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Oberlin and the Fight to End Slavery, 1833-1863

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Oberlin and the Fight to End Slavery, 1833-1863 "Be not conformed to this world": Oberlin and the Fight to End Slavery, 1833-1863 by Joseph Brent Morris This thesis/dissertation document has been electronically approved by the following individuals: Baptist,Edward Eugene (Chairperson) Bensel,Richard F (Minor Member) Parmenter,Jon W (Minor Member) “BE NOT CONFORMED TO THIS WORLD”: OBERLIN AND THE FIGHT TO END SLAVERY, 1833-1863 A Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Cornell University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy by Joseph Brent Morris August 2010 © 2010 Joseph Brent Morris “BE NOT CONFORMED TO THIS WORLD”: OBERLIN AND THE FIGHT TO END SLAVERY, 1833-1863 Joseph Brent Morris, Ph. D. Cornell University 2010 This dissertation examines the role of Oberlin (the northern Ohio town and its organically connected college of the same name) in the antislavery struggle. It traces the antislavery origins and development of this Western “hot-bed of abolitionism,” and establishes Oberlin—the community, faculty, students, and alumni—as comprising the core of the antislavery movement in the West and one of the most influential and successful groups of abolitionists in antebellum America. Within two years of its founding, Oberlin’s founders had created a teachers’ college and adopted nearly the entire student body of Lane Seminary, who had been dismissed for their advocacy of immediate abolition. Oberlin became the first institute of higher learning to admit men and women of all races. America's most famous revivalist (Charles Grandison Finney) was among its new faculty as were a host of outspoken proponents of immediate emancipation and social reform. From its beginning, Oberlin Institute and the community supported a cadre of activist missionaries who helped spur the abolitionist movement to its greatest period of growth and assisted in the breaking down of racial barriers in an exceedingly intolerant region. The college and town comprised one of the most ideologically influential and tactically successful groups of abolitionists within the antislavery movement. With Oberlin in the vanguard, the West becomes the movement’s nerve center by the late 1840s. Oberlin representatives were at the cutting edge of political antislavery organization embodied in the Liberty, Free Soil, and Republican Parties, the African American convention movement, and constant facilitators in one of the nation's busiest Underground Railroad “depots.” Oberlin was instrumental in developing diversity in antislavery thought, an aspect of the movement that most historians have not explored. Rather than falling into the distinct categories which many scholars place abolitionists (political, radical pacifist, radical militant, clerical, etc.), Oberlin abolitionists took the field as men and women devoted to ending slavery by any means necessary, even if that meant not adhering to ideological consistency or working through unconventional methods. Their philosophy was a composite of various schools of anti-slavery thought aimed at supporting the best hope of success. BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH Joseph Brent Morris was born in Columbia, South Carolina in 1978. He received his BA, magna cum laude, in English language and Literature in 2001 from the University of South Carolina. He received his MA in American History at Cornell University in 2008 and his PhD in 2010. iii This work is dedicated to John DeCarrico and Louise Sites, our first historians. iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS On my first research trip to Oberlin several years ago, I arrived at the college library about an hour before the archives opened. Sitting down to a cup of coffee in the café, I pulled out some photocopies of an old biography of an abolitionist leader (Arthur Tappan, by his brother Lewis (1870)) to look over before heading upstairs to begin my real work. I was beyond excited to be starting my archival work on Oberlin—I had read almost everything there was to be read on the subject in the secondary scholarship, and I couldn’t wait to begin my own project. But there, towards the end of the Tappan biography, I came across a challenge. Charles Grandison Finney, America’s most famous revivalist of the 19th century, Oberlin professor of theology and later its second president seemed to have some words for me before I dug into the documents myself. In a letter to Lewis Tappan reprinted in an appendix, Finney wrote of Oberlin and the antislavery movement, “The fact is that Oberlin turned the scale in all of the Northwest. No man can tell the story right unless he knows this.” I knew that, of course. The purpose of my dissertation was to emphasize and illuminate that fact. But what else might Finney have thought necessary to “tell