel 
lent propriety and effect. Thomas Earle was present to annoy 
us, as usual. Our meetings were not molested in any manner, 
excepting one evening when Douglass and I held a meeting 
after dark, when a few panes of glass were broken by some 
rowdy boys while D. was speaking. It was a grand meeting, 
nevertheless, and the house crowded with a noble auditory to the 
end. The meetings will have a powerful effect in the prose- 



190 WILLIAM LLOYD GAEEISON. I>T. 42, 

CHAP. VII. cution of our cause for the coming year. It was worth a trip 

1847 from Boston to Norristown merely to look at those who assembled 

on the occasion. I regret that I have as yet found no time to 

write a sketch of this anniversary for the Liberator. As Sydney 

Lib. 17:137, H. Gay was present, both the Standard and Pennsylvania Free 
man must be referred to for an account of it, prior to any that 
I shall be able to make of it. 

This morning, we leave in the cars for Harrisburg, which, 
though the capital of the State, is very much under the influence 
of Slavery. I do not anticipate a quiet meeting, but we shall 
bear our testimony boldly, nevertheless. 

W. L. Garrison to his Wife. 

MS and HARRISBURG, Aug. 9, 1847. 

Lib. 17:135 Q n Saturday morning, Douglass and I bade farewell to our 
Aug. 7. kind friends in Philadelphia, and took the cars for this place, 
... a distance of 106 miles. Before we started, an incident 
occurred which evinced something of that venomous pro-slavery 
spirit which pervades the public sentiment in proportion as you 
approach the borders of the slave States. There is no distinc 
tion made at Philadelphia in the cars on account of complexion, 
though colored persons usually sit near the doors. Douglass 
took a seat in one of the back cars before I arrived ; and, while 
quietly looking out at the window, was suddenly accosted in a 
slave-driving tone, and ordered to " get out of that seat," by a 
man who had a lady with him, and who might have claimed the 
right to eject any other passenger for his accommodation with 
as much propriety. Douglass quietly replied, that if he would 
make his demand in the form of a gentlemanly request, he 
would readily vacate his seat. His lordly commander at once 
laid violent hands upon him, and dragged him out. Douglass 
submitted to this outrage unresistingly, but told his assailant 
that he behaved like a bully, and therefore precluded him (D.) 
from meeting him with his own weapons. The only response of 
the other was, that he would knock D. s teeth down his throat 
if he repeated the charge. The name of this man was soon 
ascertained to be John A. Fisher of Harrisburg, a lawyer ; and 
the only palliation (if it be one) that I hear offered for his con 
duct is, that he was undoubtedly under the influence of intoxi 
cating liquor. This was a foretaste of the violence to be 
experienced on our attempting to lecture here, and which I 
anticipated even before I left Boston. 



. 42.] 



FIKST WESTEEN TOUK. 



191 



Though the cars (compared with our Eastern ones) look as if CHAP. VII. 



1847. 



Aug. 7. 

W. W. 
Rutherford. 



Aug. 7, 8. 



they were made a century ago, and are quite uncomfortable, 
yet the ride was far from being irksome, on account of the all- 
pervading beauty and opulence of the country through which 
we passed, so far as a fine soil and natural scenery are concerned. 
We passed through the counties of Philadelphia, Chester, Lan 
caster, and a portion of Dauphin, and, through the whole dis 
tance, saw but a single spot that reminded us of our rocky 
New England. Arriving at 3 o clock, we found at the depot, 
awaiting our coming, Dr. Rutherford, an old subscriber to the 
Liberator, and his sister-in-law, Agnes Crane, both of them true 
and faithful to the anti-slavery cause in the midst of a perverse 
and prejudiced people ; and also several of our colored friends, Lib. 17:122. 
with one of whom (Mr. Wolf, an intelligent and worthy man) 
Douglass went home, having previously engaged to do so; 
while I went with Dr. Rutherford, and received a cordial wel 
come from his estimable lady. 

