Abolition and Republicanism over the Transatlantic Long Term, 1640-1800 (original) (raw)
Résumés
This article compares and contrasts the conceptualization and transnational circulation of abolitionist ideas in the mid-seventeenth century English Revolution and the late-eighteenth-century “Age of Atlantic Revolutions.” Our method stresses both continuity and change across time and Atlantic space in the multiple efforts republicans made to eradicate human bondage. In both the mid-seventeenth century and the late eighteenth century, major political revolutions informed the ideas and actions of those who opposed slavery. As revolutionary fervor spread in the late eighteenth century, conservatives reacted with repressive attempts to contain the radicalism that was spilling over into the closely guarded domain of economic enslavement.
Cet article met en comparaison et en contraste la conceptualisation et les circulations transnationales des idées abolitionnistes lors de la Révolution anglaise du milieu du dix-septième siècle et lors de « l’âge des révolutions atlantiques » de la fin du dix-huitième siècle. Notre méthode est de mettre l’accent sur à la fois les continuités et les ruptures à travers les époques et l’espace atlantique à travers les efforts multiples que les républicains ont fait pour éradiquer l’asservissement des hommes. Au milieu du dix-septième siècle et à la fin du dix-huitième, des révolutions politiques majeures nourrirent ainsi les idées et les actions de ceux qui s’opposaient à l’esclavage. A mesure que la ferveur révolutionnaire se répandit à la fin du dix-huitième siècle, la réaction conservatrice prit la forme de tentatives de répressions pour contenir le radicalisme qui atteignait le domaine jalousement gardé de l’esclavage économique.
Entrées d’index
Notes
1 John goodwin, Anti-Cavalierisme, or Truth Pleading as Well as the Necessity, as the Lawfulness of this Present War,London, 1642, p. 7-9, 16, 38-39. For the meaning of political slavery in early modern England, seeQuentin skinner, ‘Rethinking Political Liberty’, History Workshop Journal, 61:1, 2006, p. 156-170, esp.158-159; ‘John Milton and the Politics of Slavery’, Visions of Politics II: Renaissance Virtue, 3 volumes_,_ New York, Cambridge University Press, 2002, p. 292-297. There was no single ideology or intellectual inheritance that unified republican (or ‘commonwealth’) thought in early modern England. Much work has been done on the classical inheritance and civic life that guided English humanist thought and political practice in the Tudor-Stuart era. See, for instance, John F. mcdiarmid (ed), The Monarchical Republic of Early Modern England, New York, Routledge, 2007, second edition, 2016), for a collection of essays reflecting on Patrick Collinson’s influential article, ‘The Monarchical Republic of Queen Elizabeth I’, Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, University of Manchester, 1987, p. 1-31. In this article, I join Skinner’s analysis of the anti-monarchical republicanism of the English Revolution with a republicanism based on civic virtue that J.G.A. Pocock famously discussed in The Machiavellian Moment: Florentine Political Thought and the Atlantic Republican Tradition, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1975). Blair Worden distinguishes between Skinnner’s neo-Roman or “constitutional republicanism” and Pocock’s Machiavellian notion of “civic republicanism.” As Worden explains, constitutional republicanism may be defined as opposition to prerogative institutions of political power, culminating in an aversion to monarchical government. Pocock’s civic republicanism reflects how the English refined Machiavelli’s Discourses to form an ideal of “political action and civic virtue” in the century leading to up to the English Revolution. See Worden’s illuminating essay, ‘Republicanism, Regicide and Republic: The English Experience’, in Martin van gelderen and Quentin skinner (eds), Republicanism: A Shared European Heritage, 2 volumes, New York, Cambridge University Press, 2004, 1: 307-327, quote on p. 308. This article, following Jonathan Scott’s work, also moves beyond Skinner and Pocock, analyzing how a republicanism of English humanism, shaped by the Radical Reformation and practical Christian moral philosophy, informed the neo-classical constitutional challenge to monarchy during the English Revolution, see Jonathan scott, ‘What were Commonwealth Principles?’, The Historical Journal, 47:3, 2004, p. 591-613.
2 For a contemporary formulation of sovereignty from the magisterial reformation perspective, see John winthrop, ‘Liberty and the Weal Public Reconciled…Concerning…the Late Court of Elections at Newtown’ and ‘A Defense of an Order of Court Made in the Year 1637,” in Thomas hutchinson (ed), A Collection of Original Papers Relative to the History of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay, Boston, 1769, p. 63-71. For work on ancient constitutional concepts of sovereignty, see Corinne weston and Janelle greenberg, Subjects and Sovereigns: The Grand Controversy of Legal Sovereignty in Stuart England, New York, Cambridge University Press, 1991; Alan cromartie, ‘The Constitutionalist Revolution: the Transformation of Political Culture in Early Stuart England’, Past and Present, 163: 1, 1999, p. 76-120; J.G.A. pocock, The Ancient Constitution and the Feudal Law: A Study of English Historical Thought in the Seventeenth Century, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1957, second edition 1987.