the story right?” I had yet to turn over a page in the archives, and the great Charles Finney was already critically looking over my shoulder. I hope that this dissertation would meet with his approval. Besides the rich records that Finney and his colleagues left for me, I could not have possibly completed this task without the help and inspiration of many, many people. In Oberlin, I was made to feel like an honorary Oberlinite by archivists Roland Baumann and Ken Grossi. They more than anyone else will be able to evaluate my use of the Oberlin archives. Also, I am indebted to Gary Kornblith and Carol Lasser for sharing with me their own work on Oberlin as well as their unique insight as Oberlinites. v Other scholars also helped me interpret the documents I found in Oberlin and pointed me to new sources as well, including Fergus Bordewich, James Horton, Marlene Merrill, William McFeely, and Stanley Harrold. Walter Edgar, Mark Smith, and Paul Johnson at the University of South Carolina inspired me to undertake graduate study in history in the first place, and offered continuous moral support throughout the process, especially during my time in Columbia. Thanks especially to Professor Johnson for serving on my dissertation committee and making my work immeasurably better in the process. At Cornell, I am indebted to my other committee members Jon Parmenter, Richard Bensel, and my chair, Ed Baptist. They are responsible for my overall graduate experience being more of a “celebration” than “an ordeal.” Margaret Washington was also closely involved in the development of this dissertation. In addition, I want to thank the participants in Cornell’s Americas Colloquium who helped me work through sections of this manuscript. My graduate student family made everything bearable, and I hope I did the same for them. Mike Schmidli, Daniel Sledge, Julian Lim, Chris Cantwell, Daegan Miller, Vernon Mitchell, Ann Wilde, and others all read parts of my manuscript, shared their thoughts, and shared their lives. I am indebted to the staffs of the Oberlin College Archives, Oberlin College Special Collections, Kent State University Special Collections, Western Reserve Historical Society, the Ohio Historical Society, Olivet College Special Collections, the South Caroliniana Library, and the Cornell University Carl A. Kroch Division of Rare Books and Manuscripts. The interlibrary loan departments at Cornell and the University of South Carolina were often life-savers. I was supported financially in my research by numerous grants from the Cornell University American Studies Department and Society for the Humanities. Also, Cornell University Sage and Daughters of the American Revolution fellowships vi allowed the opportunity to work exclusively on my dissertation for months at a time. Oberlin College awarded me a Frederick B. Artz research grant, and the University of South Carolina Institute for Southern Studies named me a visiting research fellow, and gave me library privileges and generous funds to pursue my research while in Columbia. Most importantly, my family has been the bedrock of support that most people only dream of. I can never thank my parents enough for the way they raised me and the opportunities they have made possible in my life. The unconditional pride they show in both me and my sister is overwhelming. My wife Kim has been there at every step along the way, from high school to PhD, and that is what assures me that anything is possible. That, and our precious baby Daegan, who makes everything else seem completely trivial. I love you all; thank you. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH iii DEDICATION iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS v LIST OF FIGURES x LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xi INTRODUCTION: “facts are sometimes stranger than fiction” 1 CHAPTER ONE: “To save the Godless West”: Revivalism, Abolition, and the Founding of Oberlin 27 CHAPTER TWO: “Finneyism, Abolitionism, etc.”: The Beginnings of an Antislavery Community 72 CHAPTER THREE: “A city upon a hill”: Utopian Oberlin 113 CHAPTER FOUR: “The worthies of Oberlin”: Antislavery Expansion in the Late 1830s 149 CHAPTER FIVE: “A hot-bed of abolitionism” 196 viii CHAPTER SIX: “All the truly wise or truly pious have the same end in view”: Oberlin and Abolitionist Schism 250 CHAPTER SEVEN: “The tyrant’s grapple by our vote, We’ll loosen from our brother’s throat”: Oberlin, Free Soil, and the Fight for Equal Rights 296 CHAPTER EIGHT: “We must watch and improve this tide”: Oberlin Confronts the Slave Power, 1850-1858 345 CHAPTER NINE: “That railroad center at which all branches converged”: Oberlin and the Underground Railroad 391 CHAPTER TEN: “This drama of genuine manhood and courage”: Oberlin and the Fight for Freedom 431 CONCLUSION: “Be not conformed to this world” 480 WORKS CITED 493 ix LIST OF FIGURES 1.1: Ohio’s Population in 1830 39
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