The Cherokee Racism continues. Blacks Purged from Cherokee Rolls Again. 2007

The definition of Cherokee Descendancy stems from the 19th Century Dawes Commission lists. Members of the Cherokee Nation of native Americans have voted to revoke tribal citizenship for descendants of black slaves the Cherokees once owned. A total of 76.6% voted to amend the tribal constitution to limit citizenship to "blood" tribe members. Supporters said only the Cherokees had the right to determine tribal members. Opponents said the amendment was racist and aimed at preventing those with African-American heritage from gaining tribal revenue and government funding. The Cherokee Nation has 250,000 to 270,000 members, second only to the Navajo.

'Right to vote'

The list of descendants stems from the Dawes Commission, established by Congress more than 100 years ago. It created what are known as the final rolls, establishing different categories including: "blood" Cherokee, Cherokee freedman (of African descent), Cherokee by intermarriage and Delaware Cherokee.

Principal Chief Chad Smith said about 8,700 people had voted - more than the turnout for the Cherokee constitution vote of four years ago. He said: "The Cherokee people exercised the most basic democratic right, the right to vote. "Their voice is clear as to who should be citizens of the Cherokee Nation. No-one else has the right to make that determination." But opponents of the amendment levelled accusations of discrimination. Tribal council member Taylor Keen said: "This is a sad chapter in Cherokee history... this is not my Cherokee Nation. My Cherokee Nation is one that honours all parts of her past."

Saturday's vote followed a ruling by the Cherokee Nation Supreme Court last year securing tribal citizenship for descendants of freedmen. Members can obtain government benefits and tribal services including housing and medical support. Slaves were held by a number of native American tribes and were freed after the Civil War in 1866.

Gardening Meditation

several thoughts ocured to me while gardening.

1. humans are very good at vast, cataclysmic change. so we have nothing to fear in terms of the changes that need to be made to live in harmony with the earth. we could change earth, society, the world in several key weeks. the idea that we must "ratchet down" or "transition" is absolute bullshit... evidence seems to indicate that after hundreds of millions of years during the age of the dinosaurs, they became extinct in a matter of years... this lead to cataclysmic change. it required no such "ratcheting down". necessity will forever be, the mother of invention. i thought about this, because i have not gardened in several months, yet, today, i could have my yard look better than someone who has gardened weekly for years if i was willing to put forth the effort. a man who has been fat all his life and eaten twice what he has needed, could be in better shape than a man who has never been fat with six months of working out, diet and dedication. a house, messy, filthy and neglected, could look better than a museum in the course of several weeks with sustained effort. humans can transform anything, especially their minds, almost instantaneously. any change, can occur at any time for virtually any reason (but it helps if you meditate).

2. the person with great ideas, may not (absolutely not) be the person who is skilled at carrying those ideas out. we require cooperation for every task.

3. we need to derive a system of 'karma' where it makes no difference who you are, or what you are, or how much money you have. your consumption of earthly resources deducts from your karma. your lack of use of these resources, adds to your karma. so if you are a billionaire, you can acquire a vast surplus in karma, only if your efforts lead to lowering the karma quotient of others. giving away shoes, coats, building buildings, will all lead to a higher karma quotient. this would reuire everyone to "think" and be mindful in their actions, rather than to allow economics to dictate the actions of man, as they have for the previous 3000 years or so (to some extent). if you have a private jet, several homes, multiple personal attendants, then your karma will inescapably be high. same goes for the dalai lama... he also must consider his karma quotient. no one get's any "credits" or is allowed to "borrow" from others based on their divinity or the need of their presence, comfort, etc. your karma score should be a factor for how society cares for you. if you are a crackhead, and you give birth to a drug addicted baby, your karma score should be automatically worse than someone that flies a million miles a year in a private jumbo jet.

4. i've only meditated for about 10 minutes in the last 3 weeks, yet, today, as a payoff for my efforts, i was rewarded with beautiful, beautiful calm mind space and contemplations... thank you god. you are indeed great.

Excerpt: Slaveholding Indians: The Case of the Cherokee Nation By Bernard Vincent

A good synopsis of Slaveholding Cherokee Indians. Many tears have been shed over the trail of tears, yet, there were slaves that marched and perished and were the lowest on the totem pole during the forced march. not many have said much about this event. For me, the idea of slaveholding indians is very sad. Despite the discrimination and horrible treatment of native americans, somehow, the Cherokee tribe was not able to see the inherent evils of slavery. It pains me to know that of the three known races in my blood, two held the third in slavery despite the most intimate of relations.
The purging of blacks from the rolls of the Cherokee nation, is another painful moment in the history of Afro-Indian history. I will also shed light on this subject.
This excellent synoposis, well researched, and important, was written by Bernard Vincent. the full text can be found here.

In the South-Eastern part of what has become the United States, there were also slaves among Indian tribes. Not much has been written on those slaveholding Indians nor on the life of their slaves: the subject has received very little attention It was not until the late 1970s that at least two reliable treatments of the subject appeared in print in the U.S. Rudi Halliburton, Jr’.s Red over Black: Black Slavery among the Cherokee Indians9 was published in 1977, soon followed in 1979 by Theda Perdue’s Slavery and the Evolution of Cherokee Society, 1540-186610. I shall here focus on the Cherokee tribe, partly because it is a better documented case, but also because, toward the end of the eighteenth century, the Cherokees became the chosen keystone of the U.S. Government’s “civilization program”... whose ironic and tragic outcome was the Trail of Tears.

Things changed when the first white traders arrived (around 1674). The Cherokees became increasingly dependent on European manufactured products (knives, hatchets, hoes, guns) and they in turn were suddenly threatened with being enslaved by the whites. It was in fact after the ‘Jamestown massacre’ of 1622 that “the Indians who had previously been treated as friends [by white settlers] could now be enslaved and forced to work . . . or exported to Bermuda.”11 The enslavement of Indians was actively encouraged by the white colonial authorities, and traffic in Indian slaves developed on a large scale. The Cherokees themselves often participated in “slave raids, [thus] obtaining slaves to exchange for English goods” (Perdue, 26). In 1708, the population of South Carolina “totaled 9,850 [people], including 2,900 African slaves and 1,400 Indian slaves”: in other words, slaves of both colors represented 44% of the population, and one slave out of three was an Indian!

An important cultural shift also took place. War captives became the personal property of the captors, so that Cherokees owned slaves “individually and not communally” (Perdue, 34). The desire to accumulate wealth which had no place in their traditional way of life began to play an important, if not a central role in their culture, thus preparing the ground for the future adoption of Western economic habits. It was probably because of these mimetic capacities that the Indians of that region were called the “five civilized tribes.”


But the first encounter between Indians and blacks probably dates back to 1526, when Lucas Vásquez de Ayllón, escorted by 500 colonists and about 100 African slaves, undertook to establish a settlement near the mouth of the Pedee River in South Carolina. Ayllón soon died of fever. After his death, disputes broke out among the settlers and some of the slaves escaped in the forest and found refuge with the local Indians, who had never seen black-skinned individuals before. “Black slaves later accompanied Spanish expeditions to the Cherokees, including those of Hernando de Soto in 1540 and Juan Pardo in 1567” (Perdue, 36). After these first encounters, the employment, by white settlers, of enslaved Indians alongside African slaves “produced extensive contacts between the two peoples,” but increasingly Cherokees became acquainted with blacks in another manner—as “warriors capturing black bondsmen” (Perdue, 36, 37). A treaty signed between the British and the Cherokees in 1730 encouraged the capture of African fugitives: “For every slave so apprehended and brought back, the Indian that brings him shall receive a gun and a matchcoat [woolen mantle].”12

In 1835, the Cherokees of Georgia owned a total of 776 black slaves: there were 23 full-blood slaveowners possessing a total of 69 slaves; 14 female slaveowners possessing a total of 70 slaves; and 73 mixed-blood Cherokees who possessed 637 slaves (i.e. 82% of the total number).14

By the end of the eighteenth century, the Cherokees, increasingly anxious to acquire manufactured goods through the sale of deerskins, “had seriously depleted their supply of game.” Coupled with various and large cessions of land,15 excessive hunting resulted in a growing economic crisis which had a profound effect on Cherokee culture, working habits and division of labor: only when the identification of women with agriculture had ended [did] the [large-scale] introduction and utilization of slave labor for cultivation by even a minority of Cherokees [become] possible” (Perdue, 53).

This evolution was suddenly facilitated and accelerated when in the last decade of the eighteenth century George Washington and his Secretary of Defense Henry Knox decided to launch an ambitious program aiming at civilizing the ‘savages’: the idea was to transform the Indians, and first of all the Cherokees, into farmers motivated by the concept of individual property and profit.

This project, later on taken over and amplified by Thomas Jefferson, was on the whole enthusiastically received by the Cherokees. Accepting the challenge and playing the game—even better than was expected—they became farmers,16 artisans, laborers; they opened schools and built churches; some became Christians, others freemasons,17 some were both; over time they had their own lawyers and doctors; they created a library, a museum, a learned society, and launched their own newspaper, The Cherokee Phoenix, which still exists today.

A few Cherokees, predominantly but not exclusively ‘half-breeds’, as they used to be called, were extremely successful and wealthy, owning large plantations, dressing like Europeans, living in substantial mansions, served and assisted by numerous slaves. An 1824 census indicates that there were at the time 16,000 Cherokees in the South-Eastern states (30% more than in 1809), not including 1,277 black slaves (an increase of almost 120%!).18 In 1822, they instituted a Supreme Court and in 1827 drafted and adopted a Constitution of their own, modeled on the U.S. Federal Constitution and based on the separation of powers.

