Considerations of Humanity and Expediency: The Slave Trades and African Colonization in the Early National Antislavery Movement Nicholas Perry Wood Haddonfield, NJ M.A. American History: Rutgers University, Camden, May 2007 M.Ed. Social Studies Education: Rutgers University, New Brunswick, May 2003 B.A. History: Rutgers University, New Brunswick, May 2002 A Dissertation presented to the Graduate Faculty of the University of Virginia in Candidacy for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy or Master of Arts or Master of Science or Master of Fine Arts Corcoran Department of History University of Virginia December 2013 Peter S. Onuf S. Max Edelson Elizabeth Varon Jennifer Greeson i TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT___________________________________________________iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS _______________________________________iv ABBREVIATIONS______________________________________________vi INTRODUCTION_______________________________________________1 1. ABOLITIONISTS & POLITICS: THE ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE IN CONGRESS___________________________________________________18 2. NATURAL RIGHTS, RACE, & NATIONAL IMPERATIVES_________72 3. FREE AFRICAN AMERICANS AND THE SLAVE TRADES_________116 4. SLAVE TRADING & THE FEDERAL TERRITORIES_______________167 5 THE ANGLO-AMERICAN “RACE OF GLORY”AND THE FAILURE OF COOPERATEIVE SLAVE TRADE SUPPRESSION___________________221 6. THE COLONIZATION APPEAL________________________________273 7. THE 1819 SLAVE TRADE ACT, THE MISSOURI CRISIS, & THE FUTURE OF THE AFRICAN COLONIZATION MOVEMENT_____318 ii ABSTRACT This dissertation examines the early antislavery movement, from the American Revolution into the 1820s. I argue that during these decades abolitionists pursued a coherent national agenda, worked closely with black activists, and exerted considerable political influence. I challenge the common assumptions that after the Revolution most contemporaries believed slavery would “wither away” on its own and that organized abolitionism did not become politically significant until the 1830s. The early generations of abolitionists fully recognized the obstacles to universal emancipation presented by the Constitution, economic self-interest, and racial prejudice. In response they focused on suppressing the Atlantic and domestic slave trades as the most expedient tactic for achieving the greatest humanitarian good while paving the way for state-based emancipation. In conjunction with free blacks, some white abolitionists also sought to establish a program of voluntary black emigration to Africa or the West Indies. The majority of abolitionists and free blacks later repudiated colonizationism after slaveholders and white supremacists appeared to co-opt the movement, but supporters initially hoped colonization would facilitate emancipation while creating a base from which to suppress the African slave trade. Although rarely studied together by historians, contemporaries viewed these policies as closely linked and they represented the sites of greatest cross-sectional cooperation in regard to slavery. Congress’s Slave Trade Act of 1819 implemented a program some abolitionists and black activists had encouraged since the 1770s, connecting slave trade suppression with the creation of an African colony (Liberia) which would also receive African-American emigrants and freed slaves. However, the Missouri Crisis soon destroyed the sectional trust necessary for future cross-sectional cooperation. My work illustrates the complex interconnectedness, in tactics and aims, of gradual abolitionism, the African colonization movement, and immediatist abolitionism, thus countering historians’ tendency to overstate distinctions between these elements of the antislavery movement. Looking back from the Civil War, scholars often highlight abolitionism’s growth in the 1830s; but from the perspective of the early republic, the decade is better understood as the moment when anti-abolitionism supplanted moderate antislavery as the most prominent form of cross-sectional cooperation in regards to slavery. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I have had a triumvirate of exceptional BA, MA, and PhD advisors. At Rutgers University, New Brunswick I initially took Christopher Leslie Brown’s class on slavery more because it fit into my class schedule than because of any preexisting interest in slavery or abolition. In that class Chris planted the intellectual seed that became my honors thesis and ultimately led to this dissertation. Andrew Shankman’s classes at Rutgers, Camden further convinced me that a life of history was the life for me. Much of this dissertation is an answer to Andy’s pushing me to explain the perpetuation of slavery after the American Revolution in a more nuanced form than my initial response of “they