HIS 350L: The Rise of Anglo-American Anti-Slavery, 1763-1863
Robert Olwell
Garrison 3.108 (Office hours: Wednesdays 2-5)
Phone: 475-7226
E-mail: rolwell@mail.utexas.edu
Prospectus:
On January 1, 1763, as the Seven Years’ War came to a close, African slavery and the Atlantic Slave Trade were seen as two of the main pillars upholding the British-American Empire. Both were considered vital sources of the empire’s wealth and strength and were seldom subjected to sustained criticism. Over the next century, however, this situation was utterly transformed. The American Revolution launched a barrage of rhetorical attacks on “human bondage” on both sides of the Atlantic and initiated emancipation plans in the Northern half of the United States. In 1808, Britain and American simultaneously abolished the Atlantic slave trade. In the 1830s, Parliament abolished slavery in the British West Indian colonies, while in America, thousands of “Abolitionists” organized and protested against slavery. Frustrated in their moral crusade, some abolitionists withdrew, others sought a political solution, while still others decided that violence was justified in the battle against slavery. On the first day of 1863, Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation sounded the death knell for slavery in the (now rebellious) Southern states; (the actual death sentence came in the form of the 13th amendment to the US Constitution, ratified in December 1865).
The story of the overthrow of slavery is a remarkable example of “human progress” (to use David Brion Davis’s phrase). As a historical phenomenon, it has inspired a rich and complex literature. The study of anti-slavery illuminates key historical concerns such as causality (why does change happen?) and individual motivation and agency (why and how do people affect change). Some scholars have sought to understand the larger forces, events, and ideas that engendered Anti-Slavery (and inspired Abolitionists), while others have focused upon individuals, or on the grass-roots membership of the movement, seeking to discover what compelled some people to become Abolitionists (while most did not). In examining how scholars have examined Anti-slavery, we will also engage with key interpretive categories or historical concepts such as: religion, capitalism, modernity, race, gender, and the self.
Readings:
Students should purchase a three ring binder, a three-hole punch, and perhaps also a ream of paper, and a printer cartridge. Most of the readings for the course will be made vailable via the PCL electronic reserves site. You are advised to print copies of these and bring them to class for our discussions. Other materials (chapters of books) will be available for purchase in a course packet. Students should also acquire the following six books (via Amazon or other web-emporiums) before we are assigned to discuss them in class.
Books to Buy:
Thomas Bender, ed., The Anti-Slavery Debate: Capitalism and Abolitionism as a Problem in Historical Interpretation, (Oxford, 1992).
Ronald Walters, The Anti-Slavery Appeal: American Aboltionism After 1830, (Baltimore, 1978), 3-149.
Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Written by Himself, (Boston, 1845; reprint, Bedford/St. Martins, 2003).
Seymour Drescher, The Mighty Experiment: Free Labor Versus Slavery in British Emancipation, (Oxford, 2004).
Michael Pierson, Free Hearts and Free Homes: Gender and American Anti-Slavery Politics, (Chapel Hill, 2003).
Evan Carton, Patriotic Treason: John Brown and the Soul of America, (New York, 2006).
George Frederickson, Big Enough to be Inconsistent, Abraham Lincoln Confronts Slavery and Race, (Harvard, 2008)
Assignments:
This course is organized primarily as a reading colloquium. Therefore your first responsibility is to come to each class meeting having read and thought about that week’s assigned reading. To assist you in formulating your thoughts (and to help me to formulate our discussion) I ask you to write a 500 word response paper for each week’s reading that you will bring to class. Although I won’t take attendance per se, participation in class discussions is an important part of this course. Thus, absences will count against you, but no more than coming to class unprepared to take part in our discussions. Your must also write a historical review of one of the two films we will watch in class, one of the five secondary books we will discuss, and one week’s worth of the primary sources we will be discussing in class (in italics in the syllabus). Each of these reviews will be 1500-2000 words in length (6-8 double spaced pages) and will be revised by you after being submitted to me for comment.
Grades/Grading Policy:
Grades for the course will be reckoned according to the following:
Participation/ Thirteen Response papers (5 points each; plus two “free passes” when you choose not to write a response paper)
Three Critical Reviews (15 points each)
In accordance with University policy, I will be assigning plus and minus grades in this course.
Schedule of Meetings and Readings:
25 January - Introductions; Requirements and Themes.
1 February - Slavery and Anti-Slavery before 1763 - READINGS: George Whitefield, A Letter to the Inhabitants of Maryland, Virginia, North and South Carolina Concerning Their Negroes, (Philadelphia, 1740); Alexander Garden, Remarks on Mr. Whitfield’s Letter Concerning the Negroes, (Charleston, 1740); John Woolman, Some Considerations on the Keeping of Negroes, (Philadelphia, 1754); David Brion Davis, Inhuman Bondage: The Rise and Fall of Slavery in the New World, (Oxford, 2006), 27-140; Lawrence Towner, “The Sewall-Saffin Dialogue on Slavery,” William and Mary Quarterly, (January 1964), 40-52.
