IV. Petitions to the Legislature for Abolition.
From 1815 to 1834, the legislature was constantly petitioned by the abolitionists of the state. These petitions prayed for easier conditions of emancipation, better treatment of slaves, prevention of separation of husband and wife, prohibition of the entrance of slaves into the state, and some plan of disestablishment of slavery. The Scriptures, the Constitution of the United States, the Bill of Rights, Declaration of Independence, and the laws of nature were usually made the basis of these petitions.
In 1817, one of the most suggestive of these petitions was presented. This petition proposed that the courts be empowered in granting petitions for freedom to require the master to “give to those he is discharging a lease on lands for years, free of rent, charge and taxes, with provisions adequate for the first year, with a limited portion of stock and articles of husbandry.”[44] “For years,” it states, “we have seen monied aristocracies rising in our land; and wealth attaching reverence, and creating distinction; in proportion as these evils shall increase, will men’s consciences be seared and their minds turned against the rights and liberties of those, who constitute an essential part of their wealth.” It also called attention to the need for additional protection for free negroes, and suggested that it be made a felony to steal and sell a free negro into slavery. It also pointed out that the young free negroes with neither father nor mother alive or free should be attached to suitable persons, preferably their emancipators, to be “reared to habits of industry, and prepared for the duties of life.”[45] This petition was signed by eighty-eight citizens, among whom was Jno. H. Eaton, later Andrew Jackson’s Secretary of War.
In 1815, there was a petition presented to the legislature, signed by four hundred and four citizens, of whom twenty-two were slaveholders, asking that a general plan for disestablishing slavery be enacted. There were thirty-six petitions, signed by 2153 persons, presented to the legislature in 1817,[46] and twenty-one petitions signed by 2253 persons in 1819.[47] The Manumission Society of Tennessee presented a petition to the legislature in 1819, asking that the children of slaves be emancipated at a certain age, that slaves capable of supporting themselves be manumitted without the assumption of heavy obligations by their masters, and that the “inhuman and barbarous practice of trading in slaves be prohibited.”
These petitions became more numerous in the later twenties. In 1825, there were 497 petitions presented to the legislature; in 1827, there were 2818, and 1328 in 1829. These petitions were signed by hundreds. In addition to these circulated petitions, there were many individual requests for the permission to emancipate entire families without security, or with permission for the negroes to remain in the state.