DOCSLIB.ORG

Neither a Slave Nor a King: the Antislavery Project and the Origins of the American Sectional Crisis, 1820-1848

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Neither a Slave Nor a King: the Antislavery Project and the Origins of the American Sectional Crisis, 1820-1848 City University of New York (CUNY) CUNY Academic Works All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects 6-2016 Neither a Slave nor a King: The Antislavery Project and the Origins of the American Sectional Crisis, 1820-1848 Joseph T. Murphy Graduate Center, City University of New York How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! More information about this work at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/1242 Discover additional works at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu This work is made publicly available by the City University of New York (CUNY). Contact: [email protected] NEITHER A SLAVE NOR A KING: THE ANTISLAVERY PROJECT AND THE ORIGINS OF THE AMERICAN SECTIONAL CRISIS, 1820-1848 by JOSEPH T. MURPHY A dissertation submitted to the Graduate Faculty in History in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, The City University of New York 2016 i © 2016 JOSEPH T. MURPHY All Rights Reserved ii Neither a Slave nor a King: The Antislavery Project and the Origins of the American Sectional Crisis, 1820-1848 by Joseph T. Murphy This manuscript has been read and accepted for the Graduate Faculty in History in satisfaction of the dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Date James Oakes Chair of Examining Committee Date Andrew W. Robertson Executive Officer Supervisory Committee: David Waldstreicher Andrew Robertson Eric Foner Richard B. Bernstein THE CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK iii ABSTRACT Neither a Slave nor a King: The Antislavery Project and the Origins of the American Sectional Crisis, 1820-1848 Advisor: James Oakes “Neither a Slave nor a King” intervenes in the scholarly debate over the “antislavery origins” of the sectional crisis in antebellum America – how the rise of a northern antislavery movement escalated the sectional tensions that led to southern secession and the Civil War. There are two main strands of literature on the antislavery origins of the sectional crisis. The first, in which social and cultural historians are dominant, focuses on the rise of radical (or “immediate”) abolitionism in the 1830s, exploring its impact on North-South relations and antebellum reform generally. The other strand, written by political and legal historians, looks at the emergence of antislavery politics in the 1840s and 50s – the effort to dislodge the “Slave Power” from the federal government and ban slavery’s expansion into the western territories. This historiographical divide is quickly disappearing, but its premises and assumptions still shape the literature, muddying the terms of the sectional debate over slavery and casting a shadow on the premises and assumptions of the antislavery movement. While there is ample evidence in the literature regarding how antislavery activists agitated the slavery question, it is still difficult to see what activists planned to do about slavery. This dissertation fills that gap by examining the origins and evolution of the chief political project of antislavery activists in the period 1820-1848: the effort to reorient federal policy so that it favored freedom and discouraged slavery, forcing the slave states to commence gradual abolition on their own. It also recovers the forgotten premises and assumptions of the iv slavery conflict between 1835 (the beginning of the abolitionists’ mass petition drives) and 1843 (the commencement of the Texas annexation controversy). The slavery controversy rarely focused on slavery’s status in the states; instead, it considered slavery’s relationship to federal power in areas of the Union outside the slave states, in places like Washington, D.C., the “free” states of the North, and U.S. coastal waters. In recovering the terms of slavery debate, the dissertation also sheds light on the premises and assumptions of the antislavery movement, broadly conceived. Drawing on an array of congressional records, federal and state court cases, private and public correspondence, abolitionist publications, third-party convention minutes and antislavery newspapers, “Neither a Slave nor a King” uses a new analytical framework to reinterpret long- familiar events in the antebellum era. It