March 5, 1862 As the Civil War raged in the South and West, William C. Nell, a prominent abolitionist and historian gave the keynote address at the Crispus Attucks Commemoration in Allston Hall in Boston honoring the only African American among the five men killed … Read More(1862) William C. Nell Speaks At The Crispus Attucks Commemoration, Boston
Although history has rendered Abraham Lincoln the Great Emancipator, his dedication to the anti-slavery cause was questioned by many abolitionists during his first presidential campaign of 1860. H. Ford Douglas, a Virginia-born fugitive slave who lived in Illinois in 1860, correctly saw Lincoln as an … Read More(1860) H. Ford Douglas, “I Do Not Believe in the Antislavery of Abraham Lincoln”
Schoolteacher, dentist, physician, lawyer, graduate of the American Medical College in Philadelphia, member of the Massachusetts bar, proficient in Greek and Latin, Dr. John S. Rock was unequivocally one of the most distinguished African American leaders to emerge in the United States during the antebellum … Read More(1858) John S. Rock, “I Will Sink or Swim with My Race”
By 1857 “Bleeding Kansas’ and the Dred Scott Decision had intensified sectional tensions over slavery and moved the nation closer to civil war. Against that backdrop, Charles Lenox Remond, on July 10, 1857, addressed the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society where he joined a growing chorus of … Read More(1857) Charles Lenox Remond, “An Anti-Slavery Discourse”
In September 1855, the Supreme Court of Massachusetts ruled in Boston v. Roberts that a separate school could not be maintained at taxpayer expense by the city of Boston. This decision marked the first significant victory in what would be a 99 year struggle to … Read More(1855) William C. Nell, “The Triumph Of Equal School Rights In Boston”
Image Ownership: Public Domain Samuel Ringgold Ward (1817-1864), was one of the most prominent of the anti-slavery speakers in the nation by the 1850s. Born into slavery in Maryland, he escaped with his mother to New Jersey. In 1834 when he was 17 Ward was … Read More(1850) Samuel Ringgold Ward, “Speech on the Fugitive Slave Bill”
Image Ownership: Public Domain On June 8, 1849, Frederick Douglass gave a major oration at Faneuil Hall in Boston soon after he returned from Europe. The speech addressed a number of issues including the politics of Senator Henry Clay of Kentucky. After his main address, … Read More(1849) Frederick Douglass, “On Mexico”
In a speech before the New England Anti-Slavery Society at its convention on May 7, 1844, Charles Lenox Remond adopted a theme increasingly popular among many anti-slavery activists, arguing that Northern states such as Massachusetts should secede from the Union then dominated by slaveholders. Remond … Read More(1844) Charles Lenox Remond, “For the Dissolution of the Union”
In 1842 Charles Lenox Remond became one of the first African Americans to give testimony before a state legislature when he addressed a committee of the Massachusetts House of Representatives investigating discrimination in public transportation. Here Remond contrasted the absence of discrimination in his travels … Read More(1842) Charles Lenox Remond, “The Rights Of Colored Citizens In Traveling”
In September 1832, Maria W. Stewart delivered at Boston’s Franklin Hall one of the first public lectures ever given by an American woman. Her speech, directed to the women of the African American Female Intelligence Society, called on black women to acquire equality through education. … Read More(1832) Maria W. Stewart Advocates Education for African American Women