The Court House had been obtained for us for Saturday and 
Sunday evenings. Hitherto, nearly all the anti-slavery lecturers 
have failed to gather any considerable number together ; but, on 
this occasion, we had the room filled, some of the most respect 
able citizens being present. At an early period of the evening, 
before the services commenced, it was evident that mischief 
was brewing and an explosion would ultimately follow. I first 
addressed the meeting, and was listened to, not only without 
molestation, but with marked attention and respect, though my 
remarks were stringent, and my accusations severe. As soon, 
however, as Douglass rose to speak, the spirit of rowdyism be 
gan to show itself outside of the building, around the door and 
windows. It was the first time that a " nigger " had attempted 
to address the people of Harrisburg in public, and it was re 
garded by the mob as an act of unparalleled audacity. They 
knew nothing at all of Douglass, except that he was a " nig 
ger." They came equipped with rotten eggs and brickbats, fire 
crackers, and other missiles, and made use of them somewhat 
freely breaking panes of glass, and soiling the clothes of 
some who were struck by the eggs. One of these bespattered 
my head and back somewhat freely. Of course there was a 
great deal of yelling and shouting, and of violent exclamation 
such as, " Out with the damned nigger," etc., etc. The audience 
at first manifested considerable alarm, but I was enabled to 
obtain a silent hearing for a few moments, when I told the 
meeting that if this was a specimen of Harrisburg decorum 



192 WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. OT. 42. 



CHAP. VII. and love of liberty, instead of wasting our breath upon the 
j^T 7 place, we should turn our backs upon it, shaking off the dust 
of our feet, etc., etc. 

W. L. Garrison to Ms Wife. 

MS. PITTSBURGH, Aug. 12, 1847. 

A r .M^ y I endeavored to complete a letter for you at Harrisburg, 

Aug. 9. before leaving for this place on Monday morning, but was able 
to write only a portion of one before it was time to be at the 
depot. In my perplexity, not knowing what else to do, I 
requested a colored friend to finish my letter, explaining to 
you the reason why he did so, and put it into the post-office. 
He promised to do so, and I hope was faithful to his promise. 
As I left off, just as I was giving you the particulars of the 
rowdyish outbreak at our meeting at H., I requested Mr. Brown 
to mention that no attempt was made to molest me, and that 
Douglass escaped without any serious injury, although he was 
struck in the back by a stone, and a brickbat just grazed his 
head. All the venom of the rowdies seemed to be directed against 
him, as they were profoundly ignorant of his character. . . . 

Aug. 8. On Sunday forenoon and afternoon, we addressed our colored 

friends in their meeting-house at H., at which a number of white 
ones were also present. The meetings were crowded, and a 
most happy time we had indeed. Not the slightest molestation 
was offered. 

Aug. 9. On Monday, we left Harrisburg in the cars for Chambers- 
burg, a distance of fifty-four miles. On arriving, to our serious 
regret we found that the ticket which Douglass obtained 
at H. for Pittsburgh enabled him to go directly through in 
the 2 o clock stage, while I should be compelled to wait until 
8 o clock (it proved to be 11 o clock) in the evening. This was 
annoying and unpleasant in the extreme. Douglass had a hard 
time of it, after we parted. The route over the Allegheny 
mountains, although a very beautiful and sublime one, is a 
very slow and difficult one, and, with a crowded stage, in a 
melting hot day, is quite overpowering. It seemed to me 
almost interminable almost equal to a trip across the Atlantic. 
Lib. 17: 149. Douglass was not allowed to sit at the eating- table, on the way, 
and for two days and nights scarcely tasted a morsel of food. 
0, what brutality ! Only think of it, and then of the splendid 
reception given to him in all parts of Great Britain ! On his 
arriving at Pittsburgh, however, a different reception awaited 



. 42.] 



FIKST WESTEKN TOUK. 



193 



1847. 

Aug. ii, 

1847. 



Aug. n. 



Aug. 12. 



him, which was also intended for me. A committee of twenty CHAP. VII. 
white and colored friends, with a colored band of music, who 
had sat up all night till 3 o clock in the morning, met him 
to welcome him to the place, and to discourse eloquent music 
to him. Of course, they were greatly disappointed at my not 
coming at that time. 