is a political history which places the antislavery project front and center in the narrative, giving us new insight into the chronology and meaning of sectional conflict in the 1830s and 40s. The short term is given priority over the long durée, as one of the central aims of this study is to capture the interplay between antislavery activists, jurists and politicians as they contributed to the formation of the antislavery project. The Introduction lays out some key concepts in the dissertation, from the political economic premises of the antislavery project to the importance of viewing slavery as a property regime. Part I considers the origins of the antislavery project, recovering the terms of slavery conflict in the early republic – namely, the question of slavery’s relationship to central-government power (Chapter 1). It also tells the story of how radical abolitionists in the 1830s developed a constitutional program for realizing universal abolition in the United States (Chapter 2). Part II follows the abolitionists as they press their agenda in Congress, triggering a constitutional crisis over slavery and federal power, a crisis whose insights were then used to strengthen the v antislavery project. In each of the three main theaters of constitutional debate – Washington, D.C. (Chapter 3), the “free” states of the North (Chapter 4), and U.S. coastal waters and the “high seas” (Chapter 5) – the primary issue was slavery’s relationship to federal power, as was true of Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842), the deeply controversial and profoundly important fugitive-slave case (Chapter 6). Part III tracks the political evolution of the antislavery project, as the abolitionists’ constitutional program became the official platform of the Liberty Party (Chapter 7) and, after the upheavals of the Texas and Mexican War controversies, the Free Soil Party (Chapters 8 and 9). Focusing on the antislavery project’s evolution across 1820-1848 suggests that the sectional crisis began well before 1846, the year most often associated with the Civil War’s origins. It was the pushing of a specific political program in Congress and the courts, not just sporadic agitation, which triggered the many conflicts over slavery and federal power in the 1830s and 40s – crises which culminated in the Free Soil revolt of 1846-48. The Free Soil coalition brought the antislavery project into mainstream American politics, where it would remain until the Civil War. In addition to the “antislavery origins” of the sectional crisis and the Civil War, the history of the antislavery project up to 1848 offers new insights into early- nineteenth-century political and constitutional development, as well as general lessons regarding American reform and its relationship to politics. vi Table of Contents Introduction 1 Recovering the Antislavery Project Recovering the Constitutional Crisis over Slavery, 1835-1843 The Free Soil Revolt as a Political Turning Point The Social Basis of the Antislavery Project Part I: Origins 1 The Missouri Crisis and the Problem of Slavery in the Early Republic 44 Property and Personhood in the British Empire Abolition in the Northern States Slavery and the Articles of Confederation Slavery and the U.S. Constitution Slavery National? The Missouri Crisis, 1819-1821 Benjamin Lundy and the Antislavery Response to Missouri 2 The Making of a National Antislavery Agenda 91 A Constitutional Crisis Emerges, 1824-1828 The Emergence of Radical Abolitionism, 1829-1833 The Abolitionists’ Constitutional Program Abolitionist Strategy The Meanings of “Immediate Emancipation” Part II: Crisis and Development 3 The Entering Wedge: Slavery and Federal Power in Washington, D.C. 128 The Debate over Abolition in Washington, D.C. The Proslavery Nationalism of John C. Calhoun The Antislavery Response in Congress Congress Adopts the Gag Rule Denying a Constitutional Right to Slave Property Theodore Dwight Weld and the Making of Antislavery Constitutionalism Publicizing Antislavery Constitutional Arguments Congressional Debate over the Abolitionists’ Program, 1837-1839 4 Our Constitution of Liberty: Slavery and Federal Power in the Free States 180 The Slavery Debate in the North: Transient Slaveowners and Fugitive Slaves A Nationalist on the Frontier Salmon P. Chase, Northern Lawyer vii Anti-Abolitionism and the Threat to Civil Order in the North The Case of Matilda Lawrence In re Matilda (1837) Ohio v. Birney (1837) Implementing the