Canadian Anti-Slavery Society Quotes

The first anti-slavery newspaper published in the United States & the first journal in America to advocate immediate, unconditional emancipation

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}

The first anti-slavery newspaper published in the United States & the first journal in America to advocate immediate, unconditional emancipation

One of the many complaints that many people made at the time about Smith and his Mormons was that they opposed slavery. In fact, Smith not only opposed it be had a plan for compensating the slave owner and a method for paying for it. Smith was not advocating the kinds of personal lifestyle issues of his church the way modern religious leaders do, but was concerned with the much larger issues of expansionism, corruption of the courts and judiciary, and land distribution. He was a classic reform candidate in that sense. Smith had written to most of the then likely Presidential candidates of both major parties asking for their position on the Mormons who were facing persecution wherever they went. None of the politicians would make any satisfactory commitments. Smith took Direct Action and became the only major religious official to have run for the Presidency of the United States until Pat Robertson tried and failed in 2000. Smith’s assassination shortly thereafter cut his run for the Presidency short before it made much headway and politically he had no chance to affect the race.

The Federal Fugitive Slave Act required all in free states to assist owners of escaped slaves to return them to their owners. In 1854 a Missouri slave owner tracked his escaped slave to Wisconsin and the Federal officials incarcerated the slave pending his return. A Wisconsin mob broke the slave out of jail and helped him escape to Canada. Booth was convicted under the Fugitive Slave Act for aiding the escape. Booth’s conviction was overturned by Wisconsin Supreme Court Judge Smith whose opinion overturned the Fugitive Slave Act on the grounds that it had usurped state’s rights. The Supreme Court overturned Smith’s ruling, but Booth was pardoned. See {587928}, {587927} & {587928}. State’s rights is a concept that we generally identify with Southern slave holding states to maintain slavery, but in this case, Wisconsin used the concept to fight slavery.

Baldwin was a young lawyer at the time. He represented a shipload of ex-slaves who had taken over their Spanish slave ship and landed in America. The Spanish claimed, the ship owners and some of the crew all claimed the “property.”

This bull was issued to Bishop Ferdinand located at Rubicon on the island of Lanzarote. Many critics of the Catholic Church point to the widespread use of slavery by Catholic laity and even the clergy during the Age of Discovery. It is clear, however, from the earliest appearance of slavery during this period that the official teaching of the Church condemned it as a crime subject to the sentence of excommunication ipso facto (by the very deed itself). The Church’s condemnation of “slavery,” however, did not extend to “just title” slavery, which approved of the practice in circumstances in which the person was deprived of their liberty justly. Specific examples have included slaves captured in war, persons condemned to slavery for a crime, and those who sold themselves into slavery. For an example of a type of “just title” slavery being legitimatised, see Nicholas V {612174}. In many cases the line between slavery for no morally justifiable reason, i.e. racial slavery, and “just title” slavery remained unclear to Catholic laity and clergy alike.

Though Leo XIII was very much opposed to slavery, his claim that the Catholic Church “from the beginning” sought to end slavery overlooks the inconsistent reality of several of his predecessors’ teachings. For an example of this inconsistency one may find a relevant example as late as the 19th century, see the teachings of Gregory XVI {611428}, Pius IX {612304}, and Leo XIII {611844}

The issue of slavery which had been suppressed in Congress for the first decades of the nation broke out when Missouri was considered for statehood. 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 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.

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.

Fitzhugh was a Southern iconoclast whose view of Northern labor was much like that of Karl Marx but who was an enthusiastic supporter of slavery. Fitzhugh was of the opinion that slavery would be reinstated in the North and his treatise agues for that. More and more intellectual opinion was coming to the conclusion that slavery must be abolished or made universal before Lincoln’s famous statement in his debate against Douglas. Although Northerners and Southerners had come to agree on this point, they disagreed about which alternative would and should prevail.

Benezet was a Huguenot whose family had been persecuted in France. He identified with the cause of Blacks, Indians and Acadians. He was also one of the first leaders of the American Peace Movement.