I arrived towards evening, entirely exhausted, but soon 
recovered myself by a good warm bath. A meeting had been 
held in the afternoon in the Temperance Hall, which was ably 
addressed by Douglass. In the evening, we held one together 
in the same place, crowded to overflowing. [August 13.] Yes 
terday, Friday [Thursday], we held three large meetings, two 
of them in the open air, and concluded last night with the 
greatest enthusiasm. I have seen nothing like to it on this 
side of the Atlantic. The place seems to be electrified, and the 
hearts of many are leaping for joy. 

This morning, Saturday [Friday], we are off for New 
Brighton, where we are to have a meeting this afternoon, 
and others to-morrow. I have not a moment of time, scarcely, 
left to myself. Company without end meetings continuously 
from day to day little or no sleep it is [with] the greatest 
difficulty I can find time to send you a single line in regard to 
my tour. As for the Liberator, I cannot give any sketch for the 
public eye, but hope to be able to do so in a few days. 



Beaver Co., 
Penn. 



W. L. Garrison to his Wife. 

YOUNGSTOWN [Ohio], Aug. 16, 1847. MS. 

I scribbled a few hasty lines for you at Pittsburgh, just before 
leaving that busy, though dingy and homely city a city which 
so closely resembles the manufacturing towns in England that 
I almost fancied I was once more on the other side of the 
Atlantic. So, too, the enthusiasm manifested at our meetings 
was altogether in the English style. For example, at the close Ante, p. 173. 
of our last meeting, three tremendous cheers were given to 
Douglass, three for Foster, and three for myself. Everything s. S. Foster. 
passed off in the most spirited and agreeable manner. 

On Friday, we took the steamer for Beaver, on the Ohio 
River, . . . and from thence rode to New Brighton in an 
omnibus, some three or four miles, accompanied by several of 
our colored Pittsburgh friends J. B. Vashon and son (George 
B.), Dr. Peck, Dr. Delaney (editor of the Mystery, black as jet, 
VOL. III. 13 



Aug. 13. 



M. R. De 
laney. 



194 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



[2ET. 42. 



1847. 



C. C. Bur- 
leigh, P. 
Pillsbury. 

Hosea 4 : 9. 



CHAP. VII. and a fine fellow of great energy and spirit), and others 
where we had a most cordial welcome from Milo A. Townsend 
and his wife and parents, Dr. Weaver, Timothy White, etc., etc. 
Milo is one of the truest reformers in the land, and wields a 
potent reformatory pen, but his organ of hope is not quite 
large enough. There seems to be no branch of reform to which 
he has not given some attention. 

New Brighton is a small village of eight hundred inhabitants, 
but there are several other villages in its immediate neighbor 
hood. There have been a good many lectures on slavery given 
in it by our leading anti-slavery lecturers such as Stephen and 
A. K. Foster, Burleigh, Pillsbury, Douglass, etc. ; but the people 
generally remain incorrigible. The secret is, they are much 
priest-ridden thus confirming afresh the assertion of the 
prophet, "like people, like priest." The Hicksite Quakers 
have a meeting-house here, but they are generally pro-slavery 
in spirit. No place could be obtained for our meeting except 
ing the upper room of a large store, which was crowded to 
excess, afternoon and evening, several hundred persons being 
present, and many other persons not being able to obtain 
admittance. In the evening, there were some symptoms of 
pro-slavery rowdyism outside the building, but nothing beyond 
the yelling of young men and boys. Over our heads in the 
room, were piled up across the beams many barrels of flour ; 
and while we were speaking, the mice were busy in nibbling at 
them, causing their contents to whiten some of our dresses, and 
thinking, perchance, that our speeches needed to be a little 
more floury. . . . The meetings were addressed at consider 
able length by Douglass and myself, and also by Dr. Delaney, 
who spoke on the subject of prejudice against color in a very 
witty and energetic manner. Douglass was well-nigh run down, 
and spoke with much physical debility. . . . 

Saturday forenoon, Milo [Townsend], Dr. Peck, Dr. Weaver, 
Charles Schirras, and myself, ascended a very steep eminence 
across the river, three hundred feet high, where we had a 
beautiful prospect, reminding me somewhat of the view from 
the top of Mount Holyoke, at Northampton, though it was not 
so fine or extensive, of course. . . . On reaching Milo s 
house, I was thoroughly tired out, and wet through and 
through by the perspiration. Indeed, throughout our journey, 
the weather has been uniformly and exceedingly warm, and I 
have been " wet to the skin " nearly all the time. To make 
frequent and long harangues, under such circumstances, is 



Aug. 14, 
1847. 



