MASTER STROKES.
"Help came but slowly" to the reformer. With a single instrument he had
stirred the nation, as no other man had done, on the slavery question.
He had thrown the South into widespread excitement, and thawed the
apathy of the North into widespread attention. He had won an almost
instant hearing for his cause. But he knew that this was not enough.
Effective as he had shown the weapon of the press to be, it alone was
unequal to the conduct of prolonged agitation. And prolonged agitation
Garrison clearly apprehended was to be the price of abolition. Back of
him and the _Liberator_ he needed an organized force, coadjutors like
Aaron and Hur to hold up his arms during the mighty conflict on which he
had now entered with the slave interests of the country. Those interests
were organized, and because they were organized they were powerful. The
sentiment of freedom he determined to organize and to render it thereby
invincible. To organized wrong he designed to oppose organized right,
confident that organized right would prevail in the end. He had
knowledge of the utility of temperance societies in advancing the cause
of sobriety among the people. He had learned from Lundy how much he had
relied upon the union of men as anti-slavery helps. Garrison determined
to summon to his side the powerful agency of an anti-slavery society
devoted to immediate and unconditional emancipation. He had already made
converts; he had already a small following. At Julien Hall, on the
occasion of his first lecture on the subject of slavery, he had secured
three remarkable men to the movement, viz., Rev. Samuel J. May, then a
young Unitarian minister, Samuel E. Sewall, a young member of the Bar,
and A. Bronson Alcott, a sage even in his early manhood. They had all
promised him aid and comfort in the great task which he had undertaken.
A little later two others, quite as remarkable as those first three were
drawn to the reformer's side, and abetted him in the treason to
iniquity, which he was prosecuting through the columns of the
_Liberator_ with unrivaled zeal and devotion. These disciples were Ellis
Grey Loring and David Lee Child. They were a goodly company, were these
five conspirators, men of intellect and conscience, of high family and
social connections, of brilliant attainments and splendid promises for
the future. To this number must be added a sixth, Oliver Johnson, who
was at the time editing _The Christian Soldier_, disciple of Garrison
then, and ever after his devoted friend. The early promises of this
noble half dozen friends of the slave were more than fulfilled in after
years. Often to the dingy room "under the eaves" in Merchants' Hall they
climbed to carry aid and comfort to "one poor, unlearned young man," and
to sit at his feet in this cradle-room of the new movement. It was there
in communion with the young master that suggestions looking to the
formation of an anti-slavery society, were doubtless first thrown out.
"The place was dark, unfurnitured and mean;
Yet there the freedom of a race began."
It was not all clear sailing for the editor of the _Liberator_ even with
such choice spirits. They did not always carry aid and comfort to him,
but differences of opinions sometimes as well. He did not sugar-coat
enough the bitter truth which he was telling to the nation. Some of them
would have preferred _The Safety Lamp_ to the _Liberator_ as a title
less likely to offend the prejudices of many good people. Some again
objected to the pictorial heading of the paper as an altogether unwise
proceeding, and positively mischievous. He had the same experience when
the formation of an Abolition society was under consideration. He was
confronted with this benevolent aversion to giving offence by calling
things by their right names. But much as he desired to have his friends
and followers organized for associated action, where a principle was at
stake he was with them as with slavery itself absolutely inflexible and
uncompromising. He was for organizing on the principle of immediate
emancipation. A few deemed that ground too radical and revolutionary,
and were for ranging themselves under the banner of Gradualism, thinking
to draw to their ranks a class of people, who would be repelled by
Immediatism. But Garrison was unyielding, refused to budge an inch to
conciliate friend or foe--not even such stanch supporters as were Sewall
and Loring, who supplied him again and again with money needed to
continue the publication of the _Liberator_. No, he was right and they
were wrong, and they, not he, ought accordingly to yield. The contention
between the leader and his disciples was not what was expedient, but
what was right. It was on the part of the leader the assertion of a
vital principle, and on this ground he was pledged against retreat. The
mountain could not go to Mahomet, therefore Mahomet must needs go to the
mountain. Garrison could not abandon his position, wherefore in due time
Loring, Child, and Sewall surrendered theirs. Finely has Lowell
expressed this righteous stubbornness, and steadfastness to principle in
three stanzas of his poem entitled, "The Day of Small Things," and which
have such an obvious lesson for our own times that I shall venture to
quote them in this place:
"Who is it will not dare himself to trust?
