CASSIUS M. CLAY and JOHN G. FEE: a STUDY in SOUTHERN ANTI-SLAVERY THOUGHT in the Years Which Followed the Civil War, Men Who
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Reprinted from THE JOURNAL OF NEGRO HISTORY, Vol. XLII, No. 3, July 1957 CASSIUS M. CLAY AND JOHN G. FEE: A STUDY IN SOUTHERN ANTI-SLAVERY THOUGHT In the years which followed the Civil War, men who con• templated its origins often considered the anti-slavery crusade and its effects upon the tragic event. But as years passed, many forgot that there had been various shades of opinion among opponents of slavery, and put all agitators into the same category. The careers of Cassius M. Clay and John G. Fee, however, revealed a fundamental disagreement which separated fighters of the "peculiar institution. "1 Fee and Clay lived in the same county in a slave state, Madison County, Kentucky, and in that small arena a conflict developed between them which involved the controlling as• sumptions of the entire body of anti-slavery thought. Both men were native Kentuckians, but aside from their birthplace about the only characteristic the two men shared was their opposition to the institution of human slavery. For a time, that was enough to bring them together. But when each learned more about the other's position\they separated and afterwards were as hostile toward each other as toward slav• ery itself. In their case it was the doctrine of the "higher law" which proved to be the stumbling block. Their disagreement on that issue, which arose out of their conflicting motivations, indicated the depth of the division within the ranks of South• ern antislavery spokesmen. Although it was not immediately evident to the Kentucki• ans, their differences were deep-seated. Fee, who was born in 1816 in Bracken County, Kentucky, received his anti-slavery inspiration as a religious commandment from "higher law" moral reformers. A small, weazened man with bulging fore• head and almost hairless pate which emphasized his piercing eyes, Fee had the physique and the temperament of a perse• cuted saint. The son of a slave-owning farmer, while very young he declared his intention to become a Christian min• ister. - After studies at Augusta College in Kentucky and at 1John Gregg Fee (1816-1901), Presbyterian minister, abolitionist, founder of Berea College; Cassius M. Clay (1810-1903), abolitionist, distant kinsman of Henry Clay, veteran of the Mexican War, major-general of volunteers in the Federal army, United States minister to Russia, 1861-2, and 1863-9. For both men, con• sult Dictionary of American Biography. 201 202 JOURNAL OF NEGRO HISTORY Miami Univeristy in Ohio, in 1842 young Fee entered Lane Seminary in Cincinnati. There he accepted the anti-slavery religion for which that school was becoming famous.2 ,,. I As the ascetic youth searched for a sin to repent, he discov• ered the moral implications of Kentucky's labor system. After spending much time in private meditation, Fee declared that the Christian doctrine of love required that he "abjure" slav• ery. "I saw that the [Golden] rule ... was fundamental in the religion of Jesus Christ,'' he said, ''and that unless I em• braced the principle and lived it in honest practice, I would lose my soul.' '3 With that interpretation of Christianity, Fee returned to his native state, preached against the "sin" of slaveholding, and promptly met persecution. When some Ken• tucky church members offered him a pastorate if he would "go along and preach the Gospel and let the subject of slavery alone," Fee declared his new faith. "The Gospel is the good news of salvation from sin, all sin, the sin of slaveholding as well as all other sins,'' he replied. ''I will not sell my convic• tions in reference to that which I regard as an iniquity, nor my liberty to utter these convictions for a mess of pottage.' '4 Con• vinced that slaveholders persecuted him because he dared preach the ''truth,'' Fee organized a small church in Lewis County which admitted only non-slaveholders to membership." Fee regarded himself as a religious reformer comparable to Luther, and he insisted that his only interest was in moral change among slaveowners. "As in the days of Martin Luther," he preached, "though the doctrine of justification by faith was plainly written in the Bible, yet the great body of people did not see it," so in Fee's Kentucky few seemed to understand the ''great doctrine of loving God supremely and our neighbor as ourselves.'' Though he reported that he had J been "waylaid, shot at, clubbed, stoned," he did not turn aside from his course. ''The only way to ultimate peace was to hold rigidly to the right,'' he explained, ''though in so do- 2 Autobiography of John G. Fee, Berea, Ky. Published by the National Christian Mission, Chicago, Ill., 1891. Pp. 9, 12. 