. 42.] 



FIKST WESTERN TOUK. 



195 



quite overpowering. I have never perspired so much in my 
life. The quantity of water thus exuded through the pores of 
the skin has astonished me, and I marvel that anything is left 
of me in the shape of solid matter. 

Saturday afternoon, at 4 o clock, Dr. Peck (he is a fine, 
promising colored young man, son of my old friend John 
Peck, now of Pittsburgh, and formerly of Carlisle), who has 
lately graduated at the Rush Medical College at Chicago, 
Douglass and I, took passage for this place (a distance of forty 
miles) in a canal-boat, it being the first trip of the kind I had 
ever made on a canal. The day was excessively hot, and on 
the way one of the horses was almost melted, and came within 
a hair s-breadth of losing his life. Colored persons are not 
allowed, usually, to sit at the table at regular meals, even on 
board of these paltry canal-boats, and we expected to have 
some difficulty. When the hour for supper arrived, the cap 
tain came to us, and said he had no objection to our sitting 
down together, but he did not know but some of the passengers 
would object. " We will go and see," said I, with my feelings 
somewhat roused. Happily, no objection was made. Berths 
were also given to us all, but it was impossible for me to sleep 
in so confined an atmosphere, as the cabin was small and 
thronged. The scenery on the route was very pretty. 

At 4 o clock yesterday morning (Sunday) we arrived here, 
and immediately came up to the " Mansion House," kept by 
N. Andrews. It is a " rum tavern," but the landlord (strange 
to say) is friendly to our cause, and generally entertains the 
abolition lecturers without charge. This world presents some 
queer paradoxes, and this is one of them. Yesterday, we held 
three meetings, in a beautiful grove, which were well attended. 
During the day, the burden fell chiefly upon me, as Douglass 
was entirely exhausted and voiceless. I am afraid his old 
throat complaint, the swelling of the tonsils, etc., is upon him. 
He left for Salem after dinner, accompanied by Samuel Brooke, 
a distance of forty miles. J. W. Walker, S. S. Foster, and Dr. 
Peck helped to fill up the gap at the meetings. To-day, I 
leave for New Lyme (forty miles off), where the annual meet 
ing commences on Wednesday, and will continue for three 
days. Thus far, I have stood the fatigues of the tour better 
than I anticipated. As yet, I have not had a word of intelli 
gence from home. I trust you have written to me at Salem. 



CHAP. VII. 
1847. 

Aug. 14. 



Youngs- 
town, O. 



Aug. 15. 
Youngs- 
town, O. 



Aug. 15. 



Gen. Agent 
W. A. S. S. 

Aug. 16. 

Western 
A. S. S. 



196 



WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON. 



[JEx. 42. 



MS. 

Aug. 1 6. 



Aug. 17. 

New Lytne, 

O. 



Aug. 18. 



Aug. 18. 



Joshua R. 

Giddings. 

Daniel R. 

Tilden. 



W. L. Garrison to his Wife. 

NEW LYME [Ohio], Aug. 20, 1847. 

On our way to this place, we stopped on Monday night at 
a tavern in Hartford, a place settled originally by emigrants 
from Hartford, Ct. 1 In the evening, a lecture was advertised 
to be given on Phonography by a Mr. Alexander (an abolition 
ist), in the meeting-house. Before the meeting, the lecturer 
and a deputation of persons waited upon me, and urged me to 
go over and address the assembly at least for a few minutes, as 
there was a great curiosity to see me. I complied with their 
request, and spoke about fifteen minutes in favor of Phonog 
raphy, and thus enabled the good folks to take a peep at the 
" elephant," but without his " trunk." 

