The Color Of Abolition
How a Printer, a Prophet, and a Contessa Moved a Nation
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- $10.99
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
The story of the fascinating, fraught alliance among Frederick Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison, and Maria Weston Chapman—and how its breakup led to the success of America’s most important social movement.
“Fresh, provocative and engrossing.” —New York Times
In the crucial early years of the Abolition movement, the Boston branch of the cause seized upon the star power of the eloquent ex-slave Frederick Douglass to make its case for slaves’ freedom. Journalist William Lloyd Garrison promoted emancipation while Garrison loyalist Maria Weston Chapman, known as “the Contessa,” raised money and managed Douglass’s speaking tour from her Boston townhouse.
Conventional histories have seen Douglass’s departure for the New York wing of the Abolition party as a result of a rift between Douglass and Garrison. But, as acclaimed historian Linda Hirshman reveals, this completely misses the woman in power. Weston Chapman wrote cutting letters to Douglass, doubting his loyalty; the Bostonian abolitionists were shot through with racist prejudice, even aiming the N-word at Douglass among themselves. Through incisive, original analysis, Hirshman convinces that the inevitable breakup was in fact a successful failure. Eventually, as the most sought-after Black activist in America, Douglass was able to dangle the prize of his endorsement over the Republican Party’s candidate for president, Abraham Lincoln. Two years later the abolition of slavery—if not the abolition of racism—became immutable law.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Historian and former labor lawyer Hirshman (Reckoning) focuses this informative look at the 19th-century antislavery movement on the relationship between Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison. Publisher of the abolitionist newspaper the Liberator and founder of the New England Anti-Slavery Society, Garrison and his followers called for immediate freedom for enslaved people and refused to work with any political or religious institution that didn't reject slavery. Douglass was one of the most sought-after speakers and writers associated with Garrison's network of antislavery societies until 1853, when he broke with the group to join the more politically focused American Anti-Slavery Society. Hirshman traces the roots of the fallout to Maria Weston Chapman, a wealthy activist who organized fund-raising bazaars and petition campaigns for Garrison and ran the Liberator in his absences. According to Hirshman, it was Weston Chapman's "casual racism" and attempts to micromanage Douglass, coupled with his doubts about the effectiveness of Garrison's policy of "nonpolitical nonresistance," that led to the break, a realignment of the antislavery movement that Hirshman contends was crucial to electing Abraham Lincoln in 1860. By lucidly untangling the abolitionist movement's complex web of alliances, Hirshman sheds light on the antebellum period and the dynamics of social movements in general. American history buffs will be engrossed. Illus.
Customer Reviews
Nice Attempt but Ultimately a Failure
The concept of this book is quite interesting and I had hoped for a nicely integrated triple biography, but while the narrative frames itself around Douglass, the underlying biography of Chapman is entirely neglected and Garrison is rather harshly framed. Much more time is spent on other events and in an often erratic fashion than on the main characters. I would not recommend this for someone hoping to illuminate how Maria Weston Chapman changed abolitionism or someone interested in the Garrison-Douglass relationship.