3 John lilburne, The Free Man’s Freedom Vindicated, London, 1645 in Don Wolfe (ed), The Leveller Manifestos of the Puritan Revolution, New York: Humanities Press, 1967, p. 317; Richard overton, An Arrow Against All Tyrants, London, 1646, p. 5; A Defiance Against All Arbitrary Usurpations, London, 1646, p. 2, 5, 26.
4 Vox Plebis, or the People’s Outcry Against Oppression, Injustice, and Tyranny, London, 1646, p. 2, 4; William walwyn, The Power of Love, London, 1643.
5 John clarke, Ill News from New England: or A Narrative of New England’s Persecution Wherein is Declared That While Old England is Becoming New, New England is Becoming Old, London, 1652, p. 5, 7. For more on antinomian spiritual and political beliefs, including liberty of conscience, see Christopher hill, ‘Antinomianism in 17th Century England’, in The Collected Essays of Christopher Hill, 2 volumes, Amherst, MA: University of Massachusetts Press, 1986, 1:162-184; Jonathan scott, England’s Troubles: Seventeenth-Century English Political Instability in European Context, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2000, Chapter 11; David como, Blown by the Spirit: Puritanism and the Emergence of an Antinomian Underground in Pre-Civil-War England, Stanford, Stanford University Press, 2004.
6 For Gorton’s life in New England, see Kenneth porter, ‘Samuell Gorton: New England Firebrand’, The New England Quarterly, 7:1, 1934, p. 405-454; George A. brayton, A Defense of Samuel Gorton and the Settlers of Shawomet, Providence, RI, S.S. Rider, 1883. For his time in London during the Revolution, see Jonathan Beecher field, Errands into the Metropolis: New England Dissidents in Revolutionary London, Hanover, N.H.,University of New England Press, 2009, Chapter 6.
7 Quotations from Gorton may be found in Samuel gorton, Simplicity’s Defense Against Seven-Headed Policy, London, 1646, edited by William R. staples, Providence, RI, Marshall Brown, 1853, p. 80; Edward winslow, Hypocrisie Unmasked: A True Relation of the Proceedings of the Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Against Samuel Gorton of Rhode Island, London, 1646, edited by Howard Millar chapin, Providence, 1916, p. 28, 34, 43, 44.
8 Murray tolmie, ‘Thomas Lambe, Soapboiler, and Thomas Lambe, Merchant, General Baptists’, Baptist Quarterly, 27 (1977–1978), p. 4–13; Stephen wright, ‘Thomas Lambe, 1629-1661’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Online edition, January 2008) [http://www.oxforddnb.com/index/72/101072598\].
9 [Richard overton and William walwyn], A Remonstrance of Many Thousand Citizens, London, 1646, p. 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10,14, 19-20.
10 Norah carlin, ‘Leveller Organization in London’, Historical Journal, 27:4, 1984, p. 959-960; Murray tolmie, The Triumph of the Saints, New York, Cambridge University Press, 1977, p. 144-184. Thomas edwards, Gangreana: or a Catalogue and Discovery…. of the Many Errors of this Time, 3 volumes, London, 1646, 1: 81, 91-93.
11 Philip gura,’The Radical Ideology of Samuel Gorton: New Light on the Relation of English to American Puritanism’, The William and Mary Quarterly, 36: 1, 1979, 78-100; ‘Samuel Gorton and Religious Radicalism in England, 1644-1648’_, Ibid.,_ 40:1, 1983, p. 121-124.
12 For overton, see The Arraignment of Mr. Persecution, London, 1645 and Martin’s Eccho, London, 1645; for walwyn, see England’s Lamentable Slavery, London, 1645 and A Word in Season, London, 1646. For more on Overton’s clandestine publishing career, see David R. adams, ‘The Secret Printing and Publishing Career of Richard Overton the Leveller, 1644–46’, The Library: The Transactions of the Bibliographical Society, 11: 1, 2010, p. 3-88.
13 John coffey, ‘Puritanism and Liberty Revisited: The Case for Toleration in the English Revolution’, Historical Journal, 41:4, 1998, p. 961-985.
14 Norah carlin , ‘The Levellers and the Conquest of Ireland in 1649’, Historical Journal, 30: 2, 1987, p. 269-288; Chris durston, “‘Let Ireland be Quiet:” Opposition in England to the Cromwellian Conquest of Ireland’, History Workshop Journal, 21: 1, 1986, p. 105-112.
15 [overton and walwyn], A Remonstrance of Many Thousand Citizens, 16.
16 An Agreement of the People for a Firm and Present Peace, upon Grounds of Common Right and Freedom, London, 1647, p. 4, section 2; John lilburne, William walwyn, Richard overton, and Thomas prince, An Agreement of the Free People of England, London, 1649, section 11. For more on the Levellers’ constitutional proposals, see Ian gentles, ‘The Agreements of the People and their Political Contexts, 1647-1649’, in Michael mendle (ed), The Putney Debates of 1647: The Army, the Levellers, and the English State, New York, Cambridge University Press, 2001.