On Tuesday afternoon, we arrived at this little village, the 
place selected for holding our grand convocation in this State 
the anniversary of the Western Anti-Slavery Society. Just 
after our arrival, a very severe rain-storm ensued, accompanied 
with heavy thunder and vivid lightning. It was well for our 
clothes, if not for our skins, that we escaped it. A great change 
in the weather at once took place, and the next day it was so 
cold that I wanted to be sitting by a rousing fire to feel com 
fortable. The clouds were dark and lowering, and it rained 
more or less frequently during the day. Our great tent, capable 
of holding four thousand persons, which was put up the day 
before, was blown down by the wind during the night, and, as 
it was thoroughly saturated with the rain, it required consider 
able effort to erect it again. 

Notwithstanding the unpropitious state of the weather, at an 
early hour vehicles of various descriptions began to pour into 
the place in great numbers. A small meeting-house or academy, 
close to the tent, was occupied by the Ladies Fair, which I have, 
as yet, not found time to visit ; but, for want of good manage 
ment, I am told it is not likely to realize any considerable 
amount of funds for the cause, though I believe they have a 
good variety of articles. We held two meetings in the tent on 
the first day, which were attended by a large concourse, among 
them some of the choicest friends of our cause in the land 
ay, and choicest women, too. Messrs. Giddings and Tilden, 
members of Congress, who have nobly battled for freedom in 
that body- were also present. After the organization of the 

1 Mr. Garrison was now in that north-eastern part of Ohio known as the 
(Connecticut) Western Reserve. 



^T. 42. J FIKST WESTEKN TOUK. 197 

meeting, a poetical welcome to Douglass, Foster, and myself, Lib. 17 : 176. 
written by Benjamin S. Jones, was sung with exquisite taste 
and feeling by a choir, causing many eyes to be moistened 
with tears. I then addressed the great multitude at consid 
erable length, and was followed by Douglass in a capital 
speech. In the afternoon, we again occupied the most of the 
time. The interest manifested, from beginning to end, was of 
the most gratifying character, and all seemed refreshed and 
greatly pleased. As the night approached, there appeared to 
be some symptoms of rowdyism, and it became necessary for 
some of our friends to watch all night, lest the tent should be 
damaged. 

Yesterday, all day, our meetings were still more thronged Aug. 19, 
four thousand persons being on the ground. The Disunion l847> 
question was the principal topic of discussion, the speakers 
being Douglass, Foster, and myself, in favor of Disunion, and 
Mr. Giddings against it. Mr. G. exhibited the utmost kindness 
and generosity towards us, and alluded to me in very handsome 
terms, as also to Douglass ; but his arguments were very specious, 
and I think we had with us the understanding and conscience 
of an overwhelming majority of those who listened to the debate. 
As a large proportion of the abolitionists in this section of the 
country belong to the Liberty Party, we have had to bring them 
to the same test of judgment as the Whigs and the Democrats, 
for supporting a pro-slavery Constitution ; but they are gener 
ally very candid, and incomparably more kind and friendly to Cf. Lib. 13 : 
us than those of their party at the East. 

To-day (Friday), we shall close this cheering anniversary; Aug. 20. 
after which, Douglass and I must ride forty miles to attend 
another convention at Painesville, which commences to-morrow 
morning at 10 o clock ; at the conclusion of which we must take 
another long jaunt, to hold meetings on Sunday at Munson. 
Our friends here have so multiplied the meetings that not an 
hour is left us for rest. They are unmerciful to us, and how we 
are to fulfil all the engagements made, without utterly breaking 
down, I do not know. Douglass is not able to speak at any 
length without becoming very hoarse, and, in some cases, losing 
the ability to make himself heard. This makes my task the 
more arduous. On the whole, I am enabled to sustain it pretty 
well, and shall endeavor to act as prudently as I can. 

Our reception has been very kind. The manners of the people 
are primitive and simple. The country, of course, looks like a 
newly settled one, as compared with our New England States, 



198 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAEKISON. 



|>T. 42. 



CHAP. VII. but it is comparatively thickly settled on this Western Reserve. 

jjTT In regard to contributing money towards carrying forward our 

cause, they are not so liberal as we are at the East ; indeed, 

money here is not usually plenty, although they have everything 

else in abundance. 

No quotations must be made from my hasty scrawls to you 
for the Liberator. I have not a moment s time to prepare any 
thing fit for the public eye, and must refer our friends at home 
to the Bugle for information. 

