History of American Abolitionism / Its four great epochs, embracing narratives of the ordinance of 1787, compromise of 1820, annexation of Texas, Mexican war, Wilmot proviso, negro insurrections, abolition riots, slave rescues, compromise of 1850, Kansas bill of 1854, John Brown insurrection, 1859, valuable statistics, &c., &c., &c., together with a history of the Southern Confederacy.

by F. G. De Fontaine

THIRD EPOCH.

CHAPTER VI.

The Era of “Gags” and Congressional Petitions—John Quincy Adams; his Petition for Disunion—Legislation from 1835 to 1845—Annexation of Texas—The Liberty Party of 1840, Free Soil Party of 1848, and Republican Party of 1856—Mexican War and Wilmot Proviso.

The decade embraced between the years 1835 and 1845 may be termed the third epoch in the history of this movement. In that period, the grand experiment of the abolitionists was most effectually tried. They had felt the public pulse, developed their power and resources, had the benefit of experience, and ascertained to what extent the public mind could be prejudiced by the course of agitation which they had pursued. It was in fact an era of lessons, as well to the country as to themselves. From a mere handful, the original organization had grown to be a power within itself—a power at the ballot-box—a power for right or wrong, for good or mischief, too self-reliant and too strong to be disregarded. Neither legislative enactments, nor riots, nor personal chastisement, nor public opinion, had been able to restrain its rapid advances towards the consummation of its hopes. It lost ground nowhere, and in every non-slaveholding State its friends and funds were greatly multiplied. As an indication of its extraordinary growth, the number of anti-slavery societies in the United States, in the year 1838, may be safely estimated at two thousand, with at least two hundred thousand persons enrolled as members.

These, however, were not all entitled to the suffrages of the party. They were the children and wives of fanatics who learned their lessons of abolition in the Bible classes, Sunday and secular schools, and from their parents and husbands. The sentiment was intruded, indeed, in all the relations of life—social, financial and domestic, and even in the affairs of love, Cupid himself was made subservient to its ascendancy. The belles of the day would hardly look upon a suitor who was not as well a worshipper at the shrine of their political passion, as of their beauty, and no youngster’s domestic destiny was at all certain of fruition who was not sound upon what was then regarded as the soul-saving question of abolitionism. The youths of 1840 have become the men of 1860, and in the enormous increase of the republican party, we see the result of the early influences thus set at work.

For the first time in its history, the organization began to be regarded as a political element in the land, and worthy of a courtship by those who desired its influence and support. Candidates for office began to be catechised, and such men as William H. Seward, Levi Lincoln, William L. Marcy and others, found time to give lengthy replies to the authors of this new inquisition, setting forth their views. In local politics, it was the moral and political test by which men were measured, and it lay at the foundation of all the subsequent State action of the Northern Legislatures upon the subject of anti-slavery.

In both branches of Congress, also, the question of abolition for the first time occupied a large share of the deliberations, and was discussed under every possible aspect. From 1831, when John Quincy Adams presented fifteen petitions in a single bunch, for the abolition of slavery in the District of Columbia, similar documents, got up and circulated by anti-slavery societies, poured into both branches of the National Legislature in a steady stream. They also called for a prohibition of what was termed an “internal slave trade” between the States, avowing at the same time that their ultimate object was to abolish slavery, not only in the District, but throughout the Union. It was, indeed, the only mode in which the fanatics could agitate the question in Congress, and was a part of the scheme by which they expected to accomplish their purposes. Under the influence of the feelings excited by these causes, the Southern Senators and members declared, almost to a man, that if the Southern States could not remain in the Union without having their domestic peace continually disturbed by the systematic attempts of the abolitionists to produce dissatisfaction and revolt among the slaves and incite their wild passions to vengeance, the great law of self-preservation would compel them to separate from the North. This persistent demand of the abolitionists, through petitions, continued from session to session, until, becoming a nuisance, an effort was made to prevent their farther reception. The effort was, for a time, successful, and resulted in what was called the “era of gags”—these gags being simply a rule of the House, “That all petitions, memorials, resolutions and propositions relating in any way or to any extent to the question of slavery shall, without either being printed or referred, be laid on the table, and no further action whatever shall be had thereon.”

This was respectively passed in 1836, 1837 and 1838, and in 1840 it was incorporated into the standing rules of the House—being thenceforward known as the “Twenty-first Rule.” The vote upon this was—yeas, 128; nays, 78.

The excitement produced in the House on the occasion of these several votes was intense, and speeches were made upon the question by the most distinguished men of the country.

In 1837, the immediate occasion of the contest was the pertinacious effort of Mr. Slade, of Vermont, to make the presentation of abolition petitions the ground of agitation and action against the institution of slavery in the Southern States. Mr. Rhett, of South Carolina, warned him of the consequences of such inflammatory harangues, and his refusal to desist from them was the signal for a general disorder and uproar. The next morning a resolution similar to that above quoted was adopted by a vote of 135 yeas to 60 nays—the full two-thirds and fifteen. “This,” says Thomas H. Benton, “was one of the most important votes ever delivered in the House.” Upon its issue depended the quiet of the House on one hand, and on the other the renewal and perpetuation of the scenes of the day before—ending in breaking up all deliberation and all national legislation.