Abolitionism
HIS 265
Gradual Emancipation
 American Colonization Society (1817-
1964) favored gradual, compensated
manumission & “returning” freed blacks
to Africa
Paul Cuffee (1759-1817) was mixedrace Quaker ship captain who took 38 to
Sierra Leone
 James Madison & Henry Clay were
leaders
 Liberia founded in 1821
 13,000 immigrants, 1817-67
 Became independent nation in 1847
 ACS continued settling African
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Americans in Liberia after the Civil War
Liberia
Pres. Joseph J. Roberts
First Lady Jane Roberts
Immediate Emancipation
 American Antislavery Society (1833-70)
demanded immediate, uncompen-sated
emancipation & black citizenship
 William Lloyd Garrison began publishing
The Liberator in 1831
 American Moral Reform Society linked
abolition to other evangelical reform efforts
William Lloyd Garrison
 Arthur & Lewis Tappan founded American &
Foreign Anti-Slavery Society and the Liberty
Party in 1840
 broke with Garrison over women’s rights &
political participation
 James G. Birney ran as Liberty Party pres.
Candidate in 1840 & 1844
 merged with Free Soil party in 1848, which
merged into Republican party in 1856
Theodore Weld
Black Abolitionists
 Frederick Douglass (1818-95)
 escaped from slavery in 1838
 published Narrative in 1845
 began publishing North Star in 1847
 Henry Highland Garnet (1815-82)
 escaped from slavery in 1824
Frederick Douglass
 became Presbyterian minister in 1842
 supported emigration until Civil War
 Sojourner Truth (1797-1883)
 born Isabella Baumfree
 escaped from Dumonts in 1827
 became involved with Matthias cult
 advocated westward emigration &
creation of “Negro state”
Henry Highland Garnet
The Underground Railroad
 Not as organized or as secretive as
later legend made it
 Most escapees from Upper South
 Perhaps as many as 100,000
 Free blacks organized & led many
of the Vigilance Committees
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William Still in Philadelphia
David Ruggles in New York
 Harriet Tubman (1819-1913) was
most famous “conductor”
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escaped at age 30
led some 300 others to freedom
served as scout, spy & nurse in
Civil War
Levi Coffin House, Ohio
The Amistad Case
 Joseph Cinque & 48 others
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kidnapped in Sierra Leone
Sold in Havana to Jose Ruiz &
Pedro Montes in June 1839
Cinque led mutiny July 1, 1839
Amistad captured by U.S.S.
Washington & brought to New
London, CT Aug. 26
D.A. William Holabird charged
Cinque & others with piracy &
murder
Defense team led by J.Q. Adams
Judge Andrew Judson ruled Jan.
13, 1840 that defendents were born
free, and therefore not guilty
Decision upheld by Supreme Court
March 9, 1840
Freedom Schooner Amistad