My best regards to the Jacksons, Mrs. Meriam, the Wallcuts, 
an( j ^e o t ner dear friends. Glad shall I be when my mission 
is ended. 



Eliza F. 
Meriam. 



MS. 
Friday. 

Mrs. 
Phillips. 



J.B. Yer- 
rinton. 



Wendell Phillips to Mrs. Garrison. 

NATICK [Mass.], Aug. 20 [1847]. 

You must not think we have forgotten you. I ought to have 
written long ago. Dear Ann has not really been able, though she 
has talked of you, and wanted to know this, that, and the other, 
which I was to have found out during my hurried visits to 
Boston, but, like all husbands, forgot the duty when I got to 
town. My time has been so hurried and filled that I have 
never been able to get to Pine Street, but shall yet. Those 
unruly boys need somebody to take them in hand. Get Francis 
Jackson or me to box their ears once or twice, and then they 11 
begin to value their non-resistant mother and father. 

Ann has been very poorly ever since we left Boston when 
one pain ceases, another begins, and sometimes they are not 
even kind enough to wait thus for each other, but very impo 
litely come two at once. This week, toothache even compelled 
her to the horrid task of coming into Boston. We shall return 
to little noisy, sunny, dusty, cosy, dirty, snug Essex Street very 
early sometime in September. 

Now for the " Pioneer." Does he do his duty and write 
you every other day? I m afraid not. I ve no doubt the 
jaunt will do his health good. He 11 go dancing along, and 
forget Yerrinton, types, proofs and all buying dozens of 
newspapers at every depot so as to imagine he is enjoying the 
delight of looking over exchanges ; but, alas, he can t cut out 
scraps as he does at home for you to burn. . . . 

You must not add to your other cares that of writing to us, 
but if those girls are ever quiet boys, I know, give no trouble 
and you should find a leisure fifteen minutes, we would 



. 42.] 



FIKST WESTERN TOUK. 



199 



welcome a letter not, though, if you are going to give orders CHAP. VII. 
that / should not see it. That I call abominable ! x ^" 7 

How delighted Garrison will be to hear of Geo. Thompson in 
Parliament. 1 Tell your Geo. he must get up early to keep up 
with his great namesake j and you may add to Wendy, that I 
shall end in being nothing, and we look to him to exert himself 
and keep up the honor of the name. 

Ann hopes Elizabeth has done well and you ve got many 
garments made. She hears through Mrs. Garnaut (just re 
turned from the South), that " there never was such a woman 
as Mrs. Garrison," etc., etc. . . . Well, I partly believe it ! 
Remember us to W. L. G. when you write, and believe us very 
affectionately yours, 

ANN and WENDELL PHILLIPS. 



G. T. G. 

W. P. G. 



E. P. G. 

Eliza Gar 
naut. 



W. L. Garrison to his Wife. 

RICHFIELD, Ohio, Aug. 25, 1847. 

Our great anniversary meeting closed at New Lyme on 
Friday, the 20th instant. The discussions of the last day 
were of a spirited character, and up to the last hour the 
audience was immense. We adjourned at half -past 2 o clock, 
p. M., and were then busily engaged for some time in shaking 
hands and bidding farewell to a host of friends. When the 
dense mass moved off in their long array of vehicles, dispersing 
in every direction to their several homes, some a distance of 
ten, others of twenty, others of forty, others of eighty, and 
others of a hundred miles, it was a wonderful spectacle. One 
man (colored) rode three hundred miles on horseback to be at 
the meeting ! 

After taking some refreshment, we left New Lyme about 4 
o clock for Painesville, passing through Austinburg, and taking 
supper at the house of Cornelia and Betsey Cowles s brother, 
where we had a hearty welcome. The girls arrived with Doug 
lass soon after we did, who remained under their roof until the 
next morning, when he rode over to Painesville. The girls 
are very fine singers, especially Cornelia, and we sang together 
a number of songs before we left. Dr. Peck . . . was my 
companion Mr. Jackson, a colored citizen of P., carrying us 
in his two-horse vehicle to the house of Deacon Horace Ensign 

l Thompson was elected from the London district of the Tower Hamlets, 
on a platform calling for the separation of Church and State, free trade, 
universal suffrage, etc. (Lib. 17 : 50, 126, 138). 