Who is it hath not strength to stand alone?
Who is it thwarts and bilks the inward MUST?
He and his works, like sand from earth are blown.
"Men of a thousand shifts and wiles look here!
See one straightforward conscience put in pawn
To win a world! See the obedient sphere
By bravery's simple gravitation drawn!
"Shall we not heed the lesson taught of old,
And by the Present's lips repeated still,
In our own single manhood to be bold,
Fortressed in conscience and impregnable will?"
The history of the making of this first society is an interesting story.
There were four meetings in all before it was found possible to complete
the work of its organization. These meetings extended over a space of
nearly three months, so obstinate were a minority against committing the
proposed society to the principle of immediate emancipation. The very
name which was to be given to the association provoked debate and
disagreement. Some were for christening it "Philo-African," while
Garrison would no such milk-and-water title, but one which expressed
distinctly and graphically the real character of the organization, viz.,
"New England Anti-Slavery Society." He would sail under no false or
neutral colors, but beneath the red flag of open and determined
hostility to slavery. It should be a sign which no one could possibly
mistake. The first meeting was held at the office of Samuel E. Sewall,
November 13, 1831. At the third meeting, convened New Year's evening of
1832, which was the first anniversary of the publication of the
_Liberator_, the work of organization was finished, with a single
important exception, viz., the adoption of the preamble to the
constitution. The character of the preamble would fix the character of
the society. Therefore that which was properly first was made to come
last. The fourth meeting took place on the night of January 6th in the
African Baptist Church on what was then Belknap but now known as Joy
street. The young leader and fourteen of his followers met that evening
in the school-room for colored children, situated under the auditorium
of the church. They could hardly have fallen upon a more obscure or
despised place for the consummation of their enterprise in the city of
Boston than was this selfsame negro church and school-room. The weather
added an ever memorable night to the opprobrium of the spot. A fierce
northeaster accompanied with "snow, rain, and hail in equal proportions"
was roaring and careering through the city's streets. To an eye-witness,
Oliver Johnson, "it almost seemed as if Nature was frowning upon the new
effort to abolish slavery; but," he added, "the spirits of the little
company rose superior to all external circumstances."
If there was strife of the elements without, neither was there sweet
accord within among brethren. "The spirits of the little company" may
have risen superior to the weather, but they did not rise superior to
the preamble, with the principle of immediatism incorporated in it.
Eleven stood by the leader and made it the chief of the corner of the
new society, while three, Messrs. Loring, Sewall, and Child, refused to
sign the Constitution and parted sorrowfully from the small band of the
New England Anti-Slavery Society. But the separation was only temporary,
for each returned to the side of the reformer, and proved his loyalty
and valor in the trying years which followed.
The preamble which was the bone of so much contention declared that:
"We, the undersigned, hold that every person, of full age and sane mind,
has a right to immediate freedom from personal bondage of whatsoever
kind, unless imposed by the sentence of the law for the commission of
some crime. We hold that man cannot, consistently with reason, religion,
and the eternal and immutable principles of justice, be the property of
man. We hold that whoever retains his fellow-man in bondage is guilty of
a grievous wrong. We hold that a mere difference of complexion is no
reason why any man should be deprived of any of his natural rights, or
subjected to any political disability. While we advance these opinions
as the principles on which we intend to act, we declare that we will not
operate on the existing relations of society by other than peaceful and
lawful means, and that we will give no countenance to violence or
insurrection."
