preview

"William Lloyd Garrison: the Agitator" Essay

Good Essays

Slavery has always been a controversial and debatable issue in the United States. No one attacked the African-American slavery of the southern states with greater vehemence than a group of young, radical abolitionists. Frustrated at the betrayal of the revolutionary promise that all forms of bondage would disappear in the new land and marshalling all the religious revivals that swept the country, abolitionists demanded no less than the immediate emancipation of all slaves. Bursting upon the American political system in the early 1830s, abolitionists not only opposed any reparation of slaveholders, but they also demanded full political rights for all African-Americans, North and South. The most prominent and spiteful of those …show more content…

It was at this time, that Garrison really got involved in the immediate abolition of slavery. When Garrison was only twenty-four years old, he made one of the most important speeches of his career, speaking in an "Address to the American Colonization Society." In it, he tentatively embraced the principles of colonization, yet at the same time rejected the Gradualists notion of emancipation. Being only twenty-four years old when he delivered the speech was a remarkable achievement for someone so young and was even more of an achievement for someone with little formal education. Garrison, largely self-education, read much regarding American political history and familiarized himself with the American Revolution and the founding documents. While in Baltimore, Garrison made his first notable mark on anti-slavery activism when he went to jail rather than pay a fine for criminal libel. A New England slave trader pressed charges on Garrison after he denounced him. Released after serving seven weeks in jail, Garrison returned to Boston and established the Liberator, an anti-slavery newspaper. On January 1, 1831, he published his first issue of the new weekly newspaper. Within the contents of his newspaper, Garrison left his readers with no doubt about his refusal to compromise with the sin of slavery and became the apostle of a new theory - Immediate Abolition. Garrison's outspoken stand in favor of immediate freedom of slaves made him and his

Get Access