The government of the Cherokee Nation was to a large extent in the hands of Cherokee slaveholders: “Of the twelve signers of the [Cherokee] Constitution of 1827 . . . eleven owned bondsmen . . . [they owned in fact] 22% of all the slaves in the Cherokee Nation” (Perdue, 57).

there were also a number of laws passed by the National Council which all tended to control and restrict the activities of black bondsmen: runaway slaves from white plantations were regarded and treated as “intruders,” and free blacks from outside could not reside in the Cherokee Nation without a special permit; intermarriages between Negro slaves and Indians, or whites, were unlawful (male offenders were punished with fifty-nine stripes on the bare back—female offenders with only twenty-five); purchasing goods from slaves was prohibited; slaves could neither own property, nor buy or sell liquor, nor take their masters to court for maltreatment or other forms of abuse. And those things happened.

One essential difference between white and Indian slaveholders was that, according to Halliburton, “the Cherokees did not experience the practice of slavery and [bad] conscience [emphasis mine] that permeated much of the United States. They never felt the need to justify slavery and never expressed the opinion that slavery was in the best interest of the black . Slavery was justified only on the basis of benefits that accrued to the masters” (Red, 38).

In proportion as the original civilization program became real, a growing number of whites began to realize the dangers contained in the planned evolution of Cherokees. If indeed the Indians became ‘civilized’, if the hunter became a farmer and cultivated his fields with the help of slaves, and if in addition he was a normal educated church-going citizen, on what ground could the remaining Indian lands be confiscated from such ‘Americans’?

Four events marked the pivotal year 1828: the election of John Ross, a rich full- blood Cherokee slaveowner, as ‘Principal Chief’ of the Cherokee Nation; the election of Andrew Jackson to the White House; and the decision of Georgia to invalidate all the legislation recently adopted by the Cherokee National Council, including its Constitution, and to place all Cherokees and Cherokee possessions under its sole political jurisdiction. The final, crowning event was the discovery of large quantities of gold in Cherokee territory.

The fate of the Cherokee Nation was then sealed: however ‘civilized’ and ‘American’ they had become, they would, willingly or unwillingly, be removed en masse to some western land, on the other side of the Mississippi River. In 1830 Congress passed the historic ‘Removal Act’, which gave President Jackson the authority to organize the exclusion and relocation of the Cherokees and other southern Indians in the West. In accordance with the 1802 agreement signed by Jefferson, the lands and other properties of the Cherokees were to be redistributed to the Georgians, and this was done through a lottery system. The ruling of the Supreme Court—in Worcester v. Georgia (1832)—was, as is well known, of no avail.

Ross and his group stuck to their guns and rejected all forms of compromise. The modernists, on the other hand, considered the removal of their tribe as inevitable, doubted that resistance would succeed, and preferred to obtain through negotiation the best possible material and moral terms for their departure and transfer. In December 1835, in the presence of some 500 Cherokees (out of 16,000), John Ridge and his allies signed, at New Echota, the capital of the Nation, a treaty by which they relinquished all claims to Cherokee lands east of the Mississippi River in exchange for five million dollars to cover spoliations, and a large tract of land (seven million acres) located in the north-eastern part of Indian Territory (today’s Oklahoma). From that moment on, the signers and their followers were referred to as the ‘Treaty Party’—an expression construed by the other group as meaning the ‘Traitors’ Party.

The leaders of both parties were rich planters. They owned or hired slaves and none had a bad conscience about it, nor were they in favor of emancipation. John Ross, for one, leader of the National Party, possessed a plantation and a ferry, had 19 slaves working on 170 acres of fields and orchards. His daughter was destined to marry into the finest Philadelphia society, and finally did. His own brother, Lewis, had 41 slaves. His treasurer, John Martin, had 100 slaves. Among the Treaty Party leaders, Major Ridge had some 30 slaves and his son, John, 21 (Red, 22-27). Like everybody else, John Ross took his own slaves to Oklahoma and never thought of freeing them although he was both a Christian and a freemason. It must also be noted that this ‘traditionalist’ leader was so acculturated to white society that he could not speak Cherokee and had to use an interpreter when addressing—in English—his own National Council!

Lewis Ross, brother of the Principal Chief, did on the eve of the forced removal: suspecting that there would be a high demand for slaves in Oklahoma, he bought 500 black bondsmen and had them transported by boat for sale in the new territory! 20Once displaced and relocated in Oklahoma, the Ross family was even wealthier than before, and John Ross took to living with all his slaves in a magnificent mansion called ‘Rose Cottage’.

The period following the removal of the Cherokee Nation was one of violence and chaos. The ‘Old Settlers’ expected the newly-arrived Cherokees to “accept their previously established government, laws, and chiefs” (Perdue, 73). But Ross and his nationalist friends, who far outnumbered the Old Settlers, refused to comply, and strove to keep their former institutions and laws alive. Hoping to render Ross powerless, the Treaty Party sided with the Old Settlers, but in June 1839 its key leaders (Major Ridge, John Ridge, Elias Boudinot) were cold- bloodedly assassinated by members of the National Party—who used as justification a law of 1829 (originally proposed by Major Ridge himself!) which made the unauthorized cession of Cherokee land to whites a capital offence. Only Stand Watie was able to escape: twenty years later, he reappeared as brigadier general in the Confederate army, burned down John Ross’s beautiful mansion (‘Rose Cottage’) at Park Hill, and at the end of the Civil War was the last Confederate general to surrender (June 23, 1865).

On the eve of the Civil War, according to the 1860 census, there was a total of 2,504 black slaves in the Oklahoma Cherokee Nation (60% more than in 1835, on the eve of the Great Removal). Only 2% of the Cherokee population owned slaves (Red, 177 ).23 But this fact did not prevent the Cherokees as a whole—or almost as a whole—from siding with the white Southerners during the great national struggle over slavery and emancipation. To whatever faction they belonged, however rich or poor, most Cherokees were hostile to the idea of freeing slaves. They were so intolerant of abolitionist sentiments that the missionaries or school teachers who dared disseminate antislavery doctrines “often found themselves threatened with banishment from the Nation” (Red, 91).

Stand Watie, who had become a wealthy planter and slaveowner, unhesitatingly rallied to the Confederates—like the vast majority of the Oklahoma Cherokees— and became the first Indian general in American history. With his help, and John Ross’s half-hearted approval, “two Cherokee regiments were raised for the Confederate service” (Red, 128).24 John Ross had first sided with the Union but, impressed by the first victories of the Confederate army (in particular at Bull Run and Wilson’s Creek), and anxious to preserve the unity of his Nation, he rather reluctantly decided to change sides and support the South. When the winds of war began to shift, Ross and some of his friends readjusted their position once more.

In February 1863, members of the Cherokee faction that had remained loyal to the Union met in council and repudiated the alliance with the South, which was now on its way to total defeat. Taking their inspiration from President Lincoln’s recent Emancipation Proclamation, the Federal Cherokees “passed an act which emancipated slaves and abolished slavery within their Nation” (Red, 131). The signers, although they were the first group to abolish slavery voluntarily during the Civil War, had in fact little to lose because they had no, or very few, slaves. The large slaveowners were practically all supporters of the South, and “they totally disregarded the [emancipation] law” adopted by the pro-Union group (Red, 133). And so did the Federal authorities! When the war ended, they indeed claimed that, since most Cherokees had aligned themselves with the Confederacy, “all existing treaties between the two nations were void” (Red, 133). A post-Civil War treaty was eventually signed in Washington on July 19, 1866. It provided that, in Oklahoma, the Cherokees—but also free Negroes and freed slaves—had the right

to settle in and occupy a territory “which include[d] a quantity of land equal to one hundred and sixty acres for each person who [might] so elect to reside in the [said] territory” (Red, 134). Regarding those who had found refuge outside the Cherokee Nation during the war, Article 9 stated that all free blacks and all freedmen, and their descendants, “who may return within six months . . . shall have all the rights of native Cherokees” (Red, 135). Alas, many of them were not informed in time, and returned home after the fateful date of January 19, 1867—to discover that “they were not citizens, but intruders” and were no longer entitled to a tract of tillable land (Red, 136). The outcome of war was in their favor, but once again fate and the injustice of history were against them, and many were then forced to live from hand to mouth. To make matters even worse, in 1910, a grandfather clause in the new Oklahoma constitution disenfranchised all blacks: those former slaves, or their descendants, “became so discouraged with their lot that they [engaged] in a forlorn effort to return to Africa.”25

When studying the condition of the black slaves of Cherokee masters, one cannot but observe that their work activities and living conditions were quite similar to those of their counterparts in the Southern states. One essential difference was that the Cherokees, whether or not they owned slaves, never questioned the legitimacy of slavery, never experienced any qualms of conscience about it, never felt the necessity to justify (or condemn) it morally, never developed any kind of ‘underground railroad’ within their Nation, never established any abolitionist movement. Even today “there appears to be little or no feeling of guilt” among them (Red,144).

One, moreover, can understand that a people under siege as the Cherokees were, dispossessed of their ancestral lands by the greed of a rival and conquering culture, their traditions undermined and debased, and forced en masse onto the tragic Trail of Tears, would be too focused on their own catastrophe to make the additional effort of having a Christlike attitude toward another group of downtrodden people. Nor should one forget the central paradox which characterized their evolution: the more ‘civilized’ they became, or were asked to become, the more proslavery and, if I may say so, the more ‘white’ they tended to be, in both sensibility and practice.