17 For the 1647 mutiny Leveller mutiny on Corkbush Field, Ware, Herefordshire, see Frances maseres (ed), Select Tracts Relating to the Civil Wars in England in the Reign of King Charles I, London, 1815, p. xxxiii, xl-xlii, xlv-xlvi, lv-lviii. For the 1649 Leveller mutinies in London and Oxfordshire, see Charles firth and Godfrey davies, The Regimental History of Cromwell’s Army, 2 volumes, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1940, 1: 182-184; Henry denne, The Levellers Design Discovered: or, the Anatomie of the Late Unhappy Mutiny Presented Unto the Soldiery of the Army, London, 1649. For the best interpretive work on the mutineers’ radical politics, see James holstun, Ehud’s Dagger: Class Struggle in the English Revolution, London: Verso, 2000, p. 195-235.
18 A Declaration by Congregational Societies in and about the City of London, London, 1647; The Humble Petition and Representation of Several Churches of God in London Commonly (Though Falsely) Called Anabaptists, London, 1649.
19 Edward winslow, The Danger of Tolerating Levellers in a Civil State, or, An Historical Narration of the Dangerous Pernicious Practices and Opinions wherewith Samuel Gorton and his Leveling Accomplices so Much Disturbed and Molested the Several Plantations in New-England Parallel to the Positions and Proceedings of the Present Levellers in Old England, London, 1649; field, Errands Into the Metropolis: New England Dissidents in Revolutionary London, p. 48-71.
20 John Russell bartlett (ed), Records of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations in New England, 1636-1663, Providence, RI, 1857, p. 38-65, 134–135; J.S. maloy, The Colonial Origins of Modern Democratic Thought, New York, Cambridge University Press, 2008, p. 167-169; Michelle burnham, ‘Samuel Gorton's Leveller Aesthetics and the Economics of Colonial Dissent’, The William and Mary Quarterly, 67: 3, 2010, p. 433-457.
21 Elaine Forman crane, A Dependent People: Newport in the Revolutionary Era, New York, Fordham University Press, 1962, p. 17; Lorenzo Johnston greene, The Negro in Colonial New England, 1620-1776, New York, Columbia University Press, 1942, p. 30.
22 Bartlett (ed), Records of the Colony of Rhode Island, 1:242-243.
23 For the Rhode Island abolition law within the context of transatlantic republicanism, see John donoghue, ‘Fire under the Ashes’: An Atlantic History of the English Revolution, Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2013, p. 263-267; “‘Out of the Land of Bondage”: The English Revolution and the Atlantic Origins of Abolition’, The American Historical Review, 115: 4, p. 964-965.
24 For the Atlantic, see Carla Gardina pestana, The English Atlantic in an Age of Revolution, Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press, 2004, Chapter 6; for the Mediterranean, see Michael guasco, Slaves and Englishmen: Human Bondage in the Early Modern Atlantic World, Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014, Chapter 4.
25 George gardnyer, A Description of the New World, or, America Islands and Continent, London, 1652, p. 8, 9.
26 Charles bayly, A True and Faithful Warning unto the People and Inhabitants of Bristol, London, 1663, p. 8, 9.
27 For more on kidnapping, see John wareing, ‘The Regulation and Organisation of the Trade in Indentured Servants for the American Colonies in London, 1645-1718, and the Career of William Haverland, Emigration Agent’, PhD Diss., University of London, 2000; “‘Violently Taken Away or Cheatingly Duckoyed”: The Illicit Recruitment in London of Indentured Servants for the American colonies, 1645-1718’, London Journal, 26: 2, 2001, p. 1-22. For demographic statistics and the transition from indentured servitude to racialized slavery in the English Atlantic, see David galenson, White Servitude in Colonial America: An Economic Analysis, New York, 1984, p. 216–218, tables H3 and H4; E. A. wrigley and R. S. schoefield, The Population History of England, 1541–1871: A Reconstruction, London, 1981, p. 227; J. C. coombs, ‘The Phases of Conversion: A New Chronology for the Rise of Slavery in Early Virginia’, William and Mary Quarterly, 68: 3, 2011, p. 335-338, 348; Hilary beckles, White Servitude and Black Slavery in Barbados, 1627-1715, Knoxville, University of Tennessee Press, 1989; Christopher tomlins, Freedom Bound: Law, Labor, and Civic Identity in Colonizing America, New York, Cambridge University Press, 2010; Simon newman, A New World of Labor: The Development of Plantation Slavery in the British Atlantic, Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014.
28 For Clarke, see ‘The English Career of John Clarke’, The Baptist Quarterly, 1: 8, 1923, p. 368-372. For the Fifth Monarchists in general, see B.S. capp, The Fifth Monarchy Men: A Study in Seventeenth-Century English Millenarianism, London, Faber and Faber, 1972. For the Fifth Monarchists and their critique of the slave-trading interests behind the Western Design, see donoghue, Fire under the Ashes: An Atlantic History of the English Revolution, p. 252-276.
