by Pieter J. Friedrich
02/16/06
William Lloyd Garrison wrote his "Address to the Slaves of the United States" in the 12th year of the publication of his newspaper, The Liberator. By then the paper had earned "nationwide notoriety" for its publication of Garrison's inflammatory essay, "To The Public." Just three years prior to the 1843 publication of his "Address to the Slaves" essay, Garrison's egalitarian views regarding the politicial involvement of women and his extremist notion that the U.S. Constitution was a "covenant with death and an agreement with Hell" led to a three-way split in his American Anti-Slavery Society.
It's obvious not only from the opening sentences that Garrison's intention in penning this particular essay was to encourage the slave population. Speaking to black slaves, he says, "Take courage! Be filled with hope and comfort! Your redemption draws nigh...The word has gone forth that you shall be delivered from your chains, and it has not been spoken in vain."
Certainly Garrison hoped to get this essay into the hands of fellow abolitionists. To an extent it might even be considered just as much a pep talk for the abolitionists as for the slaves - something of a "we've been through a lot, but we'll keep plugging on, so lets pat ourselves on the back and keep up the good work" piece. Perhaps the essay was also even targeted at neutral members of the population who might be swayed by the emotional relation of the many "slings and arrows" endured by the abolitionists. However, the tone of the essay makes it very clear that the primary intendend audience was the paper's black readership, which made up "three-quarters" of The Liberator's subscribers.
The main argument contained is the essay is that "redemption draws nigh" for the slaves. Garrison's evidence in favor of this argument is convincing. He writes: "Ten years ago, [the abolitionists] were so few and feeble as only to excite universal contempt; now they number in their ranks, hundreds of thousands of people. Then, they had scarcely a single anti-slavery society in operation; now they have thousands. Then, they had only one or two presses to plead your cause; now they have multitudes."
The appearance across of so many pro-abolitionist factions was indeed indicative of fast approaching emancipation. However, while the primary claim of imminent freedom was valid, the essay contains a baseless secondary claim, one which is almost laughable in retrospect. "The weapons with which the abolitionists seek to effect your deliverance," argued Garrison, "are not bowie knives, pistols, swords, guns, or any other deadly implements. They consist of appeals, warnings, rebukes, arguments and facts, addressed to the understandings, consciences and hearts of the people."
While the abolitionist movement of 1843 may have been predominantly nonviolent, such was only initially the case. The assertion that abolitionists sought emancipation sans the use of arms is not only groundless, but completely counter to any rudimentary examination of the honest facts.
For instance, abolitionist preacher Henry Ward Beecher (brother to Uncle Tom's Cabin author Harriet Beecher Stowe) soon began putting his finances towards the purchase of carbines to be distributed among anti-slavery Kansan settlers for the purpose of terrorizing area slave-owners. And a mere 13 years after the publication of the essay in question, the terrorist John Brown murdered five innocent men for the crime of exercising what was then their legal right to own slaves. Only eight months later, Garrison met and began freely associating with John Brown.
These are just a few examples of the upstanding "pacifists" who swelled the abolitionist ranks.
Garrison wrote persuasively, and his rhetoric was second to none. But his writings, flowing with spurious claims, were more style than substance. This is best exemplified by a sentence in the final paragraph of his essay. This sentence is addressed, like the rest of his essay, to the slaves. "The abolitionists of the North," wrote Garrison, "are the only true and unyielding friends on whom you can rely. They will never deceive nor betray you."
Free black man Hayward Shepherd, the first person murdered by the John Brown gang at Harper's Ferry, might have begged to differ.