One of my aims here was to show that the so-called ‘benevolence’ of slaveholding Indians, and of Cherokee slavery in particular, is a myth: a myth which, incidentally, was above all “created by the missionaries, Indian superintendents, and Cherokee agents,” all of them taking care not to displease the influential Cherokee slaveowners when writing their official reports (Red, 144). And a myth that enables the historian to avoid adding in any way to the Indian’s historical burden. In part, it is probably because of that mythical benevolence that the case of slaveholding Indians has been so much neglected and has given rise to so little research: why indeed bother about something that is not perceived as problematic or questionable? Not a single line, for instance, in John Hope Franklin’s famous history of Negro Americans, From Slavery to Freedom.


Selected Bibliography

Abel, Annie Heloise. The American Indian as Slaveholder and Secessionist, University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln and London 1992 [1915]. Excellent on Indians as secessionists, but barely mentions the existence of slavery among Native Americans!

“C”. “Slavery Among the Indians.” Southern Literary Messenger XXVIII (May 1859): pp.333-34. Anonymous but interesting point of view of a proslavery Southerner.

Halliburton, R., Jr. Red over Black: Black Slavery among the Cherokee Indians, Greenwood Press, Westport, CT 1977.

McLoughlin, William G. “Red Indians, Black Slavery and White Racism: America’s Slaveholding Indians.” American Quarterly 26, no. 4 (October

1974): pp.367-85. Emphasizes the ‘racist’ dimension of Indian attitudes in the practice of black slavery.

Perdue, Theda. Slavery and the Evolution of Cherokee Society, 1540-1866, The University of Tennessee Press, Knoxville 1979.

Roethler, Michael. “Negro Slavery among the Cherokee Indians, 1540-1866.” Ph.D. diss., Fordham University, 1964.

Sturm, Circe. Blood Politics: Race, Culture and Identity in the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, University of California Press, Berkeley, Los Angeles, London 2002. An in-depth analysis of the ‘blood, color and race’ issue as historically experienced by the Cherokees.

Willis, William S. “Divide and Rule: Red, White and Black in the Southeast.” Journal of Negro History 48 (July 1963): pp.157-76.

Indian Removal Overview from TeachUSHistory.org

Indian Removal

From 1817 to 1827, the Cherokees effectively resisted ceding their full territory by creating a new form of tribal government based on the United States government. Rather than being governed by a traditional tribal council, the Cherokees wrote a constitution and created a two-house legislature. In addition to this government, Cherokees learned to speak English and created a written language and adopted Christianity, becoming one of the "civilized" tribes that adopted features of white culture in place of their own. Elias Boudinot, a young Cherokee who was educated in Connecticut, founded a newspaper called the Cherokee Phoenix, which printed the news in both English and Cherokee.

During the 1820s, the state of Georgia began pressuring the United States government to force the Cherokee Nation off its lands in that state. The Cherokee tribe emphasized the assimilation of its culture and sent yearly delegations to Washington to lobby on their behalf. But when the tribe wrote its constitution in 1827, the Georgia government saw the move as an assertion of Cherokee sovereignty - that the tribe could become an independent nation within the state of Georgia. The 1830 Indian Removal Bill, backed by President Andrew Jackson, was the first step towards removing the Cherokees from their land for good.

In response, the Cherokees took legal action to try to save their lands. In their second Supreme Court case, Worcester v. Georgia (1832), Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall ruled that the Cherokee Nation was entitled to federal protection over those of the state laws of Georgia. The Court ruled the Indian nation was a "distinct community in which the laws of Georgia can have no force" and into which Georgians could not enter without the permission of the Cherokees themselves or in conformity with treaties. Although the Supreme Court ruled in their favor, the state of Georgia confiscated the Cherokee lands. The Treaty of New Echota, negotiated in 1835 and signed in 1836, was made by a small contingent of Cherokees led by John Ridge against the wishes of the majority of the tribe and its leader, Chief John Ross. As a result, the Cherokees had to leave their lands, traveling 800 miles to the Oklahoma Territory over what came to be called "The Trail of Tears."

Andrew Johnson saved from impeachment by Benjamin Wade... sort of.

Why wasn’t Johnson convicted in his impeachment trial? The vote famously fell 1 vote short. Why? Because several Republican’s, despite thinking that Johnson was guilty, did not want the President Pro-Tem of the Senate, Benjamin Wade to be President.

Wade joined other Radical Republicans to contravene President Johnson’s Reconstruction policies and attempt to oust him from office. Wade’s position as president pro tem of the Senate made him next in line to succeed to the Presidency. That caused several Moderate and Conservative Republicans to resist the movement to impeach and remove Johnson because they considered Wade to be a dangerous demagogue and opposed his stance on other issues, especially his support of "soft money." Wade died in Jefferson, Ohio.

The Black Old Testament: A Pantheon of Black Gods.

My old testament is Black History. From the time Africans were taken from their homeland and dispersed throughout the America's and Europe, they entered a time of modernization, spiritually, culturally, and socially, which would forever transform the African Experience.

There are non-canonized books to this Black Testament. Some experiences are essential. Jamestown, Spanish Florida, French Holdings in New Orleans, Jamaica, Haiti, England, Brazil, Argentina and Venezuela as well as the Caribbean.

Books of the Black Old Testament

Africa
The Middle Passage
1619-Jamestown
Estanvancio
Native Americans
Early Republic
Missouri Compromise
King Cotton & The Cotton Gin
Miscegenation
Nullification Crisis
Black Religion
The Gag Rule
The Compromise of 1850
Fugitive Slave Law
Kansas-Nebraska Act
Slave Narratives:
The book of William Grimes 1825
The book of Mary Prince 1831
The book of Charles Ball 1836
The book of Moses Roper 1837
The book of Frederick Douglass 1845
The book of Milton Clarke 1846
The book of William Wells Brown 1847
The book of Josiah Henson 1849
The book of Henry Bibb 1849
The book of James W. C. Pennington 1849
The book of Solomon Northup 1853
The book of John Brown 1855
The book of John Thompson 1855
The book of Peter Still and his Wife "Vina," 1856
The book of William and Ellen Craft 1860
The book of Harriet Jacobs, Boston 1861
The book of John Andrew Jackson 1862
The book of J. D. Green 1864
The book of Mary Reynolds 1827
The Republican Party
The Abolionist: Frederick Douglas, William Garrison, Theodore Weld, Angelina & Susan Grimke, William Wilberforce
Black Women: Harriet Jacobs, Harriet Tubman, Mary Bethune Cookman
"Bleeding Kansas"
Uncle Tom's Cabin
Dred Scott decision (1857) and the Lecompton Constitution
Assault on Sumner (1856)
Panic of 1857 and sectional realignments
John Brown and Harpers Ferry (1859)
The Civil War
Reconstruction
Black Codes
Jim Crow
Historically Black Colleges & Universities
W.E.B. Dubois, Booker T. Washington, Carter G. Woodson, Franklin Frazier, Marcus Garvey, John Henrik Clarke, John Hope Franklin, C.L.R. James
Buffalo Soldiers
The Harlem Renaissance Black Artists & Paul Robeson
Black Religious Leaders
Black Indians
Thorogood Marshall
The NAACP
The Civil Rights Movement
Malcolm X
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Robert F. Williams
The Boycotts
non-Violent Protest
Black Athletes
Black Religion
Black Power
Jesse Jackson
The Modern Age

The Horrors of Aspartame, Nutrasweet & Equal

Yesterday I met this brother who is an x-ray technician. we were talking about coffee, and then sweeteners, and he told me how he'd experienced numb hands, headache, dizziness and night blindness and went to a series of doctors. he finally realized he'd been dieting and using a lot of products with aspartame. he read the symptom list and it matched his symptoms. within 3 days of quitting, his symptoms disappeared. he researched aspartame.
This brother told me that Donald Rumsfied was the head of the company at the time and as soon as Reagan got into office, they fired the head of the FDA and added a new member on the board. The final vote was deadlocked. the new FDA chief broke the tie and aspartame was approved.

It sounded too damn devilish to be true. Rumsfield? we know he's satan incarnate, but I looked it up, and it appears it's all very, very true. Read on my friends.


In 1985 Monsanto purchased G.D. Searle, the chemical company that held the patent to aspartame, the active ingredient in NutraSweet. Monsanto was apparently untroubled by aspartame's clouded past, including a 1980 FDA Board of Inquiry, comprised of three independent scientists, which confirmed that it "might induce brain tumors." The FDA had actually banned aspartame based on this finding, only to have Searle Chairman Donald Rumsfeld (currently the Secretary of Defense) vow to "call in his markers," to get it approved.

The day after Ronald Reagan's inauguration, Searle re-applied to the FDA for approval to use aspartame in food sweetener, and Reagan's new FDA commissioner, Arthur Hayes Hull, Jr., appointed a 5-person Scientific Commission to review the board of inquiry's decision. It soon became clear that the panel would uphold the ban by a 3-2 decision, but Hull then installed a sixth member on the commission, and the vote became deadlocked. He then personally broke the tie in aspartame's favor. Hull later left the FDA under allegations of impropriety, served briefly as Provost at New York Medical College, and then took a position with Burston-Marsteller, the chief public relations firm for both Monsanto and GD Searle. Since that time he has never spoken publicly about aspartame.