29 “Wentworth Day,” in Richard greaves and Robert zaller (eds), Biographical Dictionary of British Radicals in the Seventeenth Century, 3 volumes, Brighton, Sussex, 1982-1984, 1: 217; donoghue, Fire under the Ashes: An Atlantic History of the English Revolution, p. 163-164, 189, 194, 196, 205.
30 Vavassor powell, A Word for God or a Testimony on Truth’s Behalf from Several Churches and Diverse Hundreds of Christians in Wales, London, 1655, p. A, 4, 5; A Narrative wherein is Faithfully Set Forth the Sufferings of John Canne, Wentworth Day, and John Clarke, London, 1658; Bodleian Library Rawlinson Mss A 39 fol. 528; 47 fol. 27; C.H. firth (ed), The Clarke Papers, 4 volumes, London, Camden Society, 1891, 3: 62; Thomas birch, (ed), Collection of the State Papers of John Thurloe, 7 volumes, London, 1742, 4: 302-317.
31 A Banner of Truth Displayed, London, 1656, p. A2, 1; England’s Rembrancer,London, 1656, p. 5; Prophets Malachy and Isaiah Prophesying to the Saints and Professors, London, 1656, p. 10-11; A Standard Set Up, London, 1657, p. 6, 7.
32 A Door of Hope, London, 1661, p. 5.
33 A Banner of Truth Displayed, p. A2, 15, 53, 54, 90.
34 A Relation or History of the Rise and Suppression of the Fifth Monarchy…the Chief of Which Sect was one Thomas Venner, a Wine Cooper, London, 1661; Thomas howell, (ed), Cobbett’s Complete Collection of State Trials and Proceedings for High Treason and Other Crimes and Misdemeanors, 1671-1678, London, T.C. Hanserd, 1810, p. 67-70; Champlin burrage, ‘The Fifth Monarchy Insurrections’, English Historical Review, 25, 1910, p. 738-745.
35 Benjamin lay, All Slave-keepers... Apostates, Philadelphia, 1737, p. 12, 61, 27.
36 'Biographical Anecdotes of Benjamin Lay’, February 10, 1790, in Benjamin rush Essays Literary, Moral and Philosophical, [Original edition, Philadelphia, 1798], Schenectady, NY: Union College Press, 1988, p. 181.
37 Ibid., p. 184.
38 Jonathan D. sassi, ‘Africans in the Quaker Image: Anthony Benezet, African Travel Narratives, and Revolutionary-Era Antislavery’, Journal of Early Modern History, 10: 1-2, 2006, p. 95-130.
39 G. S. brookes, Friend Anthony Benezet, London: Oxford University Press, 1937, p. 5.
40 The British abolitionist Granville Sharp discovered Benezet's A Short Account of That Part of Africa while browsing a London bookstore and was inspired to have it reprinted in England (1768). Shortly thereafter, Sharp wrote and published A Representation of the Injustice and dangerous tendency of tolerating Slavery in England (1769), which Benezet would later print a lengthy excerpt from. See Roger bruns, Am I not a Man and a Brother: The Antislavery Crusade of Revolutionary America, 1688-1788, New York: Chelsea House, 1977, p. 79. The re-publication of Sharp's treatise is referenced in a letter from Benezet to Sharp on May, 14, 1772. On Benezet's influence on the early abolitionist movement, see Betty fladeland, Men and Brothers: Anglo-American Antislavery Cooperation, Urbana IL: University of Illinois Press, 1972, p. 14-43; and Maurice jackson, Let This Voice Be Heard: Anthony Benezet, Father of Atlantic Abolitionism, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2010.
41 Anthony benezet, A Short Account of that Part of Africa, Inhabited by the Negroes; with Respect to the Fertility of the Country; the good Disposition of many of the Natives, and the Manner by which the Slave Trade is carried on, Philadelphia, 1762, p. 4-5.
42 The most comprehensive account of slavery and abolition during this period remains David Brion Davis' sweeping study The Problem of Slavery in the Age of Revolution, 1770-1823, New York, 1975. Recent important work on the subject includes: Peter linebaugh and Marcus rediker, The Many Headed Hydra: Sailors, Slaves, Commoners, and the Hidden History of the Revolutionary Atlantic, Boston, 2000; Robin blackburn, The American Crucible: Slavery, Emancipation and Human Rights, London and New York, 2011; and J.R. oldfield, Transatlantic Abolitionism in the Age of Revolution, Cambridge, 2013. Historians increasingly differentiate between a “radical Enlightenment,” and a “moderate Enlightenment,” which helps to distinguish various currents within eighteenth-century social thought, with important implications for the study of abolitionism. Radical religious dissent was politicized and understandings of conscience and personal independence were reformulated in the context of the Age of Revolution. Radicalism denotes a commitment to fundamentally alter social and political structures as well as cultural systems. Margaret Jacob connects the political and scientific radicalism of the early Enlightenment with the religious enthusiasm of the English Revolution. See Margaret jacob, The Radical Enlightenment: Pantheists, Freemasons and Republicans, 1981; Reprint, Lafayette, LA, Cornerstone, 2006. Jonathan Israel's characterization of what constitutes the Radical Enlightenment is somewhat different than Jacob's. While both point to the Enlightenment's seventeenth-century origins, Israel emphasizes the more secular sources of radicalism, especially the influence of the Dutch philosopher Baruch Spinoza. See Jonathan I. israel, Radical Enlightenment: Philosophy and the Making of Modernity 1650-1750, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002; and Revolutionary Ideas: An Intellectual History of the French Revolution from the Rights of Man to Robespierre, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014.
