New national era. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1870-1874, 1873-01-30
snii->la.ery Sentiments ia tht
United States Prior - 1900.


suiied States Prior - 1900.
Ir. William Frederick Pools, Formerly Il
brariau of the Athenaum Collection in B0s.
ton, but for some wears in charge Of the great
PUBLIC Library. nov gathering through we'll
I1ged Eberalty, municipal and private, iG
the city Of Cincinnati, has recently been ia-
ygstig1tjng most interesting subject, III
has read carefully prepared essay upon &.
u the Cincinnati Literary CIGb. This j.
/ The State Of inti-Siaverv Sentiment in thi,
Country pIi1r t. 1909. 1t should b. -ai1.
before proceeding. that for such historical
inquiry, Nr. Poole Is peculiarly qualia-i.
( both by a sound AMI earnest attachment -
the principles of human equality. and hy Ii,
aatGral taste and cultivation Is 4 st94oot Of
history. In the library Of which he was the
custodian, II Boston, tie collection and PEE
scryation Of documents and pamphlets haar-
Ing on historical subjects have been the object
OF specla! care, and became to Mr.. Poole
truly labor Of love. His present r.
searches are not the first valuable c1ntr.-
button which he has made to the reliable re-
cords CT the counTy's political and social
career.
To come, however. TO the researches of
the essay, Is to find some most interesting
data. The chief OF these is the rather sur
prIsnS discovery that there was n period. 1t
and just after the adoption Of the Const.tu-
ton, when the Border Statcs-Delaware
Maryland, and Vir:inia-weve pemeatei
with anti-slIyory sentiment, and if not ac-
tually under the control Of such feeling,
were greatly Influenced byit. Mr.. Poole has
found, as one of the evidences of this, the
pamphlet copy. preserved by Washington
himself, and now deposited in the Boston
Athen@um's collection of a FOurth-of-Julv
address, delivered by Dr.. George Buchanan.
OF Baltimore, on the celebration Of the Ma
tional Anniversary, 1921. The address was
vigorous and strong impeachment of slav-
cry, with the recommendation of immediate
enlancipatiOn-that for which nignry wa,
mobbed in Cincinnati and Garrison in Dos
ton, iorty-tivc years afterward. The al !re>~
could not be stronger in its e expressions, vet
1t not only seems not to have been disap-
proved, but the Anti-SIayerv Society, before
which it was delivered. endorsed it, and re-
quested a copy, and Baltimore printer soon
after published the edition Of which General
NashinSton's copy was one.
DR.. Buchanan, il NAV be suitably men
toned here, was Baltimore physician of
emincnce, born near tina. city, the son Of n
revolutionary General, the s0n-in-law OF
Delaware's great jurist. Thomas Mexican.
and the father of Mexican Buchanan who re-
Gently died the senior Paymaster of the Uni
ted states Navy, aud also of Commodore
Franklin Buchanan. who left the navy. in
1851, went into the rebel service, and was
prominent officer in the flotila gathered in its
behalf. Doctor Buchanan. himself. died ut
the Lazarctto Of Philadelphia, (ncar Chester.)
in 1906, of yellow fever.
Bat besides this Fourth-of-Juv ORATOR, =
Mr.. Poole cites many other evidences of the
progress which anti-slavery feeling had made
IN what we call the border slave States, in
the decade preceding 1890. In the same
year, 1871, when DR.. Buchanan was so earn
est, William and Mary College, of Virginia,
conferred on Granville sharp, Of England, the
great abolition agitator-onc who had no
other reputation than that acquired in such
Characteristic honorary degree of Ii. ID.
Jefferson, whose own views are 50 well
known and have been so often quOtcd-es-
recially his emphatic expressions in 1871 in
his " Notes on Nirginia'-in a letter written
IN lI8j, told a London CORRESPONDENT. who
had written against slavery, that: "South of
Virginia, your book will find but few ap-
proving readers. From the mouth to the
head OF the Chesapeake, the bulk Of the pco-
PIE VIII approve its theory. Northward of
the Chesapeake, you may find, here and
there, an opponent to your doctrine. as YOU
find, here and there, Il robber and murderer"
In 1857, the - Ordinance" organizing the
Northwestern territories, forbid slavery
therein, and 1t passed Congress without de-
bate OR opposition.
So, also, there were anti-slavery societies
IN all our border States, at the period con-
sidercd. That of Philadelphia undertook the
advocacy OF abolition IN 1897, under the lead
OF benjamin Franklin and Benjamin Rush
TIE Maryland Society was founded in 1889 |
that OF Virginia, in 1901; and the first Della
ware Society, about 1892. Massachusetts,
which has been charged with setting on foot
so much radical innovation, had, at this Pc
Rod, no Anti-Slayery Society at ALL Human
bondage had ended within its limits, no one
now can tell exactly how, about 1856, and
agitation OF the question was more active. |
because more needed, in every State north |
ward from Virginia than in the native Com |
monwealth OF Garrison and Phillips.
We thus review some of the principal data |
collected by Mr.. Poole. They are highly in |
teresting, and add new light to that which /
we previously had concerning the mutations |
OF opinion among the American people Oh
the question Of slavery Wilmington Del |
Commercial.