The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-09-21
THE FIRST PROTEST AGAINST
SLAVERY.

Some interesting and apparently authentic
documentary evidence is published in sup
port Of the claim that the Mennonites of
Pennsylvania were the first people to pub
licly protest against African slavery in the
United States. There has been a dispute
of long standing as to whether the Memo
mites or the Quakers were entitled to this
honor, and the document above referred to
leaves the question still in some doubt. 1t
purports to have been adopted, and proba-
bly, was, for there is no dispute about the
date, at a meeting of Mennonites held in
Germantown, Pa. April s, 1858. 1t opens as
follows:
These are the reasons we are against the
trafick of mems bodies as f~olloweth: Is
there any that would be done or handled
at this manner, viz, to be sold or made a
slave for all the time of his life? How
fearful & faint-hearted are many. on sea
when they see a strange vessel. being
afraid 1t would be a Turck, and they should
be taken and sold for Slaves in Turkey.
Now what is better done as Trucks doe?
Yea, rather 1t is worse for them which
We most part of such Meyers are brought
neither against their will & consent and
that Many of them are STOLEN. Row, tho
they are black, we cannot conceive there
is more liberty to have them slaves, as 1t
is to have other white ones.
The document protests at some length
against the cruelty and wickedness of en-
shaving negroes and urges their emancipa-
ton. Then" 1t continues, will Pennsyl-
vania have a good report, instead it now
hath a bad one for this sake in other Coun-
tries. Especially where We Europeans are
so DESTROYS to know in what manner We
Quackers do rule in their Province & most
of them due loock upon us with an envious
eye." This clause treats Quakers and Men
nonites as identical, and that is the point
on which the controversy turns. The doc
ument did not lead to any immediate &C
ton.
The Mennonites, who, by the way, have
always been held in high esteem for their
sound doctrines. pure lives and good citi-
zenship, antedate the Quakers in point of
origin. They derive their name from Simon
Memo, a Dutch Anabaptist reformer, who
organized his followers into a sect about
the middle of the sixteenth century. In
order to unite them he separated them from
all other Dutch and German Protestants
anu kdNe lncli a IcS uldI SySlcul VI CUuTCn
government. They flourished in Holland
and Germany during the sixteenth and sew
enteenth centuries, and early in the eigh-
teenth century went in considerable num-
bers to Russia, where they were kindly
treated. The first Mennonites came to the
William Penn. The creed and practices Of
the Quakers were much like those of the
Mennonites. The colony that settled in
Pennsylvania grew. and their descendants
are scattered in various States. There are
quite a number of them in this State. They
formerly had a publishing house at Elk
hart, and, perhaps, still have. According
to latest statistics there are about $1,000 Of
them In the United States.
The Friends, or Quakers, originated in
England, the founder of the sect being
George Fox, who was born in 1924. They
are not as old a sect as the Mennonites,
but they came to America first. William
Penn founded the Pennsylvania Quaker
colony in 1852. There is no doubt but the
Quakers were opposed to slavery from the
beginning. They opposed it in England,
where a number of negroes were held in
slavery until long past the middle of the
eighteenth century. 1t was not till June,
1772, that Lord Mansfield delivered his cell
ebrated decision that las soon as a slave
sets foot on the soil of the British islands
he becomes free" The Quakers brought
with them to the new country their opposi-
ton To war and slavery. One historian
grants from Kreisheim. In Germany. who
had adopted the principles of William Penn
and followed him into Pennsylvania, urged
in the Yearly Meeting Of the society there
: the Inconsistency OF buying. selling and