Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes
[A Southerner is] as animal, given to pleasure, frivolous, irritable, spending his days in hunting and practicing with deadly weapons to defend himself against his slaves and against his companions brought up in the same idle and barbarous way …. I do not see how a barbarous community and a civilized community can constitute one state. I think we must get rid of slavery or we must get rid of freedom.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1803-1882, Poet & Essayist, “The Assault Upon Mr. Sumner,” May 26, 1856
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His solution was not to change the prejudice or improve the opportunity for Blacks but to have complete separation of the races. See {625687}.
The Birth of a Nation was screened at the Woodrow Wilson White House as Wilson was the most racist president since Andrew Johnson. The editorial was persuasive to Boston liberals who were not prepared to impose censorship even to prevent racist propaganda from having an audience.
Louis Napoleon Bonaparte. The “colonies” to which we was referring were the French Colonies in the Caribbean—particularly Haiti. The Black slaves had revolted against the slave-owners and had taken over all positions of authority and wore the uniforms and symbols of power including the epaulettes—the gold braid shoulder pieces that were symbols of high rank in military and diplomatic uniforms which were worn on all official occasions. Napoleon never did make good on his vow. He had many more problems with his own wars and governance in Europe. This quote does demonstrate the racism that existed in supposedly tolerant France.
Eldest son of Robert Walpole. Lord Dunmore, royal governor of Virginia, had issued a proclamation offering freedom to slaves willing to defend the Crown
This quotation’s authenticity and accuracy are challenged by many scholars. The only source is the personal reminiscences of General Butler, a politician with Presidential aspirations who had his own agenda. The nuance of wording is very critical as to whether Lincoln was trying to accomplish export or whether he was asking Butler to staff out the feasibility so that Lincoln could deal with others who had raised the issue. Butler’s reply was that it was not feasible ({633655}), and there is no other record of the idea being advocated or implemented. The quotation, if indeed it was a quotations, is taken by some to indicate that Lincoln was no friend of Blacks and very racist to boot.
Lincoln had instituted the first draft in American History and it was terribly resented by many Americans. The draft laws allowed the wealthy and upper middle class to avoid service by paying a $300 fee of hiring a substitute just like in the Vietnam War the upper classes could get College Draft deferments. The mob led mostly by poor Irish, began by protesting the draft; then they attacked the mansions and houses of the wealthy; and then they went after Blacks. The Irish poor feared large numbers of Negroes coming out of slavery and competing for their jobs and lowering the prevailing wages. Blacks were beaten and lynched and 5,000 almost half of the then Negro population were driven to Brooklyn, New Jersey and the New York suburbs. It was the worst riot in United States History.
The President invited Booker T. Washington, a Black, to dine at the White House. It was described as:
First Lady Lou Henry Hoover, 1874-1944, invited Jessie DePriest the Black wife of a Congressman to tea at the White House. No Black woman had ever been there socially before. This was a typical Southern reaction. The Texas State legislature actually passed a resolution chastising the First Lady—the only such action in American history.
1st Earl of Mansfield
The issue of slavery which had been suppressed in Congress for the first decades of the nation broke out when Missouri statehood was considered. By previous agreement, slavery was not even discussed in Congress but the time period elapsed. Tallmadge not only proposed that no more slaves could come into Missouri {613176} but most shocking to the Southerners was that every person born in the new state would be free at the age of 25. In a generation, there would be no more slavery in Missouri and there would be no economic compensation for slave owners at all. The House of Representatives accepted the amendment, but it failed in the Senate. At that time, Senators were not elected by voters but were appointed by the state legislators and the Southern slave states had a disproportionate share of the senate from a population point of view. But what this quotation shows clearly that a majority of the country in 1819 were opposed to slavery and were willing to end it without compensation.
Southerners from the slave states wanted California to be admitted to the Union as a slave state. But a large majority of Californians saw that as a terrible alternative. It was argued that the Southern states would never vote to admit California if it were a free state (see {613404}) and in order to make it clear to the South that admission as a slave state was out of the question, this clause was passed at the Constitutional Convention.
The Reference to St. Domingo refers to the slave rebellion in Haiti, the first major, and successful slave revolt in the Western Hemisphere. The revolution was characterized by the revenge taken against the former slave masters. Thomas Jefferson, then the President, refused to recognize the new government and actually boycotted it. He and most Americans at the time were fearful that a slave revolt in the U. S. would produce revenge attacks against former masters, and indeed the national government supported the slave owners in subjugating all attempted armed rebellion. This reached its zenith in the Federal troops putting down the John Brown attempted revolt at Harpers Ferry. Instead of the bloodshed of a slave revolt, America experienced the bloodshed of a Civil War.
Later changed the name to The Emancipator. Many are surprised that a Southern State would have had such strong abolitionist sentiment so early, but East Tennessee was a hotbed of abolition. See {614117} and {614069}
Ralph Waldo Emerson, who went by his middle name Waldo, was an American essayist, lecturer, philosopher, abolitionist and poet who led the transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. He was seen as a champion of individualism and a prescient critic of the countervailing pressures of society, and he disseminated his thoughts through dozens of published essays and more than 1,500 public lectures across the United States.
