Hiram Rhodes Revels Quotes
I sedulously refrained from doing anything that would incite slaves to run away from their masters.
Revels, Hiram R. "The Autobiography of Hiram Rhodes Revels Together with Some Letters by and about Him." Edited by Joseph A. Borome, Midwest Journal, vol. 5, no. 1, 1953, p. 281.
This is an important quotation because it shows that slavery was the principle reason that the South succeeded and began their rebellion. In the early 20th century, there was a movement to make the Confederacy and the rebellion more noble by promoting the idea that the Civil War was fought by the South for more lofty reasons such as States Rights, Original Construction, different economic philosophies and the like. This was a more noble cause then the right to deny other human beings their rights, to own other human beings who they could beat, torture, sexually use and even murder them was a pretty selfish and demeaning reason to have started a rebellion that would then cost more Americans their lives than any other American conflict. The succession documents and others of the Southern States and the Confederacy make it clear that slavery was THE issue and fleeting references to any of the others were only made to complain about the potential effect on abolition and the refusal of the abolitionist states to cease aiding and protecting fugitive slaves.
This fear was great among many who were abolitionists as potentially there might be mass slaughter of all Southern whites.
She was one of the early abolitionists. Despite the Southern attempted repression of information of slave resistance, some of the facts emerged and were well known in the North. The South tried to suppress these incidents lest other slaves get ideas from it. Also the Southerners often maintained that Africa was so primitive and underdeveloped, that the slaves were better off in America; these actions of rebellion belied this notion.
American reformers followed slavery issues in Africa and elsewhere. The status of Africa was particularly important as the notion of extensive American Black colonization was still viable to many.
The slaves to which he is referring were the serfs of Slovakia who for hundreds of years had literally been the property of the Hungarian nobility. The problem however has been observed about any long-term slavery.
This prophecy written in the later years of Jefferson’s life turned out to be all too true. St. Domingo was an Island in the Caribbean where slavery produced a bloody war. The American Civil War would be far worse.
The Emancipation Proclamation was issued by the commander in chief as a wartime necessity. Any future President could undo that proclamation. However, the 13th Amendment outlawed slavery forever regardless of the desires of the Congress, Presidents, or State governments.
This was part of his presentation to Northern influential business men showing them what he claimed was the New South. He was particularly complimentary about the negro Christian viewpoint that inhibited revenge or retaliation for their terrible treatment. The favorable lines about Negroes were well received by Northerners. However, they were mostly unaware of his racist views he expressed when in the South. See Quotation 643649.
Under the pre-Civil War Southern economic system the poor whites had little chance of upward mobility and were in many wars as poorly off as slaves. Johnson saw this reform as much more important than the emancipation of the Negro.
Hiram Rhodes Revels was an American politician, minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, and a college administrator. Born free in North Carolina, he later lived and worked in Ohio, where he voted before the Civil War. He became the first African American to serve in the U.S. Congress when he was appointed to the United States Senate as a Republican to represent Mississippi in 1870 and 1871 during the Reconstruction era.