43 Anthony benezet, Notes on the Slave Trade, Philadelphia: 1781, p. 8.
44 On the influence of English republicanism in eighteenth-century France, see especially: Rachel hammersley_, The English Republican Tradition and Eighteenth-Century France: Between the Ancients and the Moderns_, Manchester, Manchester University Press, 2010; ‘Harringtonian Republicanism, Democracy and the French Revolution’, La Révolution française [En ligne], 5 | 2013, mis en ligne le 31 décembre 2013; Margaret jacob, The Radical Enlightenment: Pantheists, Freemasons and Republicans, 1981; Reprint, Lafayette, LA, Cornerstone, 2006, p. 94, 249-260; Raymonde monnier, Républicanisme, Patriotisme et Révolution française, Paris, L’Harmattan, 2005; Pierre lurbe, ‘Lost in [French] Translation: Sidney’s Elusive Republicanism’, in Gaby mahlberg and Dirk wiemann (eds), European Contexts for English Republicanism, Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate, 2013, p. 211-224. and Johnson K. wright, A Classical Republican in Eighteenth-Century France: The Political Thought of Mably, Stanford, Stanford University Press, 1997. For the later influence of the American Revolution on French politics and institutions, see Jacques Léon godechot, France and the Atlantic Revolution of the Eighteenth Century, 1770-1799, New York: Free Press, 1965; R. R. palmer, The Age of the Democratic Revolution: a political history of Europe and America, 1760-1800, 2 volumes, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1959-64; and Gary B. nash, “Sparks from the Altar of 76’: International Repercussions and Reconsiderations of the American Revolution,” in The Age of Revolutions in Global Context, C. 1760-1840, (eds) David Armitage and Sanjay Subrahmanyam, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.
45 Pierre bayle, A General Dictionary, London, 1734-41, Volume 6, p. 555. John Locke's sensationalist psychology, so popular among the intellectual elite of the eighteenth century, provided the epistemological basis for a philosophy that discarded belief in an innate moral capacity, which presupposed a priori understanding. He argued, rather, that the mind was shaped only by experience. See locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, London, 1689. Votaire was particularly influenced by Lockean psychology and thus hostile toward the radical sectarians of the English Revolution who often embraced individual moral conscience. For example, see his review of David Hume’s history of England: Gazette littéraire de l’Europe, Volume 1, May 2, 1764, p. 193-200.
46 ‘Droit Naturel (Morale)’, in Denis diderot and J. d'alembert (eds), Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, 17 vols. 1751-80, Volume 5, Paris: Chez Briasson, 1755, p. 115. Translated from the French original. In a related entry for ‘Right of nature’ [Law of nature], Antoine-Gaspard Boucher d'Argis wrote of the natural law [la loi naturelle] “which God has engraved in our hearts,” and is discerned primarily through “an instinct, or a kind of internal feeling” To apply the natural law to actions required that “one must consult one's conscience,” which is a form of “reason.” “Droit de la nature, ou droit naturel.” Ibid., p. 131–134. Translated.
47 Ibid., p. 936. Translated.
48 Ibid., p. 937-938. Translated.
49 Ibid., p. 937. Translated.
50 ‘Traite des nègres’, in Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, Volume 16_,_ Paris, 1765, p. 532. Translated.
51 G. T. raynal, The Philosophical and Political History of the Settlements and Trade of the Europeans in the East and West Indies, revised, augmented, and published, vol. 5, London, 1783, p. 283. The original French language edition was published as L'Histoire philosophique et politique des établissements et du commerce des Européens dans les deux Indes, Amsterdam, 1770. Raynal later published a pamphlet on the American Revolution in France, entitled The Revolution of America (1781), which was subsequently printed in English. Thomas Paine responded in his Letter Addressed to the Abbé Raynal, Philadelphia, 1782.
52 Bernard bailyn, The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1967, Chapter 6.
53 linebaugh and rediker, The Many Headed Hydra, Chapter 7; Gary B. nash, Race and Revolution, Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1990; Manisha sinha, “'To Cast Just Obliquy' on Oppressors: Black Radicalism in the Age of Revolution," The William and Mary Quarterly, Volume LXIV, No. 1 (January 2007): 149-160; and The Slave’s Cause: A History of Abolition (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2016, Chapter 2.
