The Abolitionist Movement

1899 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: The role of African-Americans in the abolitionist movement

During 1816-1860’s the abolitionist movement took on many different forms. The Christian argument (God created all men equal), was first taking on by the Quakers, “Quakers stressed the absolute universality of God’s love, the brotherhood of man, the sinfulness of physical coercion”. Following Quakers, the Colonizationists believed that the only way for blacks to attain freedom was if they were sent back to Africa. “These individuals could not be considered serious abolitionists….during these years some Colonizationists did believe that they were sponsoring Christian uplift of blacks.” Gradualist abolitionism, which was taking on by most white abolitionist was the idea that slaves would be free over time. Finally in the late 1820s and early 1830s a new more radical form of abolitionism came onto the main stream. Immediate abolitionism was the belief that slavery should end now and it was morally and constitutionally wrong. Although this form of abolitionism is attributed to William Lloyd Garrison (white abolitionist 1805-1879), African American abolitionists had demanded for an immediate end to slavery for years. “Black abolitionism was the parent of the white crusade.” One of the most influential voices to the immediate end of slavery was David Walker. 1
David Walker was born in Wilmington, North Carolina, in 1785. He was born to a slave father and a free mother. Because of the laws regarding slavery, a slave’s status depended upon his mother status. Since his mother was free, Walker was free as well. Walker remained in the South for 30 years and so he was able to witness all the evils of slavery. Walker also experienced the dangers of an African American free or enslaved living in the South. According to Florence Jackson’s book,...

... middle of paper ...

... American 1791-1861. New York: Franklin Watts Inc., 1971.
(Jackson. 37-38)
Stewart, James. Holy Warriors: The Abolitionist and American Slavery. New York : Hill and Wang , 1996.
(Steward 44)
David Walker. n.d. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4p2930.html (accessed November 19, 2013).
3. David Walker. n.d. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part4/4p2930.html (accessed November 19, 2013).
Hinks, Peter P. To Awaken My Afflicted Brethren: David Walker and the Problem of Antebellum Slave Resistance. Pennsylvania: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1997.
(Hink. 119)
4. Walker, David. "Documenting the American South ." docsouth.unc.edu. 2004. http://docsouth.unc.edu/nc/walker/walker.html (accessed November 19, 2013).
(Walker. 3)
(Walker. 9-10)
(Walker. 17,19,25)
5. Watson, Harry L. Liberty and Power: The Politics of America . New York : Hill and Wang, 2006.
(Watson. 119)

Show More
Related

  • Having Our Say by Sadie and Bessie Delany

    1098 Words  | 3 Pages

    Franklin, J., Moss, A. Jr. From Slavery to Freedom. Seventh edition, McGraw Hill, Inc.: 1994.

    Read More

  • David Walker: Analysis of the Appeal

    1549 Words  | 4 Pages

    Hinks, Pete P. To Awaken My Afflicted Brethren: David Walker and the Problem of Antebellum Slave Resistance. 1997

    Read More

  • Second Great Awakening And Abolitionist Movement Essay

    1606 Words  | 4 Pages

    The scope of the investigation is limited to the Second Great Awakening and the American Abolitionist Movement from 1830-1839, with the exception of some foundational knowledge of the movement prior to 1830 to highlight the changes within the movement in the 1830s. The investigation included an exploration of various letters, lectures, and sermons by leading abolitionists from the time period and a variety of secondary sources analyzing the Second Great Awakening and the Abolitionist Movement from 1830-1839.

    Read More

  • Griswold vs. Connecticut

    1819 Words  | 4 Pages

    Lowi, Theodore, Benjamin Ginsburg. American Government: Freedom and Power. W.W. Norton & Company, New York: 1998.

    Read More

  • Abolitionist Movement after the 1930s

    712 Words  | 2 Pages

    In early nineteenth century there was the antislavery movement which was a failure. This people who were fighting for antislavery did not have a great support. They were nice gentle people who argued with an expression of moral disapproval but did not participate in an exert of activities. Organizations were formed to help support the freeing of slaves but these organizations did not have enough economical support to help with the thousands and thousands of slaves reproducing in America. They were able to free some slaves and tried returning some of them to their home lands in Africa but that was a failure because the amount of money need it to ship the Africans back to Africa was a high cost compared to the economical support that they had. There was even resistance from some Afr...