Twelve, the apostolic number, affixed to the preamble and constitution
their names, and thus formed the first Garrisonian Society for the
abolition of slavery in the United States. The names of these apostolic
men it is well to keep in mind. They are William Lloyd Garrison, Oliver
Johnson, Robert B. Hall, Arnold Buffum, William J. Snelling, John E.
Fuller, Moses Thatcher, Joshua Coffin, Stillman B. Newcomb, Benjamin C.
Bacon, Isaac Knapp, and Henry K. Stockton. The band of reformers, their
work done, had risen to pass out of the low, rude room into the dark
night. The storm was still raging. They themselves had perchance been
sobered by the experiences of the evening. They had gone in fifteen,
they were returning twelve. And, after all, what had they accomplished?
What could they a mere handful do to abolish slavery entrenched as it
was in Church and State? It is possible that some such dim
discouragement, some such vague misgiving of the futility of the
evening's labor, was in the hearts of those wearied men, and that their
leader divined as much, for the spirit of prophecy fell upon Garrison
just as they "were stepping out into the storm and darkness." "We have
met to-night," he said, "in this obscure school-house; our numbers are
few and our influence limited; but, mark my prediction, Faneuil Hall
shall erelong echo with the principles we have set forth. We shall shake
the nation by their mighty power." Then the little band dispersed "into
the storm and darkness," carrying with them these words charged with
hope and courage.
The fruitful seed of organized agitation Garrison had securely planted
in soil fertile and ready for its reception. Its growth constitutes one
of the marvels of reforms. Within a few brief years it multiplied into
hundreds and thousands of societies throughout the free States. But its
beginnings were small and humble enough. "The objects of the society"
were according to the second article of the constitution, "to endeavor
by all means sanctioned by law, humanity, and religion, to effect the
abolition of slavery in the United States, to improve the character and
condition of the free people of color, to inform and correct public
opinion in relation to their situation and rights, and to obtain for
them equal civil and political rights and privileges with the whites."
The means which were immediately adopted by the society for the
accomplishment of these objects were mainly three, than which none
others could have been more effective. These were petitioning Congress
on the subject of slavery. The publication and circulation of
anti-slavery addresses and tracts, and the employment of anti-slavery
agents, "in obtaining or communicating intelligence, in the publication
and distribution of tracts, books, or papers, or in the execution of any
measure which may be adopted to promote the objects of the society."
Such was the simple but unequaled machinery which the New England
Anti-Slavery Society relied upon for success in the war, which it had
declared against American slavery. The executive power of the body, and
the operation of its machinery were lodged in a board of managers of
which Garrison's was the leading, originating mind. The society started
out bravely in the use of its means by memorializing Congress for the
abolition of slavery, "in the District of Columbia and in the
Territories of the United States under their jurisdiction," and by
preparing and distributing an address in maintenance of the doctrine of
immediate emancipation. The board of managers set the machinery in
motion as far and as fast as the extremely limited pecuniary ability of
the society would permit. The membership was not from the rich classes.
It was Oliver Johnson who wittily remarked that not more than one or two
of the original twelve, "could have put a hundred dollars into the
treasury without bankrupting themselves." The remark was true, and was
quite as applicable to any dozen of the new-comers as to the original
twelve. The society was never deficient in zeal, but it was certainly
sadly wanting in money. And money was even to such men and to such a
movement an important factor in revolutionizing public opinion.
The _Liberator_ was made the official organ of the society, and in this
way was added to its other weapons that of the press. This was a capital
arrangement, for by it both the paper and the society were placed under
the direction of the same masterly guidance. There was still one arrow
left in the moral quiver of the organization to reach the conscience of
the people, and that was the appointment of an agent to spread the
doctrines of the new propaganda of freedom. In August the board of
managers, metaphorically speaking, shot this arrow by making Garrison
the agent of the society to lecture on the subject of slavery "for a
period not exceeding three months." This was the first drop from a cloud
then no bigger than a hand, but which was to grow and spread until,
covering the North, was, at the end of a few short years, to flood the
land with anti-slavery agents and lecturers.