Lib. 17 : 146. 
MS. want 
ing, but the 
letter cer 
tainly be 
longs in the 
home series. 



Aug. 21. 



200 



WILLIAM LLOYD GAKKISON. 



[JET. 42. 



CHAP. VII. at Madison, where we arrived between 10 and 11 o clock at 
j^ 7 night. The deacon had invited us at New Lyme to spend the 
night at his house, but had retired with his family to rest, sup 
posing we had concluded to stop in Austinburg. He, and his 
son and daughter, soon made their appearance, and about mid 
night all was quiet again. The deacon is a Liberty Party man, 
but very kind and hearty in his feelings towards us, and his 
house is always open to anti-slavery lecturers and runaway 
slaves. 

Aug. 21, After breakfast, the next morning, we rode to Painesville, 
l847 Lake County (within three miles of Lake Erie), arriving at 
10 o clock. It is a very pleasant and well-built village, the 
prettiest and most populous of any that we have yet seen 
containing about 1500 inhabitants. The Telegraph, a Whig 
paper, is the only paper printed in it. The politics of the place 
are strongly Whig. The same remark applies to nearly every 
town and village on the Western Reserve. 1 Not having been 
invited to stop with any one at P., we went to Higley s tavern 
to brush off the dust, wash ourselves, and prepare for the meet 
ing. The landlord came out and took off our luggage, suppos 
ing that Dr. Peck was Mr. Douglass. I requested him to show us 
a chamber, and he did so, without saying a word. As soon as 
he left us, I said to my friend Peck, " Dr., I am inclined to think, 
from the looks of the landlord, that our company is not desir 
able here." In a few minutes a person came into our room, 
saying that his name was Briggs that he was the brother of 
the present Governor of Massachusetts that he had taken 
the liberty of introducing himself to us in consequence of a 
conversation he had just had with the landlord, who declared 
to him that no nigger could be allowed to sit at his table, and 
that if any such attempt were made, there would be a muss 
not that he had any objection himself, but his boarders would 
not allow it. A genuine specimen of American democratic, 
Christian colorphobia. Mr. Briggs invited us to his house, and 
we accordingly left the tavern. Our meeting was convened in 
a grove in the immediate vicinity, and several hundred persons 
were present. Gen. Paine, a lawyer (Liberty Party), presided. 
The day was fine, and the attention given was all that we could 
F.Douglass, desire. Most of the day s talking devolved on me. Frederick s 
voice was much impaired, and he had to have a bad tooth 

l This fact should be noted in connection with the cordiality shown by 
the Liberty Party abolitionists of Ohio to the representatives of the Old 
Organization. 



Geo. N. 
Briggs. 



. 42.] 



FIRST WESTEEN TOUK. 



201 



extracted during the meeting. I took dinner at Gen. Paine s CHAP. vn. 
with a company of friends, and at the close of the afternoon ^ 
meeting I went home to spend the night with J. Gillet, a true 
friend of our cause, and was very hospitably treated. 

On Sunday morning, Mr. Gillet carried me to Munson (four- Aug. 2.2.. 
teen miles), with his wife and another lady, in his carryall. The 
ride was a charming one, during which I discussed all sorts of 
theological questions with Mrs. Gillet, a lady of considerable 
quickness of intellect. On arriving at Munson, we saw the 
great Oberlin tent in a distant field ; but no village was to be 
seen, and only here and there a solitary log cabin. " Strange," 
said I to myself, " that our friends should pitch their tent in 
such a place. From whence are we to get our audience ? " 
But, on going to the spot, I found a large company already 
assembled, and in a short time the vast tent was densely 
filled, even to overflowing ; so that the multitude was greater 
than we had even at New Lyme ! It was a grand and impos 
ing spectacle. Poor Frederick was still unwell, and could only F.Douglass. 
say a few words in the forenoon j and in the afternoon he 
absented himself altogether from the meeting, and put a wet 
bandage round his throat. This threw the labor mainly upon 
me, though our sterling friends S. S. Foster and J. W. 
Walker made long and able speeches, which aided me consider 
ably. The enthusiasm was general and very great. We con 
tinued our meeting through the next day, with a large and most 
intelligent audience, and made a powerful impression. Doug 
lass was much improved, and spoke with inimitable humor, 
showing up the religion of the South in particular, and of the 
country in general. At the close, Dr. Richmond (one of our 
most intelligent and active come-outers, last from the Liberty 
Party) offered a series of resolutions, strongly commendatory 
to Douglass and myself, which were unanimously adopted by a 
tremendous " Ay ! " after which six cheers were given in the 
heartiest manner. Altogether, it was the most interesting meet 
ing I have ever attended in this country. . . . 