    Read More

  • The Growing Opposition to Slavery

    1222 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Growing Opposition to Slavery 1776-1852 Many Americans’ eyes were opened in 1776, when members of the Continental Congress drafted, signed, and published the famous document “The Declaration of Independence” in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. By declaring their independence, many of the colonists believed that slaves should have the same rights as the whites had. Abolition groups were formed, and the fight to end slavery began. In 1776, Delaware became the first state to prohibit the importation of African slaves. One year later, in 1777, Vermont became the first colony to abolish slavery (within Vermont’s boundaries) by state constitution.

    Read More

  • American Antislavery 1820-1860

    1694 Words  | 4 Pages

    The antebellum American antislavery movement began in the 1820s and was sustained over 4 decades by organizations, publications, and small acts of resistance that challenged the legally protected and powerful institution of slavery and the more insidious enemy of black equality, racism. Abolitionists were always a radical minority even in the free states of the North, and the movement was never comprised of a single group of people with unified motivations, goals, and methods. Rather, the movement was fraught with ambiguity over who its leaders would be, how they would go about fighting the institution of slavery, and what the future would be like for black Americans.

    Read More

  • The Fundamental Diffferences Between The Black Abolitionists And The White Abolitionists Movements

    1558 Words  | 4 Pages

    Russell B. Nye: Fettered Freedom: Civil Liberties and the Slavery Controversy, 1830-1860. East Lansing, Mich., 1949

    Read More

  • The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: The Formation of Identity

    2136 Words  | 5 Pages

    Douglass, Frederick. “The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass.” The Classic Slave Narratives. Ed. Henry Louis Gates Jr. New York: Penguin Group, 1987.

    Read More

  • Slavery During the 1800s

    481 Words  | 1 Pages

    Slavery in the eighteenth century was worst for African Americans. Observers of slaves suggested that slave characteristics like: clumsiness, untidiness, littleness, destructiveness, and inability to learn the white people were “better.” Despite white society's belief that slaves were nothing more than laborers when in fact they were a part of an elaborate and well defined social structure that gave them identity and sustained them in their silent protest.

    Read More

  • Four Freedoms

    2334 Words  | 5 Pages

    28.) Foner, Eric. Give Me Liberty! An American History. 4th ed. (W.W. Norton, 2012), 920.

    Read More

  • Compare And Contrast Frederick Douglass And David Walker

    1402 Words  | 3 Pages

    Walker never experienced slavery but was only a witness to the cruel institution. It is in his travels and observations that he becomes convinced of the cruelty of the institution in which he says “inhuman system of slavery, is the source from which most of our miseries proceed” (Walker Page 5). Although he had never been a slave, the racism and prejudices that existed still caused difficulties for him.

    Read More

  • 12 Years a Slave

    1194 Words  | 3 Pages

    Northup, Solomon, Sue L. Eakin, and Joseph Logsdon. Twelve years a slave. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1968. Print.

    Read More

  • How Revolutionary Was The American Revolution?

    886 Words  | 2 Pages

    The American Revolution was a “light at the end of the tunnel” for slaves, or at least some. African Americans played a huge part in the war for both sides. Lord Dunmore, a governor of Virginia, promised freedom to any slave that enlisted into the British army. Colonists’ previously denied enlistment to African American’s because of the response of the South, but hesitantly changed their minds in fear of slaves rebelling against them. The north had become to despise slavery and wanted it gone. On the contrary, the booming cash crops of the south were making huge profits for landowners, making slavery widely popular. After the war, slaves began to petition the government for their freedom using the ideas of the Declaration of Independence,” including the idea of natural rights and the notion that government rested on the consent of the governed.” (Keene 122). The north began to fr...

    Read More

  • Slavery and Abolition

    1581 Words  | 4 Pages

    Knowles, H. J. (2007). The Constitution and Slavery: A Special Relationship. Slavery & Abolition, 28(3), 309-328. doi:10.1080/01440390701685514

    Read More

More about The Abolitionist Movement

Open Document