Monday, January 19, 2015

The American Anti-Slavery Society

“It takes great courage to open one's heart and mind to the tremendous injustice and suffering in our world.”  --Vincent A. Gallagher

Then and today.  I don’t know who this Vincent A. Gallagher is, but he’s got (had?) a point.  Here in America, everything is nice and peaceful and stable for the most part, so it’s easy to forget that little kids are learning how to kill people in Iraq and Syria, people are selling their kidneys and even their eyes out of desperation for money in parts of Africa, North Korea is shutting people off from the world and doing who knows what to them, and baby girls are being buried alive because they are girls.  Like Gallagher said, we’ve got to do something about it, we’ve got to help our fellow human beings.  Whether it’s joining that Model UN class or becoming president, or even starting a blog, we have the power to do something.

The American Anti-Slavery Society was an abolitionist group that formed when sixty brave people came together in Pennsylvania (a state with no slaves and few African  Americans, but a state that relied on cotton from the South for its economy) in December of 1833 and said, “this is wrong.”  William Lloyd Garrison, a fiery abolitionist from Massachusetts, rose as a leader of this group along with Theodore Weld, Arthur Tappan, and Lewis Tappan, asking “Are right and wrong convertible terms, dependent upon popular opinion?”

The Society grew with the support of 200,000 members, and their Board of Managers included six free black people.  They said that since “all men are created equal,” then why don’t they treat black people that way?  They also drew proof from the Bible to back their opinions in the Manifesto and argued that slavery was an unnatural injustice and was the cause of political tensions that would eventually split the country apart.  How could they call themselves Christians, they asked, while they were supporting such a system of cruelty?

The ultimate goal of the Society was to free all of the slaves from their involuntary servitude in the United States peacefully, yet immediately, by spreading awareness about the brutality of slavery and appealing to the compassion of common people.  They wanted to teach black people to feel good about themselves after centuries of people teaching them to feel ashamed about themselves.  

The American Anti-Slavery Society held meetings, sent petitions to congress, published newspapers such as The Liberator, and gave lectures.  It was not uncommon for pro-slavery mobs to invade during meetings and lectures, and attack speakers.  Congress got tired of receiving their petitions, and said that they would not consider any more petitions regarding slavery.  

The Society split into two branches when William Lloyd Garrison began teaching that women deserved rights as well.  The other branch focused on the freedom and equal treatment of African Americans only because they were unwilling to accept the idea that women could be equal in society.  Angelina and Sarah Grimke became the first female leaders at the organization.

Garrison and the abolitionists encouraged northerners to boycott voting or secede from slaveowning states to peacefully bring an end to slavery, or at least let the South know the extent of their hatred of the system.  When Lincoln ran for president, they helped him win.

The American Anti-Slavery Society dissolved in 1870.

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