Henry W. Grady Quotes
Whenever he struck a blow for his own liberty he fought in open battle, and when at last he raised his black and humble hands that the shackles might be struck off, those hands were innocent of wrong against his helpless charges.
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.
Grady, Henry W. "The New South." Life of Henry W. Grady Including His Writings and Speeches, edited by Joel Chandler Harris, Cassell Publishing Company, 1890, p. 87.
Grady, a Georgian, prompted himself as a spokesman for the “New South” and while he did no advocate slavery and the brutality that had been inflicted on Southern Negroes, he was a strong white supremacist as this quotation demonstrates. He was only “liberal” compared with the total revanchist racists. However, when in the North he spoke kindly about the Negro. See Quotation 643652.
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.
Although Wedgwood was a business man and ceramic manufacturer, he was a staunch abolitionist. He made these medallions by the thousands and gave them to all who would receive them. The text became the motto of the anti-slavery society. It was one of the first examples of a logo – a symbol for a political cause being very effective.
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.
The general issued a military order emancipating slaves in Florida, Georgia and South Carolina. President Abraham Lincoln rescinded the order feeling it was too premature and it would cause the slave states that stayed in the Union--Delaware, Maryland, and Kentucky--to go over to the Confederates.
Negotiations regarding the exchange of prisoners and property. This was his view of his supposed obligation to return Negro slaves who had escaped and gone to the British during the war. The treaty of peace specified that all “property” including slaves, taken by, the British be returned to the Americans. But he and other officers did not always do so as they thought they had higher moral obligations. See {621936} for example.
This fear was great among many who were abolitionists as potentially there might be mass slaughter of all Southern whites.
When the Confederate Government realized that the Union was planning to arm escaped slaves and induct them into the Union Army, they quickly passed a law that declared any escaped slave who joined the Union Army or wore its uniform was guilty of Treason and would be executed. Most Union Generals one way or another got word to the Confederate Officers that they had better treat all Negro Union Soldiers as prisoners of war. Even President Lincoln warned the South. Butler, however, had a large number of Negro troops in his area and had heard threats of some of the Southerners to execute Black prisoners of war. He had a way of making things very clear, and he was able to prevent murder of any of his Negro troops despite the Treason law.
As a key member of Lincoln’s cabinet, William H. Seward was most concerned with preserving The Union. However, since the Constitution was written in 1787, there had been compromises made with the pro slavery forces of the South to give them proportionally more political power and to avoid interfering with the institution of slavery. The Dred Scott Supreme Court decision forced the Northern States to actively cooperate in enforcing and maintaining slavery. Large numbers of abolitionists had reached their limit and wanted no more compromises regarding slavery. Mrs. Seward was one of those. This quotation also illustrates the influence that some women had in politics even though women could not vote. Frances Seward was very much a political partner with her husband who was favored to beat Lincoln for the Republican Presidential nomination.
In early New England the General Court served as both a legislature and a judiciary before separation of powers was introduced. 5 years later the Court banned importing African slaves at all. While slavery was not common in Rhode Island, the laws was not seriously enforced on those who would defy them. It does represent a public anti-slavery sentiment that existed in Early America. It would take 200 years for Rhode Island to finally eliminate all forms of slavery.
Fremont and some of the Radical Republicans wanted Lincoln immediately to declare the slaves of the rebelling states free. As a major general in charge of an area, he wrote a military order emancipating all the slaves in his jurisdiction. President Lincoln countermanded the order as soon as he found out. He wanted Fremont to only free the slaves whose owners were actively working against the union. Lincoln needed to hold the border states like Maryland in the Union and was working on a plan whereby slave owners who were loyal to the Union would be economically compensated when their slaves were freed. If loyal slaveholders in Fremont’s area would lose their slaves with no compensation, Lincoln feared that the otherwise loyal border states would be driven to the confederacy thus shifting the balance of power. Lincoln had his own plan for emancipation and would not allow Fremont to alter that. As a result of this speech, the Radical Republicans nominated Fremont to run against Lincoln. For a few weeks he looked like he would run, but then he and Lincoln made a deal. Lincoln fired Montgomery Blair, Fremont’s arch enemy, from the cabinet, and Fremont withdrew from the election.
- Born: May 24, 1850
- Died: December 23, 1889
- Nationality: American
- Profession: Orator
Henry Woodfin Grady was an American journalist and orator who helped reintegrate the states of the Confederacy into the Union after the American Civil War. Grady encouraged the industrialization of the South. He was praised by contemporaries and by authors Shavin and Galphin as a civic promoter, political strategist and captivating speaker, and by Atlanta journalist Frederick Allen as a visionary. However, in current times, Grady's arguments for the need for white supremacy in the post-Civil War South have resulted in his legacy being seen nowadays as anywhere from positive, to both positive and negative, to racist and therefore negative. Grady's name has been removed from several schools including Atlanta's former Grady High School. Grady was the father-in-law of Federal Reserve Chairman Eugene Robert Black and grandfather of banker and World Bank President Eugene R. Black Sr.