Monday afternoon, we all started for Twinsburg, [Samuel] 
Brooke and I coming by the way of Chagrin Falls village, 
. . . and Douglass, Foster, etc., going by the way of Bain- 
bridge. In the morning we rode over to Twinsburg, where we 
found collected in a beautiful grove about a thousand persons, 
whom Douglass and I addressed at great length, both forenoon 
and afternoon. Douglass almost surpassed himself. It was a 
most gratifying occasion to all, and a good work was done. We 



Aug. 23, 
1847. 



Aug. 23. 



Aug. 24. 



202 WILLIAM LLOYD GAKRISON. [^T. 42. 



CHAP. vii. were all hospitably entertained by a stanch abolitionist, Ezra 
1847 Clark, a subscriber to the Liberator. As at New Lyme, Paines- 
ville, Munson, and other places, multitudes crowded around us 
to give us their blessing and God-speed, and to express the 
strong gratification they felt to see us in the flesh. A great 
many anti-slavery publications were sold, subscribers obtained 
for newspapers, etc., etc. Before dark we left for this place, at 
which to tarry overnight at the house of Deacon Ellsworth, on 
our way to Oberlin. 

Aug. 25. To-day is commencement day at 0., and we shall leave here 
soon after breakfast, hoping to arrive at 0. in season for the 
afternoon exercises. I have long desired to see Oberlin, but do 
not expect to accomplish much in that place, as we are to have 
only one day s meeting (to-morrow), and a good deal of preju 
dice is cherished against me on account of my " infidelity " and 
" come-outerism." We are prepared, however, to give our testi 
mony, both in regard to the Church and State, whatever may 
be thought or said of us. 

W. L. Garrison to Ms Wife. 

MS. OBERLIN, Aug. 28, 1847. 

You know that, from the commencement of the Institution in 
Oberlin, I took a lively interest in its welfare, particularly on 
account of its springing up in a wilderness, only thirteen years 
Ante, 1:421, since, through the indomitable and sublime spirit of freedom 
454 IDS 37> ky which the seceding students of Lane Seminary were actuated. 
Ante, 2 : 377. When Messrs. Keep and Dawes went over to England, a few 
years since, to obtain pecuniary aid in its behalf from the friends 
of a freedom-giving Christianity, I commended them to the con 
fidence and liberality of all British abolitionists ; and while in 
that country with them in 1840, I did what I could to facilitate 
their mission. Oberlin has done much for the relief of the flying 
fugitives from the Southern prison-house, multitudes of whom 
have found it a refuge from their pursuers, and been fed, clad, 
sheltered, comforted, and kindly assisted on their way out of 
this horrible land to Canada. It has also promoted the cause of 
emancipation in various ways, and its church refuses to be con 
nected with any slaveholding or pro-slavery church by religious 
fellowship, though it is said to be involved in ecclesiastical and 
political relations which impair the strength of its testimony, 
and diminish the power of its example. From these, if they 
exist, it is to be hoped it will be wholly extricated ere long, as 



^T. 42.] FIRST WESTERN TOUR. 203 

light increases and duty is made manifest. So thoroughly has CHAP. VII. 
the poison of slavery circulated through every vein and artery ^ 7 
of this nation that it infects every part of the body politic, 
whether religiously or politically considered. 

The desire that I had long cherished to visit Oberlin was Aug. 26. 
gratified on Thursday last. In company with Douglass, Foster, 5. 5. Foster, 
Walker, and the indefatigable General Agent of the Western wSkr. 
Anti- Slavery Society, Samuel Brooke, I arrived in season to 
attend the exercises of the graduating class in theology. The 
number of persons present was immense not less than four 
thousan