December 1965-- While working on an ulcer drug, James Schlatter, a chemist at G.D. Searle, accidentally discovers aspartame, a substance that is 180 times sweeter than sugar yet has no calories.
Spring 1967-- Searle begins the safety tests on aspartame that are necessary for applying for FDA approval of food additives.
Fall 1967-- Dr. Harold Waisman, a biochemist at the University of Wisconsin, conducts aspartame safety tests on infant monkeys on behalf of the Searle Company. Of the seven monkeys that were being fed aspartame mixed with milk, one dies and five others have grand mal seizures.
November 1970-- Cyclamate, the reigning low-calorie artificial sweetener -- is pulled off the market after some scientists associate it with cancer. Questions are also raised about safety of saccharin, the only other artificial sweetener on the market, leaving the field wide open for aspartame.
December 18, 1970-- Searle Company executives lay out a "Food and Drug Sweetener Strategy' that they feel will put the FDA into a positive frame of mind about aspartame. An internal policy memo describes psychological tactics the company should use to bring the FDA into a subconscious spirit of participation" with them on aspartame and get FDA regulators into the "habit of saying, "Yes"."
Spring 1971-- Neuroscientist Dr. John Olney (whose pioneering work with monosodium glutamate was responsible for having it removed from baby foods) informs Searle that his studies show that aspartic acid (one of the ingredients of aspartame) caused holes in the brains of infant mice. One of Searle's own researchers confirmed Dr. Olney's findings in a similar study.
February 1973-- After spending tens of millions of dollars conducting safety tests, the G.D. Searle Company applies for FDA approval and submits over 100 studies they claim support aspartame's safety.
March 5, 1973-- One of the first FDA scientists to review the aspartame safety data states that "the information provided (by Searle) is inadequate to permit an evaluation of the potential toxicity of aspartame". She says in her report that in order to be certain that aspartame is safe, further clinical tests are needed.
May 1974-- Attorney, Jim Turner (consumer advocate who was instrumental in getting cyclamate taken off the market) meets with Searle representatives to discuss Dr. Olney's 1971 study which showed that aspartic acid caused holes in the brains of infant mice.
July 26, 1974-- The FDA grants aspartame its first approval for restricted use in dry foods.
August 1974-- Jim Turner and Dr. John Olney file the first objections against aspartame's approval.
March 24, 1976-- Turner and Olney's petition triggers an FDA investigation of the laboratory practices of aspartame's manufacturer, G.D. Searle. The investigation finds Searle's testing procedures shoddy, full of inaccuracies and "manipulated" test data. The investigators report they "had never seen anything as bad as Searle's testing."
January 10, 1977-- The FDA formally requests the U.S. Attorney's office to begin grand jury proceedings to investigate whether indictments should be filed against Searle for knowingly misrepresenting findings and "concealing material facts and making false statements" in aspartame safety tests. This is the first time in the FDA's history that they request a criminal investigation of a manufacturer.
January 26, 1977-- While the grand jury probe is underway, Sidley & Austin, the law firm representing Searle, begins job negotiations with the U.S. Attorney in charge of the investigation, Samuel Skinner.
March 8, 1977-- G. D. Searle hires prominent Washington insider Donald Rumsfeld as the new CEO to try to turn the beleaguered company around. A former Member of Congress and Secretary of Defense in the Ford Administration, Rumsfeld brings in several of his Washington cronies as top management.
July 1, 1977-- Samuel Skinner leaves the U.S. Attorney's office and takes a job with Searle's law firm. (see Jan. 26th)
August 1, 1977-- The Bressler Report, compiled by FDA investigators and headed by Jerome Bressler, is released. The report finds that 98 of the 196 animals died during one of Searle's studies and weren't autopsied until later dates, in some cases over one year after death. Many other errors and inconsistencies are noted. For example, a rat was reported alive, then dead, then alive, then dead again; a mass, a uterine polyp, and ovarian neoplasms were found in animals but not reported or diagnosed in Searle's reports.
December 8, 1977-- U.S. Attorney Skinner's withdrawal and resignation stalls the Searle grand jury investigation for so long that the statue of limitations on the aspartame charges runs out. The grand jury investigation is dropped.
June 1, 1979-- The FDA established a Public Board of Inquiry (PBOI) to rule on safety issues surrounding NutraSweet.
September 30, 1980-- The Public Board of Inquiry concludes NutraSweet should not be approved pending further investigations of brain tumors in animals. The board states it "has not been presented with proof of reasonable certainty that aspartame is safe for use as a food additive."
January 1981-- Donald Rumsfeld, CEO of Searle, states in a sales meeting that he is going to make a big push to get aspartame approved within the year. Rumsfeld says he will use his political pull in Washington, rather than scientific means, to make sure it gets approved.
January 21, 1981-- Ronald Reagan is sworn in as President of the United States. Reagan's transition team, which includes Donald Rumsfeld, CEO of G. D. Searle, hand picks Dr. Arthur Hull Hayes Jr. to be the new FDA Commissioner.
March, 1981-- An FDA commissioner's panel is established to review issues raised by the Public Board of Inquiry.
May 19, 1981-- Three of six in-house FDA scientists who were responsible for reviewing the brain tumor issues, Dr. Robert Condon, Dr. Satya Dubey, and Dr. Douglas Park, advise against approval of NutraSweet, stating on the record that the Searle tests are unreliable and not adequate to determine the safety of aspartame.
July 15, 1981-- In one of his first official acts, Dr. Arthur Hayes Jr., the new FDA commissioner, overrules the Public Board of Inquiry, ignores the recommendations of his own internal FDA team and approves NutraSweet for dry products. Hayes says that aspartame has been shown to be safe for its' proposed uses and says few compounds have withstood such detailed testing and repeated close scrutiny.
October 15, 1982-- The FDA announces that Searle has filed a petition that aspartame be approved as a sweetener in carbonated beverages and other liquids.
July 1, 1983-- The National Soft Drink Association (NSDA) urges the FDA to delay approval of aspartame for carbonated beverages pending further testing because aspartame is very unstable in liquid form. When liquid aspartame is stored in temperatures above 85 degrees Fahrenheit, it breaks down into DKP and formaldehyde, both of which are known toxins.
July 8, 1983-- The National Soft Drink Association drafts an objection to the final ruling which permits the use of aspartame in carbonated beverages and syrup bases and requests a hearing on the objections. The association says that Searle has not provided responsible certainty that aspartame and its' degradation products are safe for use in soft drinks.
August 8, 1983-- Consumer Attorney, Jim Turner of the Community Nutrition Institute and Dr. Woodrow Monte, Arizona State University's Director of Food Science and Nutritional Laboratories, file suit with the FDA objecting to aspartame approval based on unresolved safety issues.
September, 1983-- FDA Commissioner Hayes resigns under a cloud of controversy about his taking unauthorized rides aboard a General Foods jet. (General foods is a major customer of NutraSweet) Burson-Marsteller, Searle's public relation firm (which also represented several of NutraSweet's major users), immediately hires Hayes as senior scientific consultant.
Fall 1983-- The first carbonated beverages containing aspartame are sold for public consumption.
November 1984-- Center for Disease Control (CDC) "Evaluation of consumer complaints related to aspartame use." (summary by B. Mullarkey)
November 3, 1987-- U.S. hearing, "NutraSweet: Health and Safety Concerns," Committee on Labor and Human Resources, Senator Howard Metzenbaum, chairman.

6th debate: Lincoln distinguishes personal from legal opinion on slavery and equality of Blacks

That Lincoln is a crafty bastard. a loquacious, and analytical speaker. he must have been a fantastic lawyer. here he defines and contrasts his personal opinion with his legal interpretation of the declaration of independence. he is able to get cheers from the audience for saying black and whites are not and never will be equal, and then he's able to get cheers and applause for saying that blacks and whites are guaranteed the same rights as whites in the declaration of independence, and that no interpretation of any of our forefathers has interpreted the declaration otherwise.

it's a good point. for in the north, by 1776, only 1 state was free (Vermont). also, it also hearkens to legal problems that come up in the early and mid-20th century, where although blacks are given citizenship, the supreme court sets a precedence that establishes the government can not legislate or render legal opinions to force individuals, businesses, etc to integrate and treat one another equally. Also, the legislative history, is one that the states themselves are the ones to determine their own positions in terms of slavery and freedom, and to also organize and draft their own constitutions. States were wary of the federal government and the popular view was that for the most part, the federal government should remain weak, focus on international and interstate regulation and provide for the defense of the nation.

Lincoln's seemingly contradictory position, as contrasted between his legal and personal opinion is reminiscent of Jefferson's, as well as the entire nation. Both Jefferson and Lincoln have a fear of the implications of slavery, yet, due to legality, there is confusion and an inability to consolidate a moral position with legal rights, which are clearly in opposition. Jefferson himself vacillated in his original and final draft of the Declaration of Independence. Jefferson's initial draft, despite his being a slave owner and the U.S. having a legal trade in slavery, initially condemned England for it's partaking in the slave trade.

This debate, this unclarity, this inability to take a firm stand on slavery, freedom and human rights, continues to this day.


Excerpts from the 6th debate, 1858 Quincy, Illinois.

As this was done in the Judge's opening speech at Galesburg, I had an opportunity, as I had the middle speech then, of saying something in answer to it. He brought forward a quotation or two from a speech of mine, delivered at Chicago, and then to contrast with it, he brought forward an extract from a speech of mine at Charleston, in which he insisted that I was greatly inconsistent, and insisted that his conclusion followed that I was playing a double part, and speaking in one region one way, and in another region another way. I have not time now to dwell on this as long as I would like, and wish only now to requote that portion of my speech at Charleston, which the Judge quoted, and then make some comments upon it. This he quotes from me as being delivered at Charleston, and I believe correctly: "I will say, then, that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races-that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which will ever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together, there must be the position of superior and inferior. I am as much as any other man in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race." ["Good," "Good," and loud cheers.] This, I believe, is the entire quotation from the Charleston speech, as Judge Douglas made it. His comments are as follows:

"Yes, here you find men who hurra for Lincoln, and say he is right when he discards all distinction between races, or when he declares that he discards the doctrine that there is such a thing as a superior and inferior race; and Abolitionists are required and expected to vote for Mr. Lincoln because he goes for the equality of races, holding that in the Declaration of Independence the white man and negro were declared equal, and endowed by divine law with equality. And down south with the old line Whigs, with the Kentuckians, the Virginians, and the Tennesseeans, he tells you that there is a physical difference between the races, making the one superior, the other inferior, and he is in favor of maintaining the superiority of the white race over the negro."