Our anti-slavery agent visited portions of Massachusetts, Maine, and
Rhode Island, preaching the Abolition gospel in divers places, and to
many people--notably at such centers of population as Worcester,
Providence, Bangor, and Portland, making at the latter city a signal
conversion to his cause in the person of General Samuel Fessenden,
distinguished then as a lawyer, and later as the father of William Pitt
Fessenden. The anti-slavery schoolmaster was abroad, and was beginning
to turn New England and the North into one resounding schoolhouse, where
he sat behind the desk and the nation occupied the forms.
So effective was the agitation prosecuted by the society during the
first year of its existence that it was no empty declaration or boast of
the _Abolitionist_, the new monthly periodical of the society, that
"probably, through its instrumentality, more public addresses on the
subject of slavery, and appeals in behalf of the contemned free people
of color, have been made in New England, during the past year (1832)
than were elicited for forty years prior to its organization."
The introduction of the principle of association into the slavery
agitation, and the conversion of it into an organized movement was an
achievement of the first importance. To Garrison, more than to any man,
or to all others put together, belongs the authorship of this immense
initiative. He it was, who, having "announced the principle, arranged
the method" of the Abolition movement. The marshaling of the
anti-slavery sentiment of New England under a common standard, in a
common cause, was a master stroke of moral generalship. This master
stroke the leader followed up promptly with a second stroke not less
masterly. That second stroke was his "Thoughts on African Colonization,"
published in the summer succeeding the formation of the New England
Anti-Slavery Society.
Garrison's championship of the cause of the slave had started with
strong faith in the efficacy and disinterestedness of the colonization
scheme as an instrument of emancipation. It commanded, therefore, his
early support. In his Park Street Church address he evinced himself in
earnest sympathy with the friends of colonization. But after his arrival
in Baltimore a change began to exhibit itself in this regard. He began
to qualify his confidence in its utility; began to discern in it
influences calculated to retard general emancipation. As these doubts
and misgivings arose within him he expressed them frankly in the
_Genius_. Lundy had been suspicious of the pro-slavery purposes or
interests of the enterprise for many years. He could not reconcile
himself to the significant or, at least, singular fact of so many
slaveholders being in the membership and the offices of the association.
Then, in addition to this lack of confidence on the part of Lundy in the
scheme, Garrison became acquainted, for the first time, with the objects
of the society's philanthropy--the class of free people of color. He
found that these people were not at all well affected to the society;
that they had no appreciation of its benevolent intentions in respect to
themselves. He found, on the contrary, that they were positively
embittered toward it and toward its designs for their removal from the
country as toward their worst enemy. This circumstance was undoubtedly a
poser to their young friend. How could he reconcile this deep-seated and
widespread disbelief in the purity of the motives of the Colonization
Society, with the simple integrity and humanity of the enterprise
itself? Later, his acquaintance with such representatives of the free
people of color in Philadelphia as James Forten and his son-in-law,
Robert Purvis, served but to confirm those first impressions which he
received in Baltimore from the Watkinses and the Greeners. It was the
same experience in New York and New Haven, in Boston and Providence. He
learned that from the very beginning, in the year 1817, that the free
people of color in Richmond and Philadelphia had, by an instinctive
knowledge of threatened wrong and danger, met and resolved against the
society and its sinister designs upon themselves. These people did not
wish to leave the country; they did not wish to be sent to Liberia; but
the society, bent on doing them good against their will, did want them
to leave the country, did want to send them to Liberia.