Abolitionists’ Agenda in the North 5 Following the Flag: Slavery and Federal Power on the High Seas 248 The Enterprise Resolutions The Amistad Affair Groves v. Slaughter (1841) The Impact of Amistad and Groves on the Abolitionist Movement The Creole Resolutions 6 A Presumption of Freedom: The Crucial Ambiguities of Prigg v. Pennsylvania 307 “A Triumph of Freedom”: Joseph Story’s Opinion in Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842) The Antislavery Response to Prigg v. Pennsylvania A Policy of “Noncooperation” Emerges Jones v. Van Zandt (1843) Part III: Politics 7 Absolute and Unqualified Divorce 352 Toward an Antislavery Politics Schism and the End of the American Antislavery Society The Liberty Party A Balance-of-Power Strategy Salmon Chase Joins the Liberty Party Debating the Objective of Antislavery Politics Salmon Chase Develops an Antislavery Platform Coalition on the Basis of Denationalization Denationalization
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Indentured Servants, Slaves, and Articles of Commerce, The
    Missouri Law Review Volume 61 Issue 4 Fall 1996 Article 1 Fall 1996 Struggle over Immigration: Indentured Servants, Slaves, and Articles of Commerce, The Mary Sarah Bilder Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/mlr Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Mary Sarah Bilder, Struggle over Immigration: Indentured Servants, Slaves, and Articles of Commerce, The, 61 MO. L. REV. (1996) Available at: https://scholarship.law.missouri.edu/mlr/vol61/iss4/1 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Law Journals at University of Missouri School of Law Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Missouri Law Review by an authorized editor of University of Missouri School of Law Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Bilder: Bilder: Struggle over Immigration: MISSOURI LAW REVIEW VOLUME 61 FALL 1996 NUMBER 4 The Struggle over Immigration: Indentured Servants, Slaves, and Articles of Commerce Mary Sarah Bilder" A long time ago, but not too long ago, Ships came from across the sea Bringing Pilgrims and prayer-makers, Adventurers and booty seekers, Free men and indentured servants, Slave men and slave masters, all new- To a new world, America! -Langston Hughes' * Assistant Professor of Law, Boston College Law School. B.A. 1987, University of Wisconsin-Madison; J.D. 1990, Harvard Law School; A.M. (History) 1992, Harvard University. I thank Bernard Bailyn, Daniel Coquillette, Anthony Farley, Phyllis Goldfarb, Daniel Kanstroom, Ray Madoff, John T. O'Keefe, Aviam Soifer, and Carol Weisbrod. Above all, I thank my parents, Richard and Sally Bilder, for their advice and encouragement.
    [Show full text]
  • Twelve Years a Slave. Narrative
    FIFTH THOUSAND TWELVE YEARS A SLAVE. NARRATIVE OF SOLOMON NORTHUP, A CITIZEN OF NEW-YORK, KIDNAPPED IN WASHINGTON CITY IN 1841, AND RESCUED IN 1853, FROM A COTTON PLANTATION NEAR THE RED RIVER, IN LOUISIANA. AUBURN: DERBY AND MILLER. BUFFALO: DERBY, ORTON AND MULLIGAN. LONDON: SAMPSON LOW, SON & COMPANY, 47 LUDGATE HILL. 1853. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year one thousand eight hundred and fifty-three, by D E R B Y A N D M ILLER , In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Northern District of New-York. ENTERED IN LONDON AT STATIONERS' HALL. TO HARRIET BEECHER STOWE: WHOSE NAME, THROUGHOUT THE WORLD, IS IDENTIFIED WITH THE GREAT REFORM: THIS NARRATIVE, AFFORDING ANOTHER Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin, IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED "Such dupes are men to custom, and so prone To reverence what is ancient, and can plead A course of long observance for its use, That even servitude, the worst of ills, Because delivered down from sire to son, Is kept and guarded as a sacred thing. But is it fit, or can it bear the shock Of rational discussion, that a man Compounded and made up, like other men, Of elements tumultuous, in whom lust And folly in as ample measure meet, As in the bosom of the slave he rules, Should be a despot absolute, and boast Himself the only freeman of his land?" Cowper. [Pg vii] CONTENTS. PAGE. EDITOR'S PREFACE, 15 CHAPTER I. Introductory—Ancestry—The Northup Family—Birth and Parentage—Mintus Northup—Marriage with Anne Hampton—Good Resolutions—Champlain Canal—Rafting Excursion to Canada— Farming—The Violin—Cooking—Removal to Saratoga—Parker and Perry—Slaves and Slavery— The Children—The Beginning of Sorrow, 17 CHAPTER II.