54 James otis, The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved (Boston, 1764), p. 43. Referring to an unpublished speech of two years earlier, John Adams recalled that “Not a Quaker in Philadelphia... had ever asserted the rights of negroes on stronger terms... I shuddered at the doctrine he taught; and I have all my life shuddered, and still shudder, at the consequences that may be drawn from such premises.” John adams to William Tudor, June 1, 1818, in The Works of John Adams, Volume 10, Charles Francis adams (ed), Boston, 1856, p. 315.
55 [Benjamin rush], A Vindication of the Address, Philadelphia, 1773, p. 49.
56 Thomas paine, Common Sense ... A New Edition ... To Which Is Added, an Appendix; Together with an Address to the People Called Quakers, H.D. Symonds: London, 1792, p. 32.
57 The Pennsylvania Journal and Weekly Advertiser, March 8, 1775.
58 Daniel P. resnick, ‘La Société des Amis des Noirs and the Abolition of Slavery’, French Historical Studies, 7, 4, 1972: p. 558-569. For the organization's minutes and related material, see Marcel dorigny and Bernard gainot, eds., La Société des Amis des Noirs, 1788-1799: Contribution a l' historie de l'abolition de l'esclavage, Paris: UNESCO, 1998.
59 Jonathan I. israel, Revolutionary Ideas: An Intellectual History of the French Revolution from the Rights of Man to Robespierre, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2014, p. 41-42, passim; and J. R. oldfield, Transatlantic Abolitionism, Cambridge, UK, 2015, p. 32-36.
60 Two leading scholars of the Amis des Noirs have observed that the society viewed Benezet “as the initiator of abolitionism.” Marcel dorigny and Bernard guinot, La Société des Amis des Noirs, 1788-1799: Contribution a l' historie de l'abolition de l'esclavage, p. 73, n. 28. Also see jackson, Let this Voice Be Heard, Chapter 7.
61 resnick, ‘Amis des Noirs and the Abolition of Slavery’, p. 560.
62 jackson, Let This Voice Be Heard, p. 181-186.
63 See, as examples, Le Patriote Français, October 9, 1789; November 10, 1789; and December 3, 1789.
64 For an excellent discussion of the coordination between abolitionists in the U.S. and Britain during this period, see sinha, The Slave’s Cause, Chapter 4. Similar exchange between the U.S. and France has received less attention by scholars.
65 oldfield, Transatlantic Abolitionism, p. 90.
66 Thomas clarkson to Bouvet de Cresse, December 1, 1789, quoted in David B. davis, The Problem of Slavery in the Age of Revolution, 1770-1823, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1975, p. 400.
67 Edmond Charles Genet, the first minster from France and a member of the French abolition society the Amis des Noirs, was feted not only in the North, but throughout the South as well. Democratic societies were founded throughout the American Republic. On democratic-republican societies in the United States, see Eugene P. link, Democratic-Republican Societies, 1790-1800, New York, 1942; Phillip S. foner (ed), The Democratic-Republican Societies, 1790-1800: A Documentary Sourcebook, Westport, 1976; Albrecht koschnik, ‘The Democratic Societies of Philadelphia and the Limits of the American Public Sphere, Circa 1793-1795’. William and Mary Quarterly 58, 2001: 615-36; and Seth cotlar, Tom Paine's America: The Rise and Fall of Transatlantic Radicalism in the Early Republic, Charlottesville, VA, 2011.
68 Laurent dubois, Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution, Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2004, p. 102-106.
69 Pennsylvania General Advertiser, October 10-11, 1791. Quoted in Ibid., p. 105.
70 cotlar, Tom Paine’s America, 62-63. For example, Abraham Bishop's series of essays, reprinted in many democratic-republican newspapers, entitled “The Rights of Black Men” advocated strongly for the rebels and compared them favorably to America patriots. See Tim matthewson, “Abraham Bishop, ‘The Rights of Black Men' and the American Reaction to the Haitian Revolution,” Journal of Negro History, Vol. 67, No. 2, Summer, 1982. On Bishop's career, see David waldstreicher, In the Midst of Perpetual Fetes: The Making of American Nationalism, 1776-1820, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1997, p. 177-183, 208-210, 221-222, 244-245. On the influence of the Haitian Revolution in the United States, see especially, Ashli white, Encountering Revolution: Haiti and the Making of the Early Republic, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010. Support for the rebels was later tempered by self-interest and political conservatism. See Laurent DuBois, “’Troubled Water’: Rebellion and Republicanism in the Revolutionary French Caribbean,” in James P. Horn, Jan Lewis, and Peter S. Onuf. The Revolution of 1800: Democracy, Race, and the New Republic. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2002; and James Alexander Dun, ‘Philadelphia not Philanthropolis: The Limits of Pennsylvanian Antislavery in the Era of the Haitian Revolution_’, The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography_, Vol. 135, No. 1, January 2011, p. 73-102.