And why did the society desire to remove the free people of color out of
the country? Was it from motives of real philanthropy? The colored
people were the first to detect its spurious humanity, the first to see
through the artful disguises employed to impose upon the conscience of
the republic. Their removal, they intuitively divined, was proposed not
to do their race a benefit, but rather to do a service to the owners of
slaves. These objects of the society's pseudo-philanthropy had the
sagacity to perceive that, practically, their expatriation tended to
strengthen the chains of their brethren then in slavery; for if the
South could get rid of its free colored population, its slave property
would thereby acquire additional security, and, of consequence,
increased market value. Like cause, like effect. If the operation of the
colonization scheme was decidedly in the interest of the masters, it was
the part of wisdom to conclude as the free colored people did actually
conclude that the underlying motive, the hidden purpose of the society
was also in the interest of the masters.
Garrison did not reach his conclusions as to the pro-slavery character
and tendency of the society abruptly. The scales fell away gradually
from his eyes. He was not completely undeceived until he had examined
the reports of the society and found in them the most redundant evidence
of its insincerity and guilt. It was out of its own mouth that he
condemned it. When he saw the society in its true character, he saw what
he must do. It was a wolf in sheep's skin running at large among the
good shepherd's flock, and inflicting infinite hurt upon his poor sheep.
He no longer wondered at the horror which the colonization scheme
inspired among the free people of color. They were right. The society
was their dangerous and determined enemy; it was the bulwark of the
slave-holding classes. With the instinct of a great purpose he resolved
to carry this powerful bulwark of slavery by assault. To the attack he
returned week after week in the _Liberator_, during a year and a half.
Then he hurled himself upon it with all his guns, facts, arguments,
denunciations, blowing away and burning up every shred of false covering
from the doctrines, principles, and purposes of the society, revealing
it to mankind in its base and monstrous character.
The society's one motive "to get rid of the free people of color," was
outrageous enough, but this was not its only sin. There was another
phase to the mischief it was working, which lifted it to the rank of a
great sinner. It was not only harmful in its principles and purposes.
"It imperatively and effectually seals up the lips," so Garrison accused
it, "of a vast number of influential and pious men, who, for fear of
giving offence to those slaveholders with whom they associate, and
thereby leading to a dissolution of the compact, dare not expose the
flagrant enormities of the system of slavery, nor denounce the crime of
holding human beings in bondage. They dare not lead to the onset against
the forces of tyranny; and if they shrink from the conflict, how shall
the victory be won? I do not mean to aver that in their sermons, or
addresses, or private conversations, they never allude to the subject of
slavery; for they do so frequently, or at least every Fourth of July.
But my complaint is that they content themselves with representing
slavery as an evil--a misfortune--a calamity which has been entailed
upon us by former generations,--_and not as an individual_ CRIME,
embracing in its folds, robbery, cruelty, oppression, and piracy. _They
do not identify the criminal_; they make no direct, pungent, earnest
appeal to the consciences of men-stealers." This was a damning bill, but
it was true in every particular; and the evidence which Garrison adduced
to establish his charges was overwhelming and irrefragable.
Nearly fifty years afterward, Elizur Wright described the baleful
influence of the society upon the humanity and philanthropy of the
nation. "The humanity and philanthropy," he said, "which could not
otherwise be disposed of, was ingeniously seduced into an African
Colonization Society, whereby all slaves who had grown seditious and
troublesome to their masters could be transplanted on the pestiferous
African coast. That this wretched and seemingly transparent humbug could
have deluded anybody, must now seem past belief; but I must with shame
confess the fact that I for one was deluded by it. And that fact would
put me in doubt of my own sanity at the time if I did not know that high
statesmen, presidents of colleges, able editors, and that most undoubted
of firm philanthropists, Gerritt Smith, shared the same delusion. Bible
and missionary societies fellowshipped that mean and scurvy device of
the kidnapper, in their holy work. It was spoken of as the most glorious
of Christian enterprises, had a monthly magazine devoted to itself, and
taxed about every pulpit in the land for an annual sermon in its favor."