Those are the Judge's comments. Now I wish to show you, that a month, or, only lacking three days of a month, before I made the speech at Charleston, which the Judge quotes from, he had himself heard me say substantially the same thing. It was in our first meeting, at Ottawa-and I will say a word about where it was, and the atmosphere it was in, after awhile-but at our first meeting, at Ottawa, I read an extract from an old speech of mine, made nearly four years ago, not merely to show my sentiments, but to show that my sentiments were long entertained and openly expressed; in which extract I expressly declared that my own feelings would not admit a social and political equality between the white and black races, and that even if my own feelings would admit of it, I still knew that the public sentiment of the country would not, and that such a thing was an utter impossibility, or substantially that. That extract from my old speech, the reporters, by some sort of accident, passed over, and it was not reported. I lay no blame upon any body. I suppose they thought that I would hand it over to them, and dropped reporting while I was reading it, but afterward went away without getting it from me. At the end of that quotation from my old speech, which I read at Ottawa, I made the comments which were reported at that time, and which I will now read, and ask you to notice how very nearly they are the same as Judge Douglas says were delivered by me, down in Egypt. After reading I added these words: "Now, gentlemen, I don't want to read at any great length, but this is the true complexion of all I have ever said in regard to the institution of slavery or the black race, and this is the whole of it; any thing that argues me into his idea of perfect social and political equality with the negro, is but a specious and fantastical arrangement of words by which a man can prove a horse-chestnut to be a chestnut horse. I will say here, while upon this subject, that I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution in the States where it exists. I believe I have no right to do so. I have no inclination to do so. I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and black races. There is a physical difference between the two, which, in my judgment, will probably forever forbid their living together on the footing of perfect equality, and inasmuch as it becomes a necessity that there must be a difference, I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position." [Cheers, "That's the doctrine."] "I have never said any thing to the contrary, but I hold that notwithstanding all this, there is no reason in the world why the negro is not entitled to all the rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence-the right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I hold that he is as much entitled to these as the white man. I agree with Judge Douglas that he is not my equal in many respects, certainly not in color-perhaps not in intellectual and moral endowments; but in the right to eat the bread without the leave of any body else which his own hand earns, he is my equal and the equal of Judge Douglas, and the equal of every other man." [Loud cheers.]

Abraham Lincoln equivocates on race in 5th Douglas Debates, 1858

Lincoln equivocates on the issue of race, clearly playing both sides. he had great potential in becoming/representing the republican view. slavery was clearly dividing the nation, and the power of the south to dictate policy based on the added political and economic power of slavery, was putting the north at a disadvantage. The issue of slave/free states was leading to a bloodletting in kansas, and free speech (the gag rule) was hijacked in the on the floor of the house. Did Lincoln believe Blacks were inferior? clearly. Did he believe they were deserving of citizenship? I believe the answer is yes. Was he a colonist? Yes, but so was Marcus Garvey and Malcolm X (for at least a portion of time) at a much later point in history. In any event, the portion I find disturbing, is that Lincoln voices the opinion that slavery would continue for at least another hundred years, which would bring us up to 1958 at least. There is no political end for him to say 100 years. He's made his point that it will end "naturally" which leaves room for immediate emancipation and abolition if it be the will of the people.

-D

Fourth Debate; Lincoln-Douglas: Charleston, Illinois

September 18, 1858

Eleven railroad cars of people from Indiana were among the approximately 12,000 in attendance.

Answering Douglas' charge made in Jonosboro that he favored racial equality Lincoln explained his views on race. Lincoln then charged that Douglas was plotting to create a constitution for Kansas without allowing it to be voted upon by the people of Kansas. Lincoln gave a detailed "history" of the 'Nebraska Bill' [Kansas-Nebraska Act] and explained a conspiracy existed to nationalize slavery.

Douglas denied any conspiracy with Roger Taney, Franklin Pierce, and James Buchanon and restated the charge that Lincoln favored equality of the races.

Source: Neely, Mark E. Jr. 1982. The Abraham Lincoln Encyclopedia. New York: Da Capo Press, Inc.

Full text of the debate follows.


Mr. Lincoln's Speech

Mr. Lincoln took the stand at a quarter before three, and was greeted with vociferous and protracted applause; after which, he said:

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: It will be very difficult for an audience so large as this to hear distinctly what a speaker says, and consequently it is important that as profound silence be preserved as possible.

While I was at the hotel to-day, an elderly gentleman called upon me to know whether I was really in favor of producing a perfect equality between the negroes and white people. [Great Laughter.] While I had not proposed to myself on this occasion to say much on that subject, yet as the question was asked me I thought I would occupy perhaps five minutes in saying something in regard to it. I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races, [applause]-that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race. I say upon this occasion I do not perceive that because the white man is to have the superior position the negro should be denied every thing. I do not understand that because I do not want a negro woman for a slave I must necessarily want her for a wife. [Cheers and laughter.] My understanding is that I can just let her alone. I am now in my fiftieth year, and I certainly never have had a black woman for either a slave or a wife. So it seems to me quite possible for us to get along without making either slaves or wives of negroes. I will add to this that I have never seen, to my knowledge, a man, woman or child who was in favor of producing a perfect equality, social and political, between negroes and white men. I recollect of but one distinguished instance that I ever heard of so frequently as to be entirely satisfied of its correctness-and that is the case of Judge Douglas's old friend Col. Richard M. Johnson. [Laughter.] I will also add to the remarks I have made (for I am not going to enter at large upon this subject,) that I have never had the least apprehension that I or my friends would marry negroes if there was no law to keep them from it, [laughter] but as Judge Douglas and his friends seem to be in great apprehension that they might, if there were no law to keep them from it, [roars of laughter] I give him the most solemn pledge that I will to the very last stand by the law of this State, which forbids the marrying of white people with negroes. [Continued laughter and applause.] I will add one further word, which is this: that I do not understand that there is any place where an alteration of the social and political relations of the negro and the white man can be made except in the State Legislature-not in the Congress of the United States-and as I do not really apprehend the approach of any such thing myself, and as Judge Douglas seems to be in constant horror that some such danger is rapidly approaching, I propose as the best means to prevent it that the Judge be kept at home and placed in the State Legislature to fight the measure. [Uproarious laughter and applause.] I do not propose dwelling longer at this time on this subject.

(Continues for another 33 paragraphs, his time -1 hour- expires)


Mr. Douglas' Speech

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: I had supposed that we assembled here to-day for the purpose of a joint discussion between Mr. Lincoln and myself, upon the political questions that now agitate the whole country. The rule of such discussions is, that the opening speaker shall touch upon all the points he intends to discuss, in order that his opponent, in reply, shall have the opportunity of answering them. Let me ask you what question of public policy, relating to the welfare of this State or the Union, has Mr. Lincoln discussed before you? (None, none, and great applause.) Gentlemen, allow me to suggest that silence is the best compliment you can pay me. I need my whole time, and your cheering only occupies it. Mr. Lincoln simply contented himself at the outset by saying, that he was not in favor of social and political equality between the white man and the negro, and did not desire the law so changed as to make the latter voters or eligible to office. I am glad that I have at last succeeded in getting an answer out of him upon this question of negro citizenship and eligibility to office, for I have been trying to bring him to the point on it ever since this canvass commenced.

(5 paragraphs omitted)

That is the polite language Senator Trumbull applied to me, his colleague, when I was two hundred miles off. Why did he not speak out as boldly in the Senate of the United States, and cram the lie down my throat when I denied the charge, first made by Bigler, and made him take it back? You all recollect how Bigler assaulted me when I was engaged in a hand-to-hand fight, resisting a scheme to force a Constitution on the people of Kansas against their will. He then attacked me with this charge; but I proved its utter falsity; nailed the slander to the counter, and made him take the back track. There is not an honest man in America who read that debate who will pretend that the charge is true. Trumbull was then present in the Senate, face to face with me, and why did he not then rise and repeat the charge, and say he would cram the lie down my throat? I tell you that Trumbull then knew it was a lie. He knew that Toombs denied that there ever was a clause in the bill he brought forward, calling for and requiring a submission of the Kansas Constitution to the people. I will tell you what the facts of the case were. I introduced a bill to authorize the people of Kansas to form a Constitution, and come into the Union as a State whenever they should have the requisite population for a member of Congress, and Mr. Toombs proposed a substitute, authorizing the people of Kansas, with their then population of only 25,000, to form a Constitution, and come in at once. The question at issue was, whether we would admit Kansas with a population of 25,000, or, make her wait until she had the ratio entitling her to a representative in Congress, which was 93,420. That was the point of dispute in the Committee of Territories, to which both my bill and Mr. Toomb's substitute had been referred. I was overruled by a majority of the committee, my proposition rejected, and Mr. Toomb's proposition to admit Kansas then, with her population of 25,000, adopted. Accordingly, a bill to carry out his idea of immediate admission was reported as a substitute for mine-the only points at issue being, as I have already said, the question of population, and the adoption of safeguards against frauds at the election. Trumbull knew this -the whole Senate knew it-and hence he was silent at that time. He waited until I became engaged in this canvass, and finding that I was showing up Lincoln's Abolitionism and negro equality doctrines, that I was driving Lincoln to the wall, and white men would not support his rank Abolitionism, he came back from the East and trumped up a system of charges against me, hoping that I would be compelled to occupy my entire time in defending myself, so that I would not be able to show up the enormity of the principles of the Abolitionists. Now the only reason, and the true reason, why Mr. Lincoln has occupied the whole of his first hour in this issue between Trumbull and myself, is, to conceal from this vast audience the real questions which divide the two great parties.