knew it was wrong but they did it anyway.” At the University of Virginia, Peter Onuf has lived up to his reputation as a wonderful advisor. His encouragement, scholarly rigor, and good cheer have made my time here exceptionally rewarding. My other committee members at UVA, Max Edelson, Elizabeth Varon, and Jennifer Greeson have also helped me develop as a scholar through their courses and feedback. I have also benefitted from two bonus committee members. Matthew Mason generously offered to serve on my committee after meeting at various conferences and letting me pester him with emails. Alan Taylor, as the incoming Thomas Jefferson Foundation Professor at UVA, graciously agreed to add my dissertation defense to his schedule while in town for a book talk. At UVA I have also benefited from coursework and conversations with Gary Gallagher, Patrick Griffin, Paul Halliday, and Joe Miller. I have presented parts of this dissertation at various conferences and as well as seminars hosted by the Gilder Lehrman Center and Queens University in Belfast, the Charles Penn Warren Center at Vanderbilt University, the McNeil Center for Early American Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, the Robert H. Smith International Center for Jefferson Studies. At these venues and others I have received helpful feedback from many people, including: Richard Blackett, David Blight, Chris Brown, Frank Cogliano, Catherine Clinton, Teresa A. Goddu, Annette Gordon-Reed, John Craig Hammond, Jane G. Landers, Evelyn McCollin, Richard Newman, Andrew Jackson O’Shaughnessy, Anthony Parent, Lawrence Peskin, Dan Richter, Beverly Tomek, and Eva Sheppard Wolf. Craig Hammond and Rich Newman have been especially encouraging and helpful over the years. At UVA I have benefitted from a great cohort of graduate student colleagues, especially David and Randi Flaherty, Mike “Kettle Bell” Caires, Jon Grinspan, and Jason Farr. I have also benefited from the camaraderie and constructive criticism of other participants in the Early American Seminar whom I have overlapped with, especially Christa Dierksheide, Lawrence Hatter, Whitney Martinko, Martin Öhman, R.S.T. Stoermer, George Van Cleve, Gaye Wilson, and Jeff Zvengrowski. Through organizations such as the Society of Historians of the Early Republic and the Omohundro Institute for Early American History and Culture, meeting other graduate students and young scholars with similar interests, including Aaron Crawford, Lo Faber, Matt Hetrick, Craig Hollander, Leonardo Marquez, and especially Andrew Diemer, Paul Polgar, and Ed Pompeian. I also spent a fun and productive year with the McNeil Center class of 2012. iv I have received important financial support from the Corcoran Department of History at UVA, the McNeil Center for Early American Studies, the Henry Huntington Library, the Library Company of Philadelphia & the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, the Robert H. Smith International Center for Jefferson Studies, the Gilder Lehman Institute of American History. My thanks to all the staff at the above archives, and especially Ellen Hickman at the Papers of Thomas Jefferson: Retirement Series, Anna Berkes at ICJS, Jessie Kratz at the National Archives, Dan Preston and Cassie Good at the Papers of James Monroe at the University of Mary Washington, Connie King at the LCP, Steve Smith at the HSP, Sue Perdue and Will Kurtz at Documents Compass/Founders Online, and all the staff at the UVA Special Collections. My family has also been a source of great support during my long years as a graduate student. Thanks to my mother Joy, father Bob, stepmother, Monika, and brother, Tim. And this dissertation is dedicated, of course, to my wonderful Alison. v ABBREVIATIONS AC [#]-[#] - Annals of Congress [congress #]-[session #] C-P-W – Coxe-Parrish-Wharton Papers, HSP DHFFC - Documentary History of the First Federal Congress, eds. Linda Grant De Pauw et al, (20 vols. to date, Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1972- present) DHRC - Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution, Digital Edition, eds. John P. Kaminski et al HL - Henry Huntington Library, San Marino, CA HR Journal – House of Representatives Journal HSP - Historical Society of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia JAH - Journal of American History JER - Journal of the Early Republic JSH - Journal of Southern History LBRP – Letter Book of Robert Pleasants 1754-1797, Haverford Special Collections, available through “Quakers & Slavery:” http://triptych.brynmawr.edu/cdm/ref/collection/HC_QuakSlav/id/11435 LCRK – Life and Correspondence of Rufus King Letter Book of WC – Official Letter Book of W.C.C. Claiborne, ed. Rowland Dunbar, (5 vols., Jackson, MS: State Department of Archives and History, 1917) MAC [#] (#) – Minutes of the Proceedings of American Convention of Abolition Societies [convention