Such was the Colonization Society, and its entrenched strength in the
piety and philanthropy of the country at the moment when Garrison
published his "Thoughts." It did not seem possible that a single arm
however powerful, was able to start its roots; but, directly upon the
launching of this bolt, the roots of the Bohun Upas, as Garrison
graphically designated the society, were seen to have started, and the
enterprise appeared blasted as by fire. The deluded intellect and
conscience of the free States saw in the fierce light, which the
pamphlet of the reformer threw upon the colonization scheme how
shamefully imposed upon they had been. They had believed the society
"the most glorious of Christian enterprises," and, lo! it stood revealed
to them a "scurvy device of the kidnapper." The effect was
extraordinary. The book was seized and its contents devoured by some of
the finest minds of the North. Here is an example of the interest which
it excited and the converts which it made: "Last Monday evening was our
Law Club meeting, and I had the great satisfaction of hearing Judge
Mellen, our Chief-Justice, say he had read your 'Thoughts,' was a
thorough convert to your views, and was ready to do all in his power to
promote them. Mr. Longfellow [father of Henry W. Longfellow] was present
also, and with equal warmth and clearness expressed himself also in
favor of your views. This is getting the two first men in the State for
talents and influence in benevolent effort. I have no doubt they will
head the list of those who will subscribe to form here an anti-slavery
society. Mr. Greenleaf [Simon] also, will cordially come in, and I need
not say he is one of the first [men] in the State, for his character is
known." This quotation is made from a letter of General Samuel
Fessenden, of Portland, Me., to Mr. Garrison, dated December 14, 1832.
Among the remarkable minds which the "Thoughts" disillusioned in respect
of the character and tendency of the Colonization Society were Theodore
D. Weld, Elizur Wright, and Beriah Green, N.P. Rogers, William Goodell,
Joshua Leavitt, Amos A. Phelps, Lewis Tappan, and James Miller McKim.
Garrison's assertion that "the overthrow of the Colonization Society was
the overthrow of slavery itself," was, from the standpoint of a student
of history, an exaggerated one. We know now that the claim was not
founded on fact, that while they did stand together they did not fall
together. But the position was, nevertheless, the strongest possible one
for the anti-slavery movement to occupy at the time. In the disposition
of the pro-slavery forces on the field of the opening conflict in 1832,
the colonization scheme commanded the important approaches to the
citadel of the peculiar institution. It cut off the passes to public
opinion, and to the religious and benevolent influences of the land. To
reach these it was necessary in the first place to dislodge the society
from its coign of vantage, its strategical point in the agitation. And
this is precisely what "The Thoughts on African Colonization" did. It
dislodged the society from its powerful place in the moral sentiment of
the North. The capture of this position was like the capture of a
drawbridge, and the precipitation of the assaulting column directly upon
the walls of a besieged castle. Within the pamphlet was contained the
whole tremendous enginery of demolition. The anti-slavery agent and
lecturer thenceforth set it up wherever he spoke.
To him it was not only the catapult; it furnished the missile-like facts
and arguments for breaching the walls of this pro-slavery stronghold as
well.
The effect of the publication of "The Thoughts" in this country was
extraordinary, but the result of their circulation in England was hardly
less so. It produced there as here a revolution in public sentiment upon
the subject. The philanthropy and piety of Great Britain had generally
prior to the unmasking of the society, looked upon it as an instrument
of Emancipation, and had accordingly given it their powerful
countenance, and not a little material support. But from the moment that
the pamphlet reached England a decided change in this regard became
manifest. The society made fruitless attempts to break the force of the
blow dealt it by Garrison in the United States. But wherever its
emissaries traveled "The Thoughts" confronted and confounded them. So
that Mr. Garrison was warranted in saying that "all that sophistry or
misrepresentation could effect to overthrow its integrity has been
attempted in vain. The work, as a whole, stands irrefutable." The
attempts made to maintain its hold upon the British public were
characterized by duplicity and misrepresentation beyond anything
practiced in America. The work of deceiving the philanthropy of Great
Britain was conducted by the emissary of the society, Elliott Cresson, a
man perfectly fitted to perform his part with remarkable thoroughness
and industry. Three thousand miles away from America, and practically
secure from contradiction, he went about making outrageous statements as
to the anti-slavery character and purpose of the colonization
enterprise. As there was no one in England sufficiently acquainted with
the operations and designs of the society, he was enabled to falsify
facts, to conceal the real principles of the scheme with astonishing
audacity and activity. He approached Wilberforce, and duped Clarkson
into a belief in the anti-slavery aim of the society.