(15 paragraphs omitted)

I will show you another charge made by Mr. Lincoln against me, as an offset to his determination of willingness to take back any thing that is incorrect, and to correct any false statement he may have made. He has several times charged that the Supreme Court, President Pierce, President Buchanan, and myself, at the time I introduced the Nebraska bill in January, 1854, at Washington, entered into a conspiracy to establish slavery all over this country. I branded this charge as a falsehood, and then he repeated it, asked me to analyze its truth and answer it. I told him, "Mr. Lincoln, I know what you are after-you want to occupy my time in personal matters, to prevent me from showing up the revolutionary principles which the Abolition party-whose candidate you are-have proclaimed to the world." But he asked me to analyze his proof, and I did so. I called his attention to the fact that at the time the Nebraska bill was introduced, there was no such case as the Dred Scott case pending in the Supreme Court, nor was it brought there for years afterward, and hence that it was impossible there could have been any such conspiracy between the Judges of the Supreme Court and the other parties involved. I proved by the record that the charge was false, and what did he answer? Did he take it back like an honest man and say that he had been mistaken? No; he repeated the charge, and said, that although there was no such case pending that year, there was an understanding between the Democratic owners of Dred Scott and the Judges of the Supreme Court and other parties involved, that the case should be brought up. I then demanded to know who these Democratic owners of Dred Scott were. He could not or would not tell; he did not know. In truth, there were no Democratic owners of Dred Scott on the face of the land. Dred Scott was owned at that time by the Rev. Dr. Chaffee, an Abolition member of Congress from Springfield, Massachusetts, and his wife; and Mr. Lincoln ought to have known that Dred Scott was so owned, for the reason that as soon as the decision was announced by the court, Dr. Chaffee and his wife executed a deed emancipating him, and put that deed on record. It was a matter of public record, therefore, that at the time the case was taken to the Supreme Court, Dred Scott was owned by an Abolition member of Congress, a friend of Lincoln's, and a leading man of his party, while the defense was conducted by Abolition lawyers-and thus the Abolitionists managed both sides of the case. I have exposed these facts to Mr. Lincoln, and yet he will not withdraw his charge of conspiracy. I now submit to you whether you can place any confidence in a man who continues to make a charge when its utter falsity is proven by the public records. I will state another fact to show how utterly reckless and unscrupulous this charge against the Supreme Court, President Pierce, President Buchanan and myself is. Lincoln says that President Buchanan was in the conspiracy at Washington in the winter of 1854, when the Nebraska bill was introduced. The history of this country shows that James Buchanan was at that time representing this country at the Court of St. James, Great Britain, with distinguished ability and usefulness, that he had not been in the United States for nearly a year previous, and that he did not return until about three years after. Yet Mr. Lincoln keeps repeating this charge of conspiracy against Mr. Buchanan when the public records prove it to be untrue. Having proved it to be false as far as the Supreme Court and President Buchanan are concerned, I drop it, leaving the public to say whether I, by myself, without their concurrence, could have gone into a conspiracy with them. My friends, you see that the object clearly is to conduct the canvass on personal matters, and hunt me down with charges that are proven to be false by the public records of the country. I am willing to throw open my whole public and private life to the inspection of any man, or all men who desire to investigate it. Having resided among you twenty-five years, during nearly the whole of which time a public man, exposed to more assaults, perhaps more abuse than any man living of my age, or who ever did live, and having survived it all and still commanded your confidence, I am willing to trust to your knowledge of me and my public conduct without making any more defense against these assaults.

(4 paragraphs omitted)

And who led that crusade against National principles in this State? I answer, Abraham Lincoln on behalf of the Whigs, and Lyman Trumbull on behalf of the Democrats, formed a scheme by which they would abolitionize the two great parties in this State on condition that Lincoln should be sent to the United States Senate in place of General Shields, and that Trumbull should go to Congress from the Belleville District, until I would be accommodating enough either to die or resign for his benefit, and then he was to go to the Senate in my place. You all remember that during the year 1854, these two worthy gentlemen, Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Trumbull, one an old line Whig and the other an old line Democrat, were hunting in partnership to elect a Legislature against the Democratic party. I canvassed the State that year from the time I returned home until the election came off, and spoke in every county that I could reach during that period. In the northern part of the State I found Lincoln's ally, in the person of FRED DOUGLASS, THE NEGRO, preaching Abolition doctrines, while Lincoln was discussing the same principles down here, and Trumbull, a little farther down, was advocating the election of members to the Legislature who would act in concert with Lincoln's and Fred Douglass's friends. I witnessed an effort made at Chicago by Lincoln's then associates, and now supporters, to put Fred Douglass, the negro, on the stand at a Democratic meeting, to reply to the illustrious General Cass, when he was addressing the people there. They had the same negro hunting me down, and they now have a negro traversing the northern counties of the State, and speaking in behalf of Lincoln. Lincoln knows that when we were at Freeport in joint discussion, there was a distinguished colored friend of his there then who was on the stump for him, and who made a speech there the night before we spoke, and another the night after, a short distance from Freeport, in favor of Lincoln, and in order to show how much interest the colored brethren felt in the success of their brother Abe, I have with me here, and would read it if it would not occupy too much of my time, a speech made by Fred Douglass in Poughkeepsie, N. Y., a short time since, to a large Convention, in which he conjures all the friends of negro equality and negro citizenship to rally as one man around Abraham Lincoln, the perfect embodiment of their principles, and by all means to defeat Stephen A. Douglas. Thus you find that this Republican party in the northern part of the State had colored gentlemen for their advocates in 1854, in company with Lincoln and Trumbull, as they have now. When, in October, 1854, I went down to Springfield to attend the State Fair, I found the leaders of this party all assembled together under the title of an anti-Nebraska meeting. It was Black Republicans up north, and anti-Nebraska at Springfield. I found Lovejoy, a high priest of Abolitionism, and Lincoln, one of the leaders who was towing the old line Whigs into the Abolition camp, and Trumbull, Sidney Breese, and Governor Reynolds, all making speeches against the Democratic party and myself, at the same place and in the same cause. The same men who are now fighting the Democratic party and the regular Democratic nominees in this State, were fighting us then. They did not then acknowledge that they had become Abolitionists, and many of them deny it now. Breese, Dougherty and Reynolds were then fighting the Democracy under the title of anti-Nebraska men, and now they are fighting the Democracy under the pretense that they are simon pure Democrats, saying that they are authorized to have every office-holder in Illinois beheaded who prefers the election of Douglas to that of Lincoln, or the success of the Democratic ticket in preference to the Abolition ticket for members of Congress, State officers, members of the Legislature, or any office in the State. They canvassed the State against us in 1854, as they are doing now, owning different names and different principles in different localities, but having a common object in view, viz: The defeat of all men holding national principles in opposition to this sectional Abolition party. They carried the Legislature in 1854, and when it assembled in Springfield they proceeded to elect a United States Senator, all voting for Lincoln with one or two exceptions, which exceptions prevented them from quite electing him. And why should they not elect him? Had not Trumbull agreed that Lincoln should have Shields's place? Had not the Abolitionists agreed to it? Was it not the solemn compact, the condition on which Lincoln agreed to abolitionize the old Whigs that he should be Senator? Still, Trumbull having control of a few abolitionized Democrats, would not allow them all to vote for Lincoln on any one ballot, and thus kept him for some time within one or two votes of an election, until he worried out Lincoln's friends, and compelled them to drop him and elect Trumbull in violation of the bargain. I desire to read you a piece of testimony in confirmation of the notoriously public facts which I have stated to you. Col. James H. Matheny, of Springfield, is, and for twenty years has been, the confidential personal and political friend and manager of Mr. Lincoln. Matheny is this very day the candidate of the Republican or Abolition party for Congress against the gallant Major Thos. L. Harris, in the Springfield District, and is making speeches for Lincoln and against me. I will read you the testimony of Matheny about this bargain between Lincoln and Trumbull when they undertook to abolitionize Whigs and Democrats only four years ago. Matheny being mad at Trumbull for having played a Yankee trick on Lincoln, exposed the bargain in a public speech two years ago, and I will read the published report of that speech, the correctness of which Mr. Lincoln will not deny:

(7 paragraphs omitted)

I am told that I have but eight minutes more. I would like to talk to you an hour and a half longer, but I will make the best use I can of the remaining eight minutes. Mr. Lincoln said in his first remarks that he was not in favor of the social and political equality of the negro with the white man. Every where up north he has declared that he was not in favor of the social and political equality of the negro, but he would not say whether or not he was opposed to negroes voting and negro citizenship. I want to know whether he is for or against negro citizenship? He declared his utter opposition to the Dred Scott decision, and advanced as a reason that the court had decided that it was not possible for a negro to be a citizen under the Constitution of the United States. If he is opposed to the Dred Scott decision for that reason, he must be in favor of confering the right and privilege of citizenship upon the negro! I have been trying to get an answer from him on that point, but have never yet obtained one, and I will show you why. In every speech he made in the north he quoted the Declaration of Independence to prove that all men were created equal, and insisted that the phrase "all men," included the negro as well as the white man, and that the equality rested upon Divine law. Here is what he said on that point:

"I should like to know if, taking this old Declaration of Independence, which declares that all men are equal upon principle, and making exceptions to it, where will it stop? If one man says it does not mean a negro, why may not another say it does not mean some other man? If that declaration is not the truth, let us get the statute book in which we find it and bear it out."

