Most of the accounts mentioned were written by those who took part in the agitation against slavery, in condemnation of those who had not kept step with their abolition pace or in apology for those whose words and conduct were thought to need defence. The time has come, perhaps, when it is possible to consider, the attitude of individuals and the denomination without a partisan wish to condemn or to defend. In this spirit the statement of Samuel J. May is to be accepted as true and just, when he says: "We Unitarians have given to the anti-slavery cause more preachers, writers, lecturers, agents, poets, than any other denomination in proportion to our numbers, if not without any comparison."[[33]]
Among those who listened to William Lloyd Garrison when in October, 1830, he first presented in Boston his views in favor of immediate emancipation, were Samuel J. May, Samuel E. Sewall, and A.B. Alcott; and these men at once became his disciples and friends.[[34]] When Garrison organized the New England Anti-slavery Society in December, 1832, he was actively supported by Samuel E. Sewall, David Lee Child, and Ellis Gray Loring. It was to the financial support of Sewall and Loring, though they did not at first accept his doctrine of immediate emancipation, that Garrison owed his ability to begin The Liberator, and to sustain it in its earliest years.[[35]] For many years, Edmund Quincy was connected with The Liberator, serving as its editor when Garrison was ill, absent on lecturing tours, or journeying in Europe. The Massachusetts Anti-slavery Society, which in 1835 succeeded the New England Society, had during many years Francis Jackson as its president, Edmund Quincy as its corresponding secretary, and Robert F. Walcutt as its recording secretary, all Unitarians.
In 1834 was formed the Cambridge Anti-slavery Society, under the leadership of the younger Henry Ware; and the membership was largely Unitarian, including the names of Dr. Henry Ware, Sidney Willard, Charles Follen, William H. Charming, Artemus B. Muzzey, Barzillai Frost, Charles T. Brooks, and Frederic H. Hedge. The purposes of the society were stated in its constitution:--
We believe that the emancipation of all who are in bondage is the requisition, not less of sound policy, than of justice and humanity; and that it is the duty of those with whom the power lies at once to remove the sanction of the law from the principle that man can be the property of man,--a principle inconsistent with our free institutions, subversive of the purposes for which man was made, and utterly at variance with the plainest dictates of reason and Christianity.
In 1843 Samuel May visited England, and at Unitarian meetings described the obstacles in the way of the abolition of slavery, and spoke of the apathy of American Unitarians. He advised the sending a letter of fraternal counsel to the Unitarian ministers of the United States "in behalf of the unhappy slave." Such a letter was prepared, and signed by eighty-five ministers. It was published in the Unitarian papers in this country, a meeting was held to consider it, and a reply sent to England signed by one hundred and thirty ministers. Mr. May was severely condemned for his part in causing such a letter to be sent, and the reply was rather in the nature of a protest than a friendly acceptance of the advice given.
A year later, however, this letter was again the subject of earnest discussion. In anniversary week, 1845, a meeting of Unitarian ministers was held to "discuss their duties in relation to American slavery." The call for this meeting was signed by James Thompson, Joseph Allen, Caleb Stetson, Samuel Ripley, Converse Francis, William Ware, Samuel J. May, Artemus B. Muzzey, Oliver Stearns, James W. Thompson, Alonzo Hill, Andrew P. Peabody, Henry A. Miles, Frederic H. Hedge, James F. Clarke, George W. Briggs, Samuel May, Barzillai Frost, Nathaniel Hall, David Fosdick, and John Weiss. At the third session, by a vote of forty-seven to seven, it was declared "that we consider slavery to be utterly opposed to the principles and spirit of Christianity, and that, as ministers of the gospel, we feel it our duty to protest against it, in the name of Christ, and to do all we may to create a public opinion to secure the overthrow of the institution." It was also decided to appoint a committee to draw up, secure signatures to, and publish "a protest against the institution of American slavery, as unchristian and inhuman." Though some of those who spoke at these meetings condemned the abolitionists, yet all of them expressed in the strongest terms their opposition to slavery.
The committee selected to prepare this protest consisted of Caleb Stetson, James F. Clarke, John Parkman, Stephen G. Bulfinch, A.P. Peabody, John Pierpont, Samuel J. May, Oliver Stearns, George W. Briggs, William P. Tilden, and William H. Channing. The protest was written by James Freeman Clarke and was accepted essentially as it came from his hands. It was signed by one hundred and seventy-three ministers,[[36]] the whole number of Unitarian ministers at that time being two hundred and sixty-seven. Some of the most prominent ministers were conspicuous by the absence of their names from this protest. It must be understood, however, that those who did not sign it were as much opposed to slavery as those who did. "This protest," said the editor of The Christian Register, in presenting it to the public,[[37]] "is written with great clearness of expression and moderation of spirit. It exhibits unequivocally and distinctly the sentiments of the numerous and most enlightened body of clergy whose names are attached to it, as well as many other ministers of the denomination who may be disinclined to act conjointly, or do not feel called upon to act at all in any prescribed way, on the subject." It was not a desire to defend slavery that kept these ministers from signing the protest, but their excessive individualism, and their unwillingness to commit the denomination to opinions all might not accept. A few paragraphs from the protest will indicate its spirit and purpose:--
"Especially do we feel that the denomination which takes for its motto Liberty, Holiness and Love should be foremost in opposing this system. More than others we have contended for three great principles,--individual liberty, perfect righteousness, and human brotherhood. All of these are grossly violated by the system of slavery. We contend for mental freedom; shall we not denounce the system which fetters both mind and body? We have declared righteousness to be the essence of Christianity; shall we not oppose the system which is the sum of all wrong? We claim for all men the right of brotherhood before a universal Father; ought we not to testify against that which tramples so many of our brethren under foot?"
"We, therefore, ministers of the gospel of truth and love, in the name of God the universal Father, in the name of Christ the Redeemer, in the name of humanity and human brotherhood, do solemnly protest against the system of slavery as unchristian, and inhuman," "because it is a violation of right, being the sum of all unrighteousness which man can do to man," "violates the law of love," "degrades man, the image of God, into a thing," "necessarily tends to pollute the soul of the slave," "to defile the soul of the master," "restricts education, keeps the Bible from the slave, makes life insecure, deprives female innocence of protection, sanctions adultery, tears children from parents and husbands from wives, violates the divine institutions of families, and by hard and hopeless toil makes existence a burden," "eats out the heart of nations and tends every year more and more to sear the popular conscience and impair the virtue of the people."