Let Your Motto Be Resistance,

1

• Chapter 9
• Let Your Motto Be Resistance,
• 1833-1850

2
I. A Rising Tide Racism Violence

• Increased racism and violence, 1830-1860
• Met with growing abolitionist militancy
• Manifest Destiny
• Legitimized war for territorial expansion
• Defined progress in racial terms
• White people are a superior race
• Nativism
• Scientific justification
• Continued enslavement of black people
• Extermination of Indians

3
Anti-black and Anti-abolitionist Riots

• Urban riots pre-dated abolition
• Increased as abolitionism gained strength,
  1830s-1840s
• Philanthropist, 1836 and 1841
• Providence, Rhode Island
• New York City
• See Map 9-1 and Figure 9-1

4
Texas and War with Mexico

• Texas annexation divided the nation
• Fear of adding another slave state
• Political parties avoided the issue
• Manifest Destiny and 54-40 or Fight
• James K. Polk wanted Texas and Oregon
• Texas annexed in 1845
• War with Mexico, 1846-1848
• Polk provoked war

5
Texas and War with Mexico (cont.)

• Mexican Cession
• Wilmot Proviso
• Slavery expansion
• California gold
• Compromise of 1850
• Stronger fugitive slave law
• Personal liberty laws
• Prigg v. Pennsylvania

6
II. The Response of the Antislavery Movement

• Race-related violence increased
• Created difficulties
• Setting policies
• White abolitions set policy
• Abolitionist commitment to non-violence weakened
• Limited options

7
The American Anti-Slavery Society

• American Anti-Slavery Society
• AASS, 1831
• Black men participated without formal
  restrictions
• Rarely held positions of authority
• William Lloyd Garrison
• Immediate, uncompensated emancipation
• Equal rights for African Americans

8
Black and Womens Anti-slavery Societies

• Fundraising
• Main task
• Bake sales, bazaars, and fairs
• Feminism
• Created an awareness of womens rights
• Challenged male culture
• Essays, poems, speeches
• Sojourner Truth
• See PROFILE

9
The Black Convention Movement

• First convention, Philadelphia, 1831
• Local, state, and national black conventions
• Provided a forum for black male abolitionists
• Abolition of slavery
• Improve conditions for northern black people
• Integrate public schools
• Black suffrage
• Juries
• Testify against white people in court

10
III. Black Community Institutions

• Free black communities
• Fivefold increase, 1790-1830
• Gradual emancipation and individual manumission
• Provided resources
• Churches, schools, and benevolent organizations
• Provided the foundations for black anti-slavery
  institutions

11
Black Churches

• Leading black abolitionists often ministers
• Used pulpits to attack slavery and racial hatred
• Provided meeting places for abolitionists
• Forum for speakers

12
Black Newspapers

• Important voice in abolition movement
• Freedoms Journal
• Samuel Cornish
• North Star
• Frederick Douglass
• Financial difficulties

13
IV. Moral Suasion

• Reform strategy
• Appeal to Christian conscience
• Support abolition and racial justice
• Slaveholding was a sin
• Sexual exploitation, unrestrained brutality
• Northerners guilt
• Government protected slaveholder interests
• Cloth manufactures
• Fugitive Slave Act of 1798

14
Moral Suasion (cont.)

• AASS
• Used moral arguments against slave owners
• Ultimately failed
• Great Postal Campaign
• Sent anti-slavery literature to the South
• Petitions to Congress
• To end slavery in Washington, D.C.

15
Moral Suasion (cont.)

• Reactions
• Southern response
• Southern postmasters censored mail
• Vigilantes attacked antislavery supporters
• Gag Rule, 1836
• Northern response
• Mobs attacked abolitionists
• Disrupted meetings, destroyed newspaper presses
• Elijah P. Lovejoy

16
V. The American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society

• Divided by failure of moral suasion
• AASS splintered in 1840
• Role of women in abolitionism
• Garrisons increasing radicalism
• Members form the AFASS
• Lewis Tappan
• Liberty party
• First antislavery political party
• James G. Birney, 1840

17
VI. A More Aggressive Abolitionism

• Growing northern empathy for slaves
• Labor demands sent slaves to the Southwest
• Radical wing of Liberty party
• Constitution supported slave resistance
• Encouraged northerners to help slaves escape
• The Amistad and the Creole
• The Underground Railroad
• Harriet Tubman
• See Map 9-2
• Canada West

18
VII. Black Militancy

• Too much talk and not enough action
• More black abolitionists consider forceful action
• Weak loyalty to national organizations
• Influenced by rebellious slaves
• Many black abolitionists wanted to do more,
  1840s-1850s
• Charged white abolitionists with duplicity
• Lewis Tappan
• William Lloyd Garrison

19
VIII. Frederick Douglass

• Born a slave, 1818
• Learned to read
• Developed a trade
• Escaped in 1838
• Antislavery lecturer, 1841
• Encouraged by Garrison
• Breaks with Garrison in 1847
• North Star, 1847
• Endorsed the New York Liberty party, 1851

20
IX. Black Nationalism

• African-American migration and black nationalism
• Best means to realize black aspirations
• Violence
• Convinced a small few to advocate emigration
• Martin R. Delany
• See VOICES
• Henry Highland Garnett
• See PROFILE
• Douglass and other black abolitionists rejected
• Wanted freedom in the Unites States

21
X. Conclusion

• From gradual to immediate abolition of slavery
• Adjust antislavery tactics to meet rising
  violence
• Combined approach
• Moral suasion
• Political involvement
• Direct action
• Movement to black nationalism
• Promote interests, rights, and identity