    [Show full text]
  • John Quincy Adams, the Gag Rule, and Antislavery An
    JOHN QUINCY ADAMS, THE GAG RULE, AND ANTISLAVERY AN HONORS THESIS SUBMITTED TO FULFILL THE REQUIREMENTS of I.D. 499 by RICHARD A. GANTZ ADVISER - WILLIAM EIDSON BALL STATE UNIVERSITY MUNCIE, INDIANA AUGUST t 1968 ·~ __ I t 196L~ . G,:: {f! TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION •••..•••••.•••.•••..•••. page 1 CI1A.PTER 1 .•••••••••••••••••••••••••• page 2 CI1A.PTER 2 ••••••••••••••••••••••••••. page 12 CONCLUSIONS .•••••.••..••.••••••••••• page 31 BIBLIOGRAPHY ••••. ••••••••.••• ••••••• page 33 INTRODUCTION In the United states in the 1830's, the foremost issue that threatened the future of the Union was slavery. The abolition and antislavery societies became much more aggressive in their campaign to attack slavery. Under this new pressure, the South grew extremely sensitive and defensive of its peculiar institution. In an attempt to still the disruptive debate over slavery, the House of Representatives in 1836 adopted a "gag" rule to stop the flood of petitions calling for abolition. This was passed by the Southerners with the support of the majority of representatives from the North. The leader of the opposition to the gag rule was the venerable ex-President, John Quincy Adams, who was rendering his last years of public service in the House of Representatives. Adams, in his attempt to rescind the gag rule became, willingly or not, the unofficial leader of the antislavery movement. The struggle against the gag rule was closely connected to but was not quite the same as the antislavery movement. In view of this fact and John Quincy Adams's role in both movements, a question arises as to how much his involvement in the antislavery movement was prompted by his work against the gag rule.
    [Show full text]
  • The Color Line in Ohio Public Schools, 1829-1890
    THE COLOR LINE IN OHIO PUBLIC SCHOOLS, 1829-1890 DISSERTATION Presented In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By LEONARD ERNEST ERICKSON, B. A., M. A, ****** The Ohio State University I359 Approved Adviser College of Education ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This dissertation is not the work of the author alone, of course, but represents the contributions of many persons. While it is impossible perhaps to mention every­ one who has helped, certain officials and other persons are especially prominent in my memory for their encouragement and assistance during the course of my research. I would like to express my appreciation for the aid I have received from the clerks of the school boards at Columbus, Dayton, Toledo, and Warren, and from the Superintendent of Schools at Athens. In a similar manner I am indebted for the courtesies extended to me by the librarians at the Western Reserve Historical Society, the Ohio State Library, the Ohio Supreme Court Library, Wilberforce University, and Drake University. I am especially grateful to certain librarians for the patience and literally hours of service, even beyond the high level customary in that profession. They are Mr. Russell Dozer of the Ohio State University; Mrs. Alice P. Hook of the Historical and Philosophical Society; and Mrs. Elizabeth R. Martin, Miss Prances Goudy, Mrs, Marion Bates, and Mr. George Kirk of the Ohio Historical Society. ii Ill Much of the time for the research Involved In this study was made possible by a very generous fellowship granted for the year 1956 -1 9 5 7, for which I am Indebted to the Graduate School of the Ohio State University.
    [Show full text]
  • Image Credits, the Making of African
    THE MAKING OF AFRICAN AMERICAN IDENTITY: VOL. I, 1500-1865 PRIMARY SOURCE COLLECTION The Making of African American Identity: Vol. I, 1500-1865 IMAGE CREDITS Items listed in chronological order within each repository. ALABAMA DEPT. of ARCHIVES AND HISTORY. Montgomery, Alabama. WEBSITE Reproduced by permission. —Physical and Political Map of the Southern Division of the United States, map, Boston: William C. Woodbridge, 1843; adapted to Woodbridges Geography, 1845; map database B-315, filename: se1845q.sid. Digital image courtesy of Alabama Maps, University of Alabama. ALLPORT LIBRARY AND MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS. State Library of Tasmania. Hobart, Tasmania (Australia). WEBSITE Reproduced by permission of the Tasmanian Archive & Heritage Office. —Mary Morton Allport, Comet of March 1843, Seen from Aldridge Lodge, V. D. Land [Tasmania], lithograph, ca. 1843. AUTAS001136168184. AMERICAN TEXTILE HISTORY MUSEUM. Lowell, Massachusetts. WEBSITE Reproduced by permission. —Wooden snap reel, 19th-century, unknown maker, color photograph. 1970.14.6. ARCHIVES OF ONTARIO. Toronto, Ontario, Canada. WEBSITE In the public domain; reproduced courtesy of Archives of Ontario. —Letter from S. Wickham in Oswego, NY, to D. B. Stevenson in Canada, 12 October 1850. —Park House, Colchester, South, Ontario, Canada, refuge for fugitive slaves, photograph ca. 1950. Alvin D. McCurdy fonds, F2076-16-6. —Voice of the Fugitive, front page image, masthead, 12 March 1854. F 2076-16-935. —Unidentified black family, tintype, n.d., possibly 1850s; Alvin D. McCurdy fonds, F 2076-16-4-8. ASBURY THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY. Wilmore, Kentucky. Permission requests submitted. –“Slaves being sold at public auction,” illustration in Thomas Lewis Johnson, Twenty-Eight Years a Slave, or The Story of My Life in Three Continents, 1909, p.