71 James pemberton to Le Amis des Noirs, Aug. 29, 1791, PAS Papers, HSP.
72 Minutes of the Proceeding of the Delegates of the Abolition Societies, established in different parts of the United States, Assembled in Philadelphia, Jan. 1, 1794, Philadelphia, 1794, p. 23.
73 ‘The Abolition of Slavery, February 4, 1794’, in Laurent dubois and John D. garrigus (eds and trans), Slave Revolution in the Caribbean, 1789-1804, Boston, 2006, p. 131.
74 Ibid, p. 129.
75 ‘Les Citoyenes de couleur de Philadelphie a L'Assemblee Nationale’, September 24, 1793. John Carter Brown Library, Providence, Rhode Island. Also see Gary B. nash, ‘Reverberations of Haiti in the American North: Black Saint Dominguans in Philadelphia’, Pennsylvania History, Vol. 65 (1998), p. 53.
76 Anonymous to Benjamin Rush, Mar. 3, 1794, Benjamin Rush Miscellaneous Correspondence, Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
77 Minutes of the proceedings of a Convention of Delegates from the Abolition Societies Established in Different Parts of the United States, Philadelphia, 1797, p. 43. Also see p. 30-31.
78 Some Federalist papers covered the decree, but not in the same detail or as frequently as the opposition press. See, as examples, Gazette of the United States (New York) May 1, 1794; American Apollo (Boston), May 8, 1794; Providence Gazette, (Providence, RI), May 10, 1793.
79 City Gazette (Charleston, South Carolina), August 19, 1794.
80 Simon P. Newman, Parades and the Politics of the Street: Festive Culture in the Early American Republic, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1997, 139-140.
81 Northern Star, July 11, 1792. Theobald Wolfe Tone went as far as to toast to “the spirit of the French mob to the people of Ireland.” Theobald Wolfe tone, T. W. moody, R. B. mcdowell, and C. J. woods, The Writings of Theobald Wolfe Tone, 1763-98, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998, p. I:274. For more on political toasts in this context, see Martyn powell, ‘Political Toasting in Eighteenth-century Ireland’, History 91 4, Wiley: 2006, 508–29.
82 Nini rodgers, Equiano and Anti-Slavery in Eighteenth-Century Belfast, Belfast, Northern Ireland: Belfast Society in association with the Ulster Historical Foundation, 2000. Equiano lodged with United Irishmen Samuel Nielson during his stay in Belfast.
83 Richard Robert madden, Richard robert, The United Irishmen, Their Lives and Times, London: J. Madden, 1842, p. 303; wilson, United Irishmen, United States, p. 134.
84 Henry Joy mccracken to Sam McTier, 1792, in William drennan, Maria luddy, Jean agnew, and Martha drennan mctier, The Drennan-McTier Letters, Volume 1,Dublin: Women's History Project in association with the Irish Manuscripts Commission, 1998, p. 411.
85 Northern Star (Belfast), April 14, 1792.
86 Thomas russell, A letter to the people of Ireland, on the present situation of the country, Belfast, 1796, p. 15, 17, 18.
87 Ibid., p. 18, 22.
88 Ibid., p. 22.
89 Ibid., p. 22-23.
90 Ibid., p. 23.
91 Thomas Addis Emmet was the brother of Robert Emmet, another influential Irish revolutionary. See Patrick M. geoghegan, Robert Emmet: A Life, Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2002; and Anne dolan, Reinterpreting Emmet: Essays on the Life and Legacy of Robert Emmet, Dublin, Ireland: University College Dublin Press, 2007.
92 Thomas Addis emmet, Memoir of Thomas Addis and Robert Emmet, Volume 1, New York, 1915, p.28, 8-9.
93 While some among the United Irishmen who migrated to the United States maintained firm in their opposition to slavery, others accommodated the Jeffersonian shift away from antislavery activity amongst Democratic-Republicans. See Michael durey, Transatlantic Radicals and the Early American Republic. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1997, 282–288; wilson, United Irishmen, United States, 133-140; and Richard J. twomey, Jacobins and Jeffersonians: Anglo-American Radicalism in the United States, 1790–1820, New York: Garland Publishing, 1989, p. 102–106. On the shift away from antislavery positions amongst Jeffersonians more generally, see Padraig riley, Slavery and the Democratic Conscience: Political Life in Jeffersonian America. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press_,_ 2016.
94 Thomas A. emmet to Joseph McCormick, New York, January 28, 1805, in Ibid., p. I:393.
95 Emmet's first case in the United States involved the prosecution of a slave-trader. Ibid., p. I:491. On Emmet's activities with the N-YMS, see wilson, United Irishmen, United States, p.135; and Craig A. landy, ‘Society of United Irishmen Revolutionary and New-York Manumission Society Lawyer: Thomas Addis Emmet and the Irish Contributions to the Antislavery Movement in New York’, New York History 95, Spring, 2014, p. 193-222.