Unmasked in America, the time had come when the interests of the
Abolition movement on this side of the Atlantic required that it should
be stripped of its disguises on the other side also. No better
instrument could be selected for this purpose than the man who had torn
the mask from its features in the United States. And so in March, 1833,
the Board of Managers of the New England Anti-Slavery Society notified
the public of the appointment of "William Lloyd Garrison as their agent,
and that he would proceed to England as soon as the necessary
arrangements can be made, for the purpose of procuring funds to aid in
the establishment of the proposed MANUAL LABOR SCHOOL FOR COLORED YOUTH,
and of disseminating in that country the truth in relation to American
slavery, and to its ally, the American Colonization Society." The
managers offered in justification of their step the fact that "Elliott
Cresson is now in England as an agent for the Colonization Society, and
that he has procured funds to a considerable amount by representing that
the object of the society is 'to assist in the emancipation of all the
slaves now in the United States.' It is important that the
philanthropists of that country should be undeceived, and that the real
principles and designs of the Colonization Society should be there made
known."
In pursuance of this mission Garrison sailed from New York, May 2, 1833.
Twenty days later he landed in Liverpool. His arrival was opportune, for
all England was watching the closing scene in the drama of West India
Emancipation. He was an eye-witness of the crowning triumph of the
English Abolitionists, viz., the breaking by Act of Parliament of the
fetters of eight hundred thousand slaves. He was in time to greet his
great spiritual kinsman, William Wilberforce, and to undeceive him in
respect of the Colonization Society, before death claimed his body, and
to follow him to his last resting-place by the side of Pitt and Fox, in
Westminster Abbey.
A highly interesting incident of this visit is best told in Mr.
Garrison's own words. He said:
"On arriving in London I received a polite invitation by letter from Mr.
Buxton to take breakfast with him. Presenting myself at the appointed
time, when my name was announced, instead of coming forward promptly to
take me by the hand, he scrutinized me from head to foot, and then
inquired, 'Have I the pleasure of addressing Mr. Garrison, of Boston, in
the United States?' 'Yes, sir,' I replied, 'I am he; and I am here in
accordance with your invitation.' Lifting up his hands he exclaimed,
'Why, my dear sir, I thought you were a black man! And I have
consequently invited this company of ladies and gentlemen to be present
to welcome Mr. Garrison, the black advocate of emancipation, from the
United States of America.' I have often said that that is the only
compliment I have ever had paid to me that I care to remember or to tell
of! For Mr. Buxton had somehow or other supposed that no white American
could plead for those in bondage as I had done, and therefore I must be
black!"