8 February - Anti-Slavery and the Crisis of Empire, 1763-1775 - READINGS: Francis Hargrave, An Argument in the Case of James Somersett, A Negro, Lately Heard in the Court of King’s Bench, ( London, 1772); Jack Greene, “Slavery or Independence: Some Reflections on the Relationship Between Liberty, Black Bondage, and Equality in Revolutionary South Carolina,” South Carolina Historical Magazine, (July 1979), 193-214; Christopher Brown, “Empire Without Slaves: British Concepts of Emancipation in the Age of the American Revolution,” William and Mary Quarterly, (April 1999), 273-306; Peter Dorsey, “To Corroborate Our Own Claims: Public Positioning and the Slavery Metaphor in Revolutionary America,” American Quarterly, (September 2003), 353-86; Simon Schama, Rough Crossings: Britain, the Slaves, and the American Revolution, (New York, 2005), 21-57.
15 February - Anti-Slavery and the American Revolution, 1775-1804 – READINGS: John Chester Miller, The Wolf by the Ears: Thomas Jefferson and Slavery, (New York, 1977), 1-59; Gary Nash and Jean Soderlund, Freedom By Degrees: Emancipation in Pennsylvania and Its Aftermath, (Oxford, 1991), 74-136; T.H. Breen, “Making History: The Force of Public Opinion and the Last Years of Slavery in Revolutionary Massachusetts,” in Ronald Hoffman, Mechal Sobel, and Fredrika Teute, eds., Through A Glass Darkly: Reflections on Personal Identity on Revolutionary America, (Chapel Hill, 1997), 67-95; and Gregory Massey, “The Limits of Revolutionary Anti-Slavery Thought in the Revolutionary Lower South, John Laurens and Henry Laurens,” Journal of Southern History, (August 1997), 495-530.
22 February – The British Campaign against the Slave Trade, 1783-1808 – READING: Thomas Bender, ed., The Anti-Slavery Debate: Capitalism and Abolitionism as a Problem in Historical Interpretation, (Oxford, 1992), 1-259.
1 March - Film: “Amazing Grace” (watch in class); READINGS: House of Commons Debate on the Abolition Bill, 28 February 1805; David Spring, “The Clapham Sect, Some Social and Political Aspects,” Victorian Studies, (September 1961), 35-48.
8 March – The American Colonization Society – READINGS: David Walker, Appeal to the Coloured Citizens of the World, (Boston, 1830), [Extract on Colonization]; “Letters to the American Colonization Society [Part 1],” Journal of Negro History, (April 1925), 154-180; Delindus Brown, Free Blacks' Rhetorical Impact on African Colonization: The Emergence of Rhetorical Exigence,” Journal of Black Studies, (March 1979), 251-265; David Stafford, “The American Colonization Society: An Application of Republican Ideology to Early Antebellum Reform,” Journal of Southern History, (May 1979), 201-220; Douglas R. Egerton, "Its Origin Is Not a Little Curious": A New Look at the American Colonization Society, “ Journal of the Early Republic, (Winter, 1985), pp. 463-480.
15 March – SPRING BREAK (NO CLASS)
22 March - The Origins of American Abolitionism- READINGS: Ronald Walters, The Anti-Slavery Appeal: American Aboltionism After 1830, (Baltimore, 1978), 3-149; Charles Sellers, The Market Revolution: Jacksonian America, 1815-1846, (Oxford, 1991), 202-68.
29 March - Abolitionist Literature – William Lloyd Garrison, “To the Public,” Liberator, [First Issue], (Boston, 1 January 1831); Theodore Weld, American Slavery As it Is: Testimony of a Thousand Witnesses, (Boston 1839), [Extract], Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Written by Himself, (Boston, 1845; reprint, Bedford/St. Martins, 2003).
April 5 – British Emancipation, 1834-38 – READING: Seymour Drescher, The Mighty Experiment: Free Labor Versus Slavery in British Emancipation, (Oxford, 2004).
April 12 - Film: “Amistad” (watch in class); READINGS: Trial of the prisoners of the Amistad on the writ of habeas corpus before the Circuit Court of the United States for the district of Connecticut, (New York, 1839); Casey King, “Abolitionists in American Cinema: From The Birth of a Nation to Amistad,” in Timothy McCarthy and John Stauffer, eds., Prophets of Protest: Reconsidering the History of American Abolitionism, (New York, 2006), 268-93.
April 19 – Anti-Slavery and American Politics – READINGS: Eric Foner, “The Wilmot Proviso Revisited,” Journal of American History, (September 1969), 262-279; Michael Pierson, Free Hearts and Free Homes: Gender and American Anti-Slavery Politics, (Chapel Hill, 2003).
April 26 – Militant Abolitionism – READING: Evan Carton, Patriotic Treason: John Brown and the Soul of America, (New York, 2006).
May 3 - Lincoln and Slavery – READINGS: Abraham Lincoln (Extracts from Writings and Speeches); George Frederickson, Big Enough to be Inconsistent, Abraham Lincoln Confronts Slavery and Race, (Harvard, 2008).