Lincoln maintains there that the Declaration of Independence asserts that the negro is equal to the white man, and that under Divine law, and if he believes so it was rational for him to advocate negro citizenship, which, when allowed, puts the negro on an equality under the law. I say to you in all frankness, gentlemen, that in my opinion a negro is not a citizen, cannot be, and ought not to be, under the Constitution of the United States. I will not even qualify my opinion to meet the declaration of one of the Judges of the Supreme Court in the Dred Scott case, "that a negro descended from African parents, who was imported into this country as a slave is not a citizen, and cannot be." I say that this Government was established on the white basis. It was made by white men, for the benefit of white men and their posterity forever, and never should be administered by any except white men. I declare that a negro ought not to be a citizen, whether his parents were imported into this country as slaves or not, or whether or not he was born here. It does not depend upon the place a negro's parents were born, or whether they were slaves or not, but upon the fact that he is a negro, belonging to a race incapable of self-government, and for that reason ought not to be on an equality with white men. (Immense applause.)

My friends, I am sorry that I have not time to pursue this argument further, as I might have done but for the fact that Mr. Lincoln compelled me to occupy a portion of my time in repelling those gross slanders and falsehoods that Trumbull has invented against me and put in circulation. In conclusion, let me ask you why should this Government be divided by a geographical line-arraying all men North in one great hostile party against all men South? Mr. Lincoln tells you, in his speech at Springfield, "that a house divided against itself cannot stand; that this Government, divided into free and slave States, cannot endure permanently; that they must either be all free or all slave; all one thing or all the other." Why cannot this Government endure divided into free and slave States, as our fathers made it? When this Government was established by Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Jay, Hamilton, Franklin, and the other sages and patriots of that day, it was composed of free States and slave States, bound together by one common Constitution. We have existed and prospered from that day to this thus divided, and have increased with a rapidity never before equaled in wealth, the extension of territory, and all the elements of power and greatness, until we have become the first nation on the face of the globe. Why can we not thus continue to prosper? We can if we will live up to and execute the Government upon those principles upon which our fathers established it. During the whole period of our existence Divine Providence has smiled upon us, and showered upon our nation richer and more abundant blessings than have ever been conferred upon any other.

Senator Douglas' time here expired, and he stopped on the minute, amidst deafening applause.


Mr. Lincoln's Reply

As Mr. Lincoln stepped forward, the crowd sent up three rousing cheers.

MR. LINCOLN said:

Fellow citizens-It follows as a matter of course that a half-hour answer to a speech of an hour and a half can be but a very hurried one. I shall only be able to touch upon a few of the points suggested by Judge Douglas, and give them a brief attention, while I shall have to totally omit others for the want of time.

Judge Douglas has said to you that he has not been able to get from me an answer to the question whether I am in favor of negro citizenship. So far as I know, the Judge never asked me the question before. [Applause.] He shall have no occasion to ever ask it again, for I tell him very frankly that I am not in favor of negro citizenship. [Renewed applause.] This furnishes me an occasion for saying a few words upon the subject. I mentioned in a certain speech of mine which has been printed, that the Supreme Court had decided that a negro could not possibly be made a citizen, and without saying what was my ground of complaint in regard to that, or whether I had any ground of complaint, Judge Douglas has from that thing manufactured nearly every thing that he ever says about my disposition to produce an equality between the negroes and the white people. If any one will read my speech, he will find I mentioned that as one of the points decided in the course of the Supreme Court opinions, but I did not state what objection I had to it. But Judge Douglas tells the people what my objection was when I did not tell them myself. Now my opinion is that the different States have the power to make a negro a citizen under the Constitution of the United States if they choose. The Dred Scott decision decides that they have not that power. If the State of Illinois had that power I should be opposed to the exercise of it. [Cries of "good," "good," and applause.] That is all I have to say about it.

(1 paragraph omitted)

The other way is for us to surrender and let Judge Douglas and his friends have their way and plant slavery over all the States cease speaking of it as in any way a wrong-regard slavery as one of the common matters of property, and speak of negroes as we do of our horses and cattle. But while it drives on in its state of progress as it is now driving, and as it has driven for the last five years, I have ventured the opinion, and I say to-day, that we will have no end to the slavery agitation until it takes one turn or the other. [Applause.] I do not mean that when it takes a turn toward ultimate extinction it will be in a day, nor in a year, nor in two years. I do not suppose that in the most peaceful way ultimate extinction would occur in less than a hundred years at least; but that it will occur in the best way for both races, in God's own good time, I have no doubt. [Applause.] But, my friends, I have used up more of my time than I intended on this point.

(10 paragraphs omitted, end of debate)

Harriet Beecher Stowe: Premeditated Masterpiece, Luck, or....?

There has been much speculation as to the origins of "Uncle Tom's Cabin".
Academics have reconstructed her upbringing, her religious, moral, and philosophical influences. They have delved into her reading list, her correspondence, her intimate relationships. Her family have been exhaustively researched. Feminist have looked at her writings, and the themes within the novel from a feminist perspective. As she has been hailed as one of the greatest voices in the abolitionist movement, she never was a formal member of any of the hundreds of abolitionist societies. Some have asked about her absence from the front lines of the feminist movement.

The story first appeared in 1852 in the abolitionist newspaper National Era. Soon her account created great interest and lead to a large, faithful readership. in the days before radio, television and even in-home libraries, serialized accounts in newspapers, passed from person to person perhaps 30 or more times, were the nations primary cultural infusion.

By the time the novel came out it sold 300,000 copies the first year, and by 1865 had sold a million. today It's been translated into over 60 languages and remains the nations best selling book of all time save the bible. liberal thinkers and artistic writers hailed it as a masterpiece. traditional male writers derided her work for "sentimentality", it's romantic elements and for what they saw as the improper public airing of issues by a woman no less. Needless to say the South found endless faults with the novel.

African-Americans have both hailed the novel and taken great solace in it's message as a form of vindication and advocacy (the majority). Some African-Americans at the time took umbrage at her passages where the character George and Eliza repatriate themselves in Africa after sojourns in France and New England. The idea of colonization was controversial issue prior to emancipation. Some felt that Blacks had no place in America. Though they wanted an end to slavery, they did not see Blacks as equal. Other's saw colonization as a right. In their paternalistic view, it was best for freed slaves to be "free" in Africa, their homeland. (Frederick Douglass' only objection to the book was the section on colonization. He felt it was problematic and harmful to the notion that Blacks were U.S. citizens and should not be placed, as a political solution, in Africa.)

Today, most criticism of the novel is in reality a reflexive reaction to the time established stereotypes based upon the novel. The idea of an "Uncle Tom" perhaps the 2nd most caustic insult to an African-American following the n-word. There's Jim Crow, now associated with black codes and racist demogoguery. Many of the stage plays as well as art based on the world, is in the form of the romantic paternalistic myth as justification for the peculiar institution -indistinguishable- from racist advertisements for grits, watermelon, minstrel shows. Many stage adaptations of the play were authentic to it's nature, yet far more stripped the novel of it's abolitionist leanings and rhetoric and preserved, distorted and enhanced the stereotypes and stripped the intelligence and humanity from it's characters in a way that southern and racist northern audiences found benignly entertaining.

James Baldwin voiced perhaps the most famous criticism of the novel. Baldwin read the novel several times in his youth. Seemingly he was obsessed with it. Ultimately, after much consideration, he simply said it was a "very bad" novel. he accused it of not only being sentimental, but in it's depiction of George and Eliza, a slap at dark-skinned Blacks and playing into the harmful stereotype of light-skinned Black superiority. In the character of Uncle Tom, he saw a weak, feeble, god-fearing ignorant man. Unable to stand on his own. In fear of God, and subservient and servile to his master.

More pointedly, as a work of fiction, Baldwin holds Beecher Stowe fully accountable for the characters she created, seemingly with no credit or leeway given to her for the fact that virtually every situation she depicted, represented thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of Black lives in slavery. Baldwin's passion is heartfelt as it is heart-rending. Baldwin, well-aware of his "double-consciousness" as an African-American, yearns for a definition which seamlessly encompasses his Blackness, his Man-ness and his American-ness outside of the history of slavery and racism in America.

Baldwin's desire is admirable, and understandable, yet, in Beecher-Stowe's time, let alone Baldwin's, such a definition did not exist within popular culture, and certainly not within the psyche of those that publicly ached for more.

The scholarship and research that has gone into the novel and it's origins is perfectly understandable. Yet, as it is thorough and true. At times humans are wont to make more of something than is evident, supportable, or even comprehensible to the artists themselves.

In my reading of Beecher-Stowe, my research and reading, as well as understanding-intuition-, as well as experience and professional training, has brought me to a more simplified conclusion regarding her work.

Harriet Beecher Stowe grew up in one of America's greatest families, and in one of the most dynamic times and geographic areas at a crucial time in history. She was a witness to the birthplace of one of the most incredible and gripping movements in the United States and free world. Due to her father's, and then husbands active religious lifestyle. She live in and traveled to several different regions of the United States. Most notably Kentucky, Ohio, New York and Maine.

