December 2, 1859 – William Lloyd Garrison Delivers a Tribute to John Brown, Advocating End of Slavery

William Lloyd Garrison (1805 – 1879), was a prominent American abolitionist and journalist. His anti-slavery newsletter, The Liberator, in print from 1831 to the abolishment of slavery in 1865, was widely read throughout the United States.

William Lloyd Garrison, circa 1870

As the Library of Congress points out:

The radical tone of the paper was unprecedented because it labeled slave-holding a crime and called for immediate abolition. When the Nat Turner rebellion of August 1831 escalated Southern fears of slave uprisings, some Southern states passed laws making circulation of The Liberator a crime and called for prosecution of Garrison. Although he had detractors, Garrison quickly became a noted leader of the anti-slavery movement and helped launch the American Anti-Slavery Society in Philadelphia in 1833. Until he ceased publication in 1865, Garrison employed the Liberator to advance militant anti-slavery views. He especially opposed African colonization, as is shown in the article entitled ‘Emigration’ in column one of this issue.”

Like other major abolitionists, Garrison had a price was on his head; he was burned in effigy and a gallows was erected in front of his Boston office. At one point he had to be smuggled onto a ship to escape to England, where he remained for a year.

Garrison, a devout Christian, believed the moral problem of slavery could only be solved through a non-violent approach. But when the abolitionist John Brown seized the largest Federal arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, in October of 1859, Garrison saw the value of Brown’s martyrdom. As Elisa De Togni writes in “Martyrdom through Militancy and the Onset of Civil War”:

The raid on Harpers Ferry and the resulting execution of Brown was a major turning point in the American abolitionist movement, causing many peaceful abolitionists to accept more militant measures to push for the end of slavery.”

John Brown in 1859

Brown was tried by the Commonwealth of Virginia, sentenced to death, and hanged on this day in history, December 2, 1859. On that day in Boston, Garrison delivered a tribute to Brown which he later published in The Liberator. He used the occasion to advocate that the North secede from the South to end slavery, proclaiming:

By the dissolution of the Union we shall give the finishing blow to the slave system; and then God will make it possible for us to form a true, vital, enduring, all-embracing Union, from the Atlantic to the Pacific–one God to be worshipped, one Saviour to be revered, one policy to be carried out–freedom everywhere to all the people, without regard to complexion or race–and the blessing of God resting upon us all! I want to see that glorious day!”

You can read the entire text of Garrison’s speech here.