    [Show full text]
  • Chapter I: the Supremacy of Equal Rights
    DIVISION OF THE HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES CALIFORNIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY PASADENA, CALIFORNIA 91125 CHAPTER I: THE SUPREMACY OF EQUAL RIGHTS J. Morgan Kousser SOCIAL SCIENCE WORKING PAPER 620 March 1987 ABSTRACT The black and white abolitionist agitation of the school integ ration issue in Massachusetts from 1840 to 1855 gave us the fi rst school integ ration case filed in Ame rica, the fi rst state sup reme cou rt decision re po rted on the issue, and the fi rst state-wide law banning ra cial disc rimination in admission to educational institutions. Wh o favo red and who opposed school integ ration, and what arguments did each side make? We re the types of arguments that they offe re d diffe rent in diffe re nt fo ru ms? We re they diffe rent from 20th centu ry arguments? Wh y did the movement triumph, and why did it take so long to do so? Wh at light does the st ruggle th row on views on ra ce re lations held by membe rs of the antebellum black and white communities, on the cha racte r of the abolitionist movement, and on the development of legal doct rines about ra cial equality? Pe rhaps mo re gene rally, how should histo ri ans go about assessing the weight of diffe rent re asons that policymake rs adduced fo r thei r actions, and how flawed is a legal histo ry that confines itself to st rictly legal mate ri als? How can social scientific theo ry and statistical techniques be profitably applied to politico-legal histo ry? Pa rt of a la rge r project on the histo ry of cou rt cases and state and local provisions on ra cial disc rimination in schools, this pape r int roduces many of the main themes, issues, and methods to be employed in the re st of the book.
    [Show full text]
  • Can Words Lead to War?
    Middle School Uncle Tom’s Cabin Inquiry Can Words Lead to War? Full-page illustration from first edition Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Hammatt Billings. Available in Uncle Tom’s Cabin & American Culture. Supporting Questions 1. How did Harriet Beecher Stowe describe slavery in Uncle Tom’s Cabin? 2. What led Harriet Beecher Stowe to write Uncle Tom’s Cabin? 3. How did northerners and southerners react to Uncle Tom’s Cabin? 4. How did Uncle Tom’s Cabin affect abolitionism? THIS WORK IS LICENSED UNDER A CREATIVE COMMONS ATTRIBUTION- NONCOMMERCIAL- SHAREALIKE 4.0 INTERNATIONAL LICENSE. 1 Middle School Uncle Tom’s Cabin Inquiry Can Words Lead to War? Framework for Summary Objective 12: Students will understand the growth of the abolitionist movement in the Teaching American 1830s and the Southern view of the movement as a physical, economic and political threat. Slavery Consider the power of words and examine a video of students using words to try to bring about Staging the Question positive change. Supporting Question 1 Supporting Question 2 Supporting Question 3 Supporting Question 4 How did Harriet Beecher What led Harriet Beecher How did people in the How did Uncle Tom’s Stowe describe slavery in Stowe to write Uncle North and South react to Cabin affect abolitionism? Uncle Tom’s Cabin? Tom’s Cabin? Uncle Tom’s Cabin? Formative Formative Formative Formative Performance Task Performance Task Performance Task Performance Task Complete a source analysis List four quotes from the Make a T-chart comparing Participate in a structured chart to write a summary sources that point to the viewpoints expressed discussion regarding the of Uncle Tom’s Cabin that Stowe’s motivation and in northern and southern impact Uncle Tom’s Cabin includes main ideas and write a paragraph newspaper reviews of had on abolitionism.