She had an incredible memory. At age 6 she had memorized 27 hymns and 2 chapters of the bible. In a sense it was not so much her memory, as natural ability to fully absorb that which she had been introduced. A skill that played into the creation of her novel. In terms of literature, philosophy and religious studies, she had a voracious appetite, and prescient existentialist perception. She was deeply religious and yearned to be closer to God. This desire played a role in her understanding of the fell nature of the peculiar institution.

In the Beecher house there was frequent debate, discussion and opinioning of the days events and major ideas and movements of the day. This passion for discussion and critical reasoning, is seen in the dialectical nature of her work. Characters frequently have discussion where moral, life experience and strategies and plans, as well as motivations are discussed and debated.

having lost her mother at age 6, and a dear friend (her future husband's wife), a black washer woman, and child as well as others, she understood the capricious nature of slave ownership. No slave was "safe" regardless of how petted they were by their master, for death or pecuniary crisis could suddenly lead to sale, perhaps "down south" and separation from all they knew, and often times their entire family. Other factors that played into Beecher Stowe's make-up was that she was prone to states of reverie, where she would appear blank to the world. not speak, and appear distant and absorbed. During these times there is evidence that she was integrating and synthesizing information that would later pour out of her in her writings, most notably, Uncle Tom's Cabin.

Beecher Stowe may have been manic-depressive. She once left for hydrotherapy for 18 months to treat an intransigent depression. She herself was prone to depression, and lead a hard life of hand to mouth existence and rapid increase in her family with serial childbirth (the average woman for her time had 5.1 children, not all of which survived childhood). As she worked, cooked, performed chores, often with her husband away on business, she also had to find time to engage in her passion of writing. snatching a few moments here and there to write -much in the same manner as former slave and author Harriet Jacobs, aka Linda Brent. Her depression, reverie, hard-scrabble life, appetite for knowledge and regional influences were all in addition to her flights of imaginative prowess -she insisted that she had not written Uncle Tom's Cabin, rather, as she had consecrated herself to God and confirmed her faith, he had used her to produce the novel.

Beecher Stowe's father was the President of Lane Seminary at the same time her husband was one of the advanced professors of old testament literature. In fact he was one of the world's leading scholars on the old testament.

the famous Lane debates on slavery, while Theodore Dwight Weld was a student, took place while she was in residence in Cincinnati. She remarked at the time that she felt after hearing about slavery that one must "do something" in response. her religious influences had taught her that all men, quite literally, were equal and sons and brothers before God. she also felt that one must work to find salvation after having been born into sin. She believed that faith without works, was hollow and meaningless. She also believed in the equality of women and men, and spoke proudly of how her and her husband would discourse on numerous subjects and reach important decisions on their family together.

No doubt the heavy Quaker influence in the abolitionist movement, no doubt informed her perspective on the equality of men and women, which placed her in direct conflict with the antebellum idea of a woman's dependence, pedestal like position, while also being forced to turn a blind eye to the philandering of her husband, and the multitude of mulatto children running about the plantation.

Her own sister married a wealthy planter, and upon her marriage she returned to his plantation, to find several mulatto children, whom he admitted that he was the father. He was simply increasing his stock. Stowe's sister soon returned to the family and left the husband. This event no doubt made a strong impression on Stowe. For a the same time southern ladies were put on a pedestal, and were thought should not engage in any menial work, their homes were torn apart from the inside by promiscuity, adultery, rape, unacknowledged step-children and violence in the form of whippings, floggings, beatings and verbal *assaults.

Stowe had lost one of her own children to cholera. it was a slow, agonizing, painful death and she felt helpless to soothe or help her child. This experience she admitted, allowed her the empathy and compassion to imagine the pain of a slaver mother violently separated from her child. A much loved black washer-woman died suddenly of cholera. This also, like all other mortal events, deeply affected Stowe.

Other events, such a the Kansas-Nebraska act, the Missouri Compromise, the Dred Scott decision and finally, the Fugitive Slave act, had slowly, methodically and forcefully placed Stowe, irrevocably to take up her pen, and spill forth a tale, which was the culmination and perfection of the moral and ethical arguments, the personal narratives, her readings, religious upbringing, and literary artistic powers to meld and spin all of the above elements seamlessly through her humanity, her sentiment, and her goal to bring home, the full emotional and humane impact of the slave system upon the cultural institution of America.

The vital elements as well as the stars were in proper alignment. All that was needed, was a Harriet Beecher Stowe to bring it all together.

The work, was wholly intentional. Calculated, and yet, so beautifully intertwined, as to place doubt in the minds of many as to what exact role the author, and luck had to do with it -that is- if one believed the novel to be any good to begin with.

*[one book Stowe read thoroughly and used for background was American Slavery as it is: Testimony of a Thousand Witnesses by Theodore Dwight Weld, a former student of her husband. In it is recounted a scene where a slave woman is thought to have spooned out too much molasses to a slave owners son. She is beaten by the slave owner, first with his fists, forearms and elbows. When he tires of this and the slave reflexively raises her arms in defense, the slave owner is further enraged and has her arms held behind her by another slave and he proceeds to beat her with his shoe, until her face is unrecognizable and her ears are swollen to the size of a man's palm. All of this occurred in front of his young son and wife as well as a visitor from the north. To add to the indignity, when this slave woman was finally excused, she had to utter, "Thank You Massa"]

The Battle for Free Speech in Antebellum America

Free speech was under attack during the abolitionist movement. The south had effectively and legally blocked debate and free speech on the matter of slavery. It was illegal in all slave holding states to distribute literature of any sort which advocated any lessening of the system of slavery. Southern legislatures, not thinking that having their own laws on the books were enough, appealed to northern states to make it illegal to use the post office to distribute any such materials or to even publish them for distribution in the south.

Resolved, that the State of Virginia has a right to claim prompt and efficient legislation by her co-states to restrain... and to punish those of their citizens... who... assail her safety and tranquility, by forming associations for the abolition of slavery, or printing, publishing or circulating through the mail or otherwise, seditious and incendiary publications design, calculated or having a tendency to operate on her population.

Wendell Phillips speaking on behalf of abolitionist discoursed on the philosophy of the movement:

What is the denunciation with which we are charged? It is endeavoring, in our faltering human speech, to declare the enormity of the sin of making merchandise of men, of separating husband and wife, taking the infant from its mother, and selling the daughter to prostitution of a professedly Christian nation... the south is one great brothel, where half a million of women are flogged to prostitution, or, worse still, are degraded to believe it honorable.

Free blacks were a vital part of the abolitionist movement. And in time, as they became more vocal, there would be some divisions between black and white. first in philosophy, and then in a great divide where women's rights and feminism, began to become a greater issue of importance. This was seen by some as a distraction. Another fracture was based on the anti-political stance of Garrison. Wendell Phillips and others began to break off, throwing support to Lincoln for President, while Garrison eschewed politics. The result of this was in effect the forming two separate abolitionist movements, neither of which was as strong as the former.

Many free blacks resented the racism and paternalism of the whites an preferred to focus their efforts by holding all-black negro conventions. Frederick Douglass speaks of Garrison in effect wanting to gag his speeches for he seemed "too intelligent" and "unbelievable" they wanted him to stick to merely telling his story, which the White abolitionist would be the ones to editorialize and extemporize upon the moral and ethical issues of his tale.

Meanwhile, in Congress, the issue of slavery was barred from debate in the House of Representatives, thus effectively barring it's discussion in the upper house, due to the "gag rule" passed by southerners and Democrats, which was in effect from 1840-44. The gag rule stipulated as follows:

That upon presentation of any memorial or petition praying for the abolition of slavery or the slave trade in any District, Territory, or state of the Union an upon the representation of any resolution, or tother paper touching that subject, the reception of such memorial, petition, resolution or paper, shall be considered as objected to, and the question of it's reception shall be laid on the table, without debate, or further action thereon.
that no petition, memorial, resoution or other paper praying for the abolition of slaver in the district of Columbia, or any state or territory or the slave trade between the states or territories of the unied states in which it now exist, shall be receive y this house or entertained in any way whatever.

John Quincy Adams, former President and defender of the Amistad captives, was the main opposition to the gag rule. he succeeded in overturning it, after being denied the ability to bring a bill to the floor to proposed that beginning on July 4, 1842, every child born on American soil would be free, and that no slave trading could occur in the District of Columbia after July 4, 1845. William Slade of of Vermont and Joshua Giddings of Ohio were also Adams' supporters.

The Republican party itself was formed as an opposition to slavery, directly and indirectly.

from Wikipedia:

The Republican Party was first organized in 1854, growing out of the "anti-Nebraska" coalition of old Whigs, free soil Democrats etc. who mobilized in opposition to Stephen Douglas's January 1854 introduction of the Kansas-Nebraska Act into Congress, a bill which repealed the 1820 Missouri compromise prohibition on slavery north of latitude 36° 30' in the old Louisiana purchase territories, and so was viewed as an aggressive expansionist pro-slavery maneuver by many. Besides opposition to slavery, the new party put forward a progressive vision of modernizing the United States—emphasizing higher education, banking, railroads, industry and cities, while promising free homesteads to farmers. They vigorously argued that free-market labor was superior to slavery and the very foundation of civic virtue and true American values—this is the "Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men" ideology

Charles Sumner was also key in the struggle. A Massachusetts Republican Senator challenged segregated schools in Boston. he hated racial discrimination and slavery, and fought to have slave owners compensated from the national treasury. After the 13th amendment, he went on to fight for full racial equality.