3 Ibid., 13·4. <i Ibid., 20·1. 5 Ibid., 59. A STUDY IN SOUTHERN ANTI-SLAVERY THOUGHT 203 ing, I had, in the Gospel sense, to leave ... all for Christ's sake. I was conscious that no other motive impelled me.' '6 John G. Fee's single-minded devotion to his interpretation of Christianity led him to renewed allegiance to the "higher law'' which motivated religiously-inspired abolitionists. How• ever humane slavery might appear, to Fee it was inherently sinful. "It is oppression still; a violation of the law of love," he insisted. "No man can maintain a Christian character and persist in it ... '' He urged his followers to practice the law of love even to the extent of disregarding man-made law when it conflicted with their moral absolutes. "A law that is not im• moral and wicked ought to be borne with until it can be re• pealed," he told them. "But an impious, wicked law may not be obeyed." Laws which instituted human slavery were wicked, he went on. Such a law "violates religious duty, inter• feres with the right of conscience, and is therefore unconstitu• tional, and should really have no binding effect,'' he said. "Let us obey the voice of God, 'Break every yoke and let the oppressed go free.' 'n Fee's unremitting warfare upon slavery soon brought him to the attention of another Kentucky anti-slavery spokesman, Cassius M. Clay. But though Clay agreed with Fee that slav• ery was an evil to be exorcised, his reasoning was altogether different. While Preacher Fee considered the institution sin• ful, Clay considered it harmful to free white laborers and the chief barrier to a diversified economy in the South. But it was not only in his motivation that Clay differed from the preacher -his appearance and his personality were unlike Fee's. He was nearly twice as heavy as the tiny Fee; he was tall and heavy-set, chunky and muscular, with quick, cat-like move• ments; and his head was covered with unruly hair. Moreover, unlike the ascetic Fee, Clay enjoyed the banquet board and the wine cup, and he boasted of his physical prowess. While Fee 6 tua., 16-17, 65. 7 John G. Fee, Colonization. The Present Scheme of Colonisation Wrong, Delusive, and Retards Emancipation. American Reform Tract and Book Society, Cincinnati, n.d. [185H] Pp. 6, 44, 45, 47. In the introduction to the pamphlet, Fee clearly declared his purpose: ''Much of this tract is an appeal to conscience and Christian principle; because, says a British writer, 'we never made any head• way in the abolition of the slave trade, and of slavery, till it was taken up by religious men, prosecuted as a concern of the soul, with reference to eternity, and motives drawn from the cross of Christ'." 204 JOURNAL OF NEGRO HISTORY was a nonresister, Clay referred to himself as a ":fighting Christian,'' and he never went out unarmed. In the course of an active career he fought opponents with fists, with cane, with pistols, and with bowie-knif e, and he gained a wide reputation as a dangerous man in a rough-and-tumble :fight.8 Perhaps the most important difference between the two men was in heritage. Clay was born into Kentucky landed aristocracy, and he enjoyed the advantages of family and of wealth. His father, a pioneer to the Dark and Bloody Ground, had amassed a fortune in land and commercial ventures and was able to give his sons the best available advantages in life. Cassius, the youngest, born in 1810 in Madison County, was well educated with a degree from Yale College and a law course at Kentucky's Transylvania University. As soon as he ·l reached the legal age, he began his political career and served several terms in the state legislature.9 While he was a representative, Clay began to criticize slav• ery but he did not use moral preachments against it as did the religious agitators of the Lane Seminary type. "It is not a matter of conscience with me," he admitted. "I press it not upon the consciences of others.' 11° Clay also rejected the no• tion, dear to religious abolitionists, that the Negro was his brother. John G. Fee had put it bluntly: "The 'colored man' is none the less a man because he is 'colored';" and he added that ''God has ever been on the side of the oppressed, and against the oppressor.' ui But Clay disliked the Negro and sought constitutional emancipation as a means of getting them out of the state. "I have studied the Negro character," he said. "They lack self-reliance--we can make nothing out of them. God has made them for the sun and the banana!' '12 In seeking liberty for the blacks, therefore, he was careful to ex• plain that he did so in order that the ''white laborers of the 8 The Life of Cassius Marcellus Clay: Memoirs, Writings, and Speeches.