    [Show full text]
  • 1 Sumner, Charles. the Selected Letters of Charles Sumner. Edited
    Sumner, Charles. The Selected Letters of Charles Sumner. Edited by Beverly Wilson Palmer. 2 vols. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1990. Vol. 2 Lawyers and politicians, 20 Lincoln, Seward, Sumner, Chicago convention nomination, 23-24 Law, barbarism of slavery, Lewis Tappan, 26 Crime Against Kansas speech, 29-30 Fugitive slave law, 31-32 Election, Lincoln, secession threats, 34 Seward, 37 Secession, 37ff Secession and possible civil war, 38-39 Thurlow Weed, Lincoln, Winfield Scott, 40-41 Scott, Seward, 42 John A. Andrew, no compromise, 43, 47-48 Fears compromise and surrender, 44 Massachusetts men need to stand firm, 46 Massachusetts, Buchanan, Crittenden compromise, 50-51 Personal liberty laws, 51-52 Fort Sumter, forts, 53 Virginia secession election, 54 New Mexico compromise, 55-57 Lincoln, 59 Lincoln and office seekers, 64 Seward influence, 64 Lincoln and war, 65 Northern unity, Lincoln, 69 John Lothrop Motley, 70-71 Congressional session, legislation, 71-72 Blockade, 73 Bull Run defeat, Lincoln, 74 Cameron and contrabands, 75 Lincoln, duty of emancipation, 76 William Howard Russell, Bull Run, 76-78 Slavery, Frémont, Lincoln, 79 Frémont, 80 Wendell Phillips, Sumner speech on slavery, 80 Slavery, English opinion, emancipation, Cameron, contraband order, 81-87 War, slavery, tariff, 82 Trent affair, Mason and Slidell, 85-94 Charles Stone, 95 Lieber, Stanton, Trent affair, 98 Stanton, 99 Lincoln, Chase, 100 Davis and Lincoln, 101 1 Andrew, McClellan, Lincoln, 103 Establishing territorial governments in rebel states, 103-8 Fugitive
    [Show full text]
  • Abolitionist Movement
    Abolitionist Movement The goal of the abolitionist movement was the immediate emancipation of all slaves and the end of racial discrimination and segregation. Advocating for immediate emancipation distinguished abolitionists from more moderate anti-slavery advocates who argued for gradual emancipation, and from free-soil activists who sought to restrict slavery to existing areas and prevent its spread further west. Radical abolitionism was partly fueled by the religious fervor of the Second Great Awakening, which prompted many people to advocate for emancipation on religious grounds. Abolitionist ideas became increasingly prominent in Northern churches and politics beginning in the 1830s, which contributed to the regional animosity between North and South leading up to the Civil War. The Underground Railroad c.1780 - 1862 The Underground Railroad, a vast network of people who helped fugitive slaves escape to the North and to Canada, was not run by any single organization or person. Rather, it consisted of many individuals -- many whites but predominantly black -- who knew only of the local efforts to aid fugitives and not of the overall operation. Still, it effectively moved hundreds of slaves northward each year -- according to one estimate, the South lost 100,000 slaves between 1810 and 1850. Still, only a small percentage of escaping slaves received assistance from the Underground Railroad. An organized system to assist runaway slaves seems to have begun towards the end of the 18th century. In 1786 George Washington complained about how one of his runaway slaves was helped by a "society of Quakers, formed for such purposes." The system grew, and around 1831 it was dubbed "The Underground Railroad," after the then emerging steam railroads.
