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Ml 48106 18 BEDFORD ROW. LONDON WC1R 4EJ. ENGLAND B001570 NDUKWU, MAURICE DICKSiiN ANTISLAVERY IN MICHIGAN: A STUDY OF ITS ORIGIN, DEVELOPMENT, AND EXPRESSION FROM TERRITORIAL PERIOD ID I6G 0. MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY, P H .D ., 1 9 7 9 f University' ! Microfilms International 3 0 0 n. zeeb road, ann arb o r, mi 48io6 Urw ■ft — ______ ... Intematk3^al 300 N, ZEEB ROAD, ANN ARBOR. Ml 48106 ANTISLAVERY IN MICHIGAN: A STUDY OF ITS ORIGIN, DEVELOPMENT, AND EXPRESSION FROM TERRITORIAL PERIOD TO 1860 by Maurice Dickson Ndukwu A THESIS Submitted to Michigan State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Department of History 1979 ABSTRACT ANT ISLAVERY IN MICHIGAN: A STUDY OF ITS ORIGIN, DEVELOPMENT, AND EXPRESSION FROM TERRITORIAL PERIOD TO 1860 By Maurice Dickson Ndukwu In 1832 Elizabeth Margaret Chandler and Laura S. Haviland inspired a small group of Quakers in Lenawee County to organize the first antislavery society in Michigan. It was known as the Logan Female Antislavery Society. By 1836 other concerned citizens, mostly clergymen, had not only formed local antislavery societies in other parts of the state but had also united them by establishing the Michigan State Anti-Slavery Society. As an auxiliary member of the American Anti-Slavery Society, the Michigan society vowed to agitate through moral persuasion and other constitutional means for immediate and universal emancipation of the Negro slaves in the nation. In their campaigns to convince their fellow citizens that Negro slavery was morally wrong and ought to be imme­ diately abolished, they encountered serious difficulties. Through their dedication and determination, they gradually shifted their agitation from immediate universal emancipation to opposition against the extension of slavery into new territories. In addition, they became the advocates of free Maurice Dickson Ndukwu white laborers of America, and, to win the support of a larger segment of people, the antislaveryites also focused their agitation on the effect of slavery on the free men, and the oppressive nature of the slave-power of the South. Realizing the limitations of relying solely on antislavery lectures for the success of their cause, the leaders reluc­ tantly accepted the idea of combining their moral agitation with political action. By carefully exploiting issues in national politics involving the slavery controversy, issues which disrupted the unity of the Democratic and Whig political parties, the moral crusaders were able to promote their cause by transforming their movement into a political party. Based on manuscript materials, contemporary news­ papers, printed public documents, and other published works, this study traces the origin of antislavery sentiment in Michigan, the difficulties encountered by the members of the society, and the strategies and measures the leaders employed to promote the antislavery movement in Michigan during the period covered by this study. In addition this study also discusses the complexity of the factors which caused most Northerners to join the Republican Party, the organization of which helped strengthen the antislavery movement in Michigan and elsewhere. TABLE OF CONTENTS Page INTRODUCTION ............................................ 1 Chapter I. THE GENESIS OF THE ANTISLAVERY MOVEMENT IN MICHIGAN: THE TERRITORIAL ERA ............... 5 II. THE FORMATION OF THE MICHIGAN STATE ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY .......................... 27 III. THE PROGRESS OF THE ANTISLAVERY MOVEMENT IN MICHIGAN, 1837 47 IV. BY EVERY MEANS POSSIBLE: ABOLITIONISM IN MICHIGAN, 1838-1839 74 V. ABOLITIONISTS AND FUGITIVE SLAVES ........... 108 VI. THE POLITICS OF OPPORTUNISM: POLITICAL ANTISLAVERY IN MICHIGAN, 1840-1850 ........... 136 VII. THE EMERGENCE OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY AND THE PROGRESS OF POLITICAL ABOLITIONISM IN MICHIGAN, 1851-1860 205 BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................ 269 APPENDIX A - The Declaration of Sentiments ............ 332 B - The Constitution of the Michigan Anti- Slavery Society ............................ 341 APPENDIX C - Distribution of Black Population by Counties in Michigan in 1850 . 345 D - Resolutions from "Proceedings of Free Soil State Convention in Michigan," 1851 348 E - Platform, State Mass Convention of the Free Democrats, February 22, 1854 . 351 F - Resolutions, Mass Convention, Free Democrats, Court House, Kalamazoo, June 21, 1854 .......................... 354 G - Call for the "Under Oaks" Republican Convention, July 6, 1854 ............. 357 H - Call for the Mass Convention of the Free Democratic Party, to be Held in Kalamazoo, June 21, 1854.............. 360 I - Resolutions, Republican Mass Convention, Kalamazoo, September 12 , 1855 ........ 363 J - Resolutions, Republican Mass Convention, Marshall, Michigan, July 8, 1856 . 366 iv INTRODUCTION Freedom, equality, and liberty for all were and still are the most important sacred rights of American citizens. These sacred rights of man were the basic principles upon which the American Republic was founded. Its people earnestly believed in the inalienable rights of man and fought the British in 1776 in defense of their rights. Chattel slavery had come under severe attack by 1776 by pamphleteers following out the logic of Revolutionary thought. The connection, for those who chose to see it, was obvious. In eighteenth century political discourse, particu­ larly in America, slavery was a crucial concept. The ulti­ mate political threat, the absolute political evil, slavery was embedded in the structure of political thought. It appeared in every statement of political principle, in every discussion of constitutionalism or legal rights, and in every exhortation to resistance. Political slavery which the Revolutionary leaders fought against in the eighteenth century was not different from the condition of bondage to which the blacks in Southern plantations were subjected. The condition of the slaves was only more dramatic, a more bizarre variation of the condition of all who had lost the power of self-determination. Their 1 2 degradation so painfully visible and unambiguously estab­ lished in law was only the final realization of what the loss of freedom could mean everywhere. There was no such thing as partial liberty, for anyone who had authority to restrain and control the conduct of someone else had every­ thing. Therefore, from this point of view, it made no little difference whether one's bondage was private or public, civil or political. It did not even matter whether a slave was treated well or poorly. Chattel slavery was simply undemocratic, immoral and inhuman. As Stephen Hopkins once observed: Anyone who is bound to obey the will of another, is as really a slave though he may have a good master as if he had a bad one; and this is stronger in political bodies than in natural ones, as the former have perpetual succession and remain the same; and although they may have a very good master at one time, they'may have a very bad one at another.1 The presence of an enslaved black population in America became a political issue where slavery had the gen­ eral meaning stated above. The contrast between what political leaders of the Revolution sought for themselves and their fellow citizens, and what they imposed on, or at least tolerated in, others became too glaring to be ignored. In order to establish the union of the colonies after the American War of Independence, it was thought perhaps wise to ^Quoted in Bernard Bailyn, ed., Pamphlets of the American Revolution, 1750-1776 (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1965) , p. 142. 3 please the slaveholding states by refraining from any attack on Negro slavery where it already existed in 1787. Neverthe­ less, the Continental Congress of the confederated colonies took one advanced step in that direction by enacting a law which would check the extension of slavery into new regions. This measure was the Northwest Ordinance, adopted on July 13, 1787. The ordinance forbade the introduction of slavery in all the territory north of the Ohio River. The State of Michigan was one of the five states carved out of the old Northwest. By this law of 1787 slavery was not allowed to exist in Michigan. Michigan entered the Union as the twenty-sixth state in 1837.