Garrison promptly threw down his challenge to Elliott Cresson, offering
to prove him an impostor and the Colonization Society "corrupt in its
principles, proscriptive in its measures, and the worst enemy of the
free colored and slave population of the United States." From the first
it was apparent that Cresson did not mean to encounter the author of the
"Thoughts" in public debate. Even a mouse when cornered will show fight,
but there was no manly fight in Cresson. Garrison sent him a letter
containing seven grave charges against his society, and dared him to a
refutation of them in a joint discussion. This challenge was presented
four times before the agent of colonization could be persuaded to accept
it. Garrison was bent on a joint public discussion between himself and
Mr. Cresson. But Mr. Cresson was bent on avoiding his opponent. He
skulked under one pretext or another from vindicating the colonization
scheme from the seven-headed indictment preferred against it by the
agent of the New England Anti-Slavery Society. As Cresson could not be
driven into a joint discussion with him there was nothing left to
Garrison but to go on without him. His arraignment and exposure of the
society in public and private was thorough and overwhelming. He was
indefatigable in the prosecution of this part of his mission. And his
labor was not in vain. For in less than three months after his reaching
England he had rendered the Colonization Society as odious there as his
"Thoughts" had made it in America. The great body of the anti-slavery
sentiment in Great Britain promptly condemned the spirit and object of
the American Colonization Society. Such leaders as Buxton and Cropper
"termed its objects _diabolical_;" while Zachary Macaulay, father of the
historian, did not doubt that "the unchristian prejudice of color (which
alone has given birth to the Colonization Society, though varnished over
with other more plausible pretences, and veiled under a profession of a
Christian regard for the temporal and spiritual interests of the negro
which is belied by the whole course of its reasonings and the spirit of
its measures) is so detestable in itself that I think it ought not to be
tolerated, but, on the contrary, ought to be denounced and opposed by
all humane, and especially by all pious persons in this country."
The protest against the Colonization Society "signed by Wilberforce and
eleven of the most distinguished Abolitionists in Great Britain,"
including Buxton, Macaulay, Cropper, and Daniel O'Connell, showed how
thoroughly Garrison had accomplished his mission. The protest declares,
thanks to the teachings of the agent of the New England Anti-Slavery
Society, that the colonization scheme "takes its roots from a cruel
prejudice and alienation in the whites of America against the colored
people, slave or free. This being its source the effects are what might
be expected; that it fosters and increases the spirit of caste, already
so unhappily predominant; that it widens the breach between the two
races--exposes the colored people to great practical persecution, in
order to _force_ them to emigrate; and, finally, is calculated to
swallow up and divert that feeling which America, as a Christian and
free country, cannot but entertain, that slavery is alike incompatible
with the law of God and with the well-being of man, whether the enslaver
or the enslaved." The solemn conclusion of the illustrious signers of
this mighty protest was that: "That society is, in our estimation, not
deserving of the countenance of the British public." This powerful
instrument fell, as Garrison wrote at the time, "like a thunderbolt upon
the society." The damage inflicted upon it was immense, irreparable. The
name of Thomas Clarkson was conspicuous by its absence from the protest.
He could not be induced to take positive ground against the society.
Garrison had visited him for this purpose. But the venerable
philanthropist, who was then blind, had taken position on _neutral
ground_, and could not, after an interview of four hours, be induced to
abandon it. But, fortunately, potent as the name of Clarkson would have
been in opposition to the society, it was not indispensable to its
overthrow in Great Britain. Garrison had won to his side "all the
staunch anti-slavery spirits," while Cresson was able to retain only "a
few titled, wealthy, high-pretending individuals."
The success of the mission was signal, its service to the movement
against slavery in America manifold. Garrison writing from London to the
board of managers, summarized the results produced by it as follows:
"1st, awakening a general interest among the friends of emancipation in
this country, and securing their efficient coöperation with us in the
abolition of slavery in the United States; 2d, dispelling the mists with
which the agent of the American Colonization Society has blinded the
eyes of benevolent men in relation to the design and tendency of the
society; 3d, enlisting able and eloquent advocates to plead our cause;
4th, inducing editors of periodicals and able writers to give us the
weight of their influence; 5th, exciting a spirit of emulation in the
redemption of our slave population among the numerous female
anti-slavery societies; 6th, procuring a large collection of
anti-slavery documents, tracts, pamphlets, and volumes, which will
furnish us with an inexhaustible supply of ammunition." These were
indeed some of the grand results of laborious weeks. His mission was
ended. He was profoundly grateful to the good God for its success. The
great movement which he had started against oppression in his own
country was awaiting his aggressive leadership. He did not tarry abroad,
therefore, but set sail from London August 18, 1833, for New York, where
he landed six weeks later.