    [Show full text]
  • Abraham Lincoln, Kentucky African Americans and the Constitution
    Abraham Lincoln, Kentucky African Americans and the Constitution Kentucky African American Heritage Commission Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Collection of Essays Abraham Lincoln, Kentucky African Americans and the Constitution Kentucky African American Heritage Commission Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Collection of Essays Kentucky Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission Kentucky Heritage Council © Essays compiled by Alicestyne Turley, Director Underground Railroad Research Institute University of Louisville, Department of Pan African Studies for the Kentucky African American Heritage Commission, Frankfort, KY February 2010 Series Sponsors: Kentucky African American Heritage Commission Kentucky Historical Society Kentucky Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission Kentucky Heritage Council Underground Railroad Research Institute Kentucky State Parks Centre College Georgetown College Lincoln Memorial University University of Louisville Department of Pan African Studies Kentucky Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission The Kentucky Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission (KALBC) was established by executive order in 2004 to organize and coordinate the state's commemorative activities in celebration of the 200th anniversary of the birth of President Abraham Lincoln. Its mission is to ensure that Lincoln's Kentucky story is an essential part of the national celebration, emphasizing Kentucky's contribution to his thoughts and ideals. The Commission also serves as coordinator of statewide efforts to convey Lincoln's Kentucky story and his legacy of freedom, democracy, and equal opportunity for all. Kentucky African American Heritage Commission [Enabling legislation KRS. 171.800] It is the mission of the Kentucky African American Heritage Commission to identify and promote awareness of significant African American history and influence upon the history and culture of Kentucky and to support and encourage the preservation of Kentucky African American heritage and historic sites.
    [Show full text]
  • Convict Servitude, Authority, and the Rise of Humanitarianism in the Anglo-American World, 1718-1809
    ABSTRACT THE “VILE COMMODITY”: CONVICT SERVITUDE, AUTHORITY, AND THE RISE OF HUMANITARIANISM IN THE ANGLO-AMERICAN WORLD, 1718-1809 Nicole K. Dressler, Ph.D. Department of History Northern Illinois University, 2018 Aaron S. Fogleman, Director This dissertation examines the role that British convict transportation and penal servitude in America played in the early history of humanitarianism. During the eighteenth century, Britons and American’s ideas about moral obligations and suffering changed drastically toward traditionally detested people, including transported convicts, African slaves, sailors, and the poor. Many histories of humanitarianism and human rights have glazed over the subject’s early modern roots; however, more recently scholars have challenged the unilinear and inevitably triumphal narrative of human rights cultures and launched new investigations into the historical foundations of the movement. This study argues that emerging ideas of punishment, morality, and unfreedom evoked by convict labor created new moral responsibilities, widened the plane of sympathies, and inspired novel denunciations of suffering in eighteenth- and early nineteenth- century Anglo-American culture. It uses legal and judicial records, public commentaries, and the papers of prominent reformers in London and the three colonies (later states) that imported the most convicts on the North American mainland, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia. It traces the attitudes, ethics, and practices regarding penal servitude from 1718, following a new British law that ushered in an era of massive convict transportation, through the American Revolution and into the early Republic period. The study shows how labor systems as a whole played an unrecognized, critical role and influenced early modern abolitionist and moralist thinking and rhetoric.
    [Show full text]
  • The University of Chicago Law Review
    The University of Chicago Law Review Volume 85 June 2018 Number 4 © 2018 by The University of Chicago ARTICLES Citizens of the State Maeve Glass† According to conventional wisdom, state citizenship emerged out of the local- ism of early America and gave way to national citizenship with the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment. This Article offers a different account of state citizen- ship and, with it, new resources for analyzing the Constitution. It argues that far from a primordial category that receded into irrelevance, state citizenship provided a crucial strategic tool in America’s antislavery movement, as abolitionist lawyers used the label of state citizenship to build a coalition with white elites by reframing the issue of slavery from the rights of a black person to the sovereignty of a state. In particular, beginning in the mid-1830s, abolitionist lawyers in Boston who confronted the limits of inherited arguments based on national citizenship turned to the Constitution’s clause guaranteeing the privileges and immunities of state citi- zenship. By pairing this Article IV clause with the then-prevailing norm of a state’s sovereign duty to protect its citizens, these lawyers argued that failure on the part of Massachusetts to intervene in the police laws of the southern coastal states targeting free blacks would imperil the state’s beleaguered standing. These arguments in turn became the basis for the country’s first challenge to the laws of the southern states † Associate Professor of Law, Columbia Law School. For helpful comments on earlier drafts, many thanks to Tomiko Brown-Nagin, Jessica Bulman-Pozen, Christine Desan, Einer Elhauge, Elizabeth F.
    [Show full text]