96 On the impact of the French Revolution on American political culture, see Newman, Parades and the Politics of the Street; durey, Transatlantic Radicals; cotlar, Tom Paine's America; Larry E. tise, The American Counterrevolution: A Retreat from Liberty, 1783-1800, Mechanicsburg, PA: Stackpole Books, 1998, Part 2; Rachel Hope cleves, The Reign of Terror in America: Visions of Violence from Anti-Jacobinism to Antislavery, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009; and Matthew Rainbow Hale, ‘On Their Tiptoes: Political Time and Newspapers During the Advent of the Radicalized French Revolution, Circa 1792-1793’, Journal of the Early Republic 29, 2 (2009): p. 191-218.
97 Hans-Jiirgen grabbe, ‘European Immigration to the United States in the Early National Period, 1783-1820’, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 133, June 1989, p. 192. On the Irish community in Philadelphia during the Age of Revolution, see Maurice J. bric, Ireland, Philadelphia and the Reinvention of America, 1760-1800. Four Courts Press, Portland, OR, 2008. On Irish affection for America during this period, see Vincent morley, Irish Opinion and the American Revolution, 1760-1783, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
98 ‘Constitution of the American Society of United Irishmen’, in William cobbett, Detection of a Conspiracy, Formed by the United Irishmen With the Evident Intention of Aiding the Tyrants of France in Subverting the Government of the United States, Philadelphia, 1798, p. 5.
99 American Society of United Irishmen, December 18, 1797, Philadelphia, 1797, p. 21.
100 Cobbett viewed France's emancipation proclamation as further evidence that the sister republic should not serve as a model for the United States. In August of 1794 he wrote that “In the abolition of negro slavery, for example, the Governments of the United States have not rushed headlong into the mad plan of the National Convention.” They have, he continued, “in spite of clubs and societies, proceeded with caution and justice.” William cobbett, Observations on the Emigration of Doctor Joseph Priestley, August 1794, in Porcupine's Works, London,1801, p. 173.
101 Peter Porcupine [William cobbett], A Bone to Gnaw for the Democrats Part II; Containing, Observations on a Patriotic Pamphlet, Entitled, ‘Proceedings of the United Irishmen,’ Philadelphia, 1797, p. 4, 2, 6, 15-16.
102 William cobbett, Detection of a Conspiracy, Formed by the United Irishmen With the Evident Intention of Aiding the Tyrants of France in Subverting the Government of the United States, Philadelphia, 1798, p. 4, 7, 23, 27-28, 21.
103 See James Morton smith, Freedom's Fetters; The Alien and Sedition Laws and American Civil Liberties, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1956. Debates over the act frequently refer to “Jacobins” as a threat. See, for example, Thomas Hart benton and John C. rives, Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856: From Gales and Seatons' Annals of Congress; from Their Register of Debates; and from the Official Reported Debates, by John C. Rives, New York: D. Appleton, 1857, p. 2: 239, 279, 306, 336.
104 Windham Herald (Windham, CT), January 17, 1799.
105 davis, Slavery in the Age of Revolution, 306-326; and Inhuman Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World (Oxford, England: Oxford University Press, 2006), 154-155.
106 On the marginalization of radical democrats in the late 1790s, see cotlar, Tom Paine’s America, Chapter 3; durey, Transatlantic Radicals, Chapter 6; and tise, The American Counterrevolution, Part 4. In the context of race and antislavery, see Dun, ‘Philadelphia not Philanthropolis’; Larry E. tise, Proslavery: A History of the Defense of Slavery in America, 1701–1840, University of Georgia Press, Athens, GA, 1987, Chapter 2; Douglas bradburn, The Citizenship Revolution: Politics and the Creation of the American Union, 1774-1804 Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2009, Chapter 7; and David gellman, "Race, the Public Sphere, and Abolition in Late Eighteenth-Century New York," Journal of the Early Republic, Vol. 20, No. 4, (Winter, 2000): p. 607-636. On Democratic-Republicans and antislavery in the early nineteenth century, see Sean wilentz, “Jeffersonian Democracy and the Origins of Political Antislavery in the United States: The Missouri Crisis Revisited’, The Journal of the Historical Society 4, no.3, September, 2004, 375-401; riley, Slavery and the Democratic Conscience; and Sinha_, The Slave’s Cause,_ Chapter 6. On the emergence of Federalist antislavery in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, see cleves, Reign of Terror in America; Linda kerber, Federalists in Dissent: Imagery and Ideology in Jeffersonian America, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1970, p. 62-63; and Paul finkleman, Slavery and the Founders: Race and Liberty in the Age of Jefferson, New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1996.
Pour citer cet article
Référence électronique
Anthony Di Lorenzo et John Donoghue, « Abolition and Republicanism over the Transatlantic Long Term, 1640-1800 », La Révolution française [En ligne], 11 | 2016, mis en ligne le 01 décembre 2016, consulté le 19 novembre 2024. URL : http://journals.openedition.org/lrf/1690 ; DOI : https://doi.org/10.4000/lrf.1690
Droits d’auteur
Le texte et les autres éléments (illustrations, fichiers annexes importés), sont « Tous droits réservés », sauf mention contraire.