Part 3 (2/2)

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_, p 32]

The struggle of the Northern Quakers to enlighten the colored people had i moral force operated in the minds of most of this sect to impel them to follow the example of certain leaders who emancipated their slaves[1] Efforts in this direction were redoubled about the hteenth century when Anthony Benezet,[2] addressing himself with unwonted zeal to the uplift of these unfortunates, obtained the assistance of Clarkson and others, who solidified the antislavery sentiive their time and means to the more effective education of the blacks After this period the Quakers were also concerned with the improvement of the colored people's condition in other settleood account of these efforts in his _Suppression of the African Slave Trade_]

[Footnote 2: Benezet was a French Protestant Persecuted on account of their religion, his parents land and later to Philadelphia He became a teacher in that city in 1742 Thirteen years later he was teaching a school established for the education of the daughters of thehis own spelling-book, prirammar, some of the first text-books published in America Known to persecution himself, Benezet always syly, he connected himself with the Quakers, who at that tiious equality and the a interested in the welfare of the colored race, Benezet first attacked the slave trade, so exposing it in his speeches and writings that Clarkson entered the field as an earnest advocate of the suppression of the iniquitous traffic See Benezet, _Observations_, p 30, and the _African Repository_, vol iv, p 61]

[Footnote 3: Quaker Pahten this period, was not of much importance As the Presbyterians, Methodists, and Baptists did not proselyte extensively in this country prior to the hteenth century, these denoro education before the liberalis the revolutionary era, made it possible for these sects to reach the people The Methodists, however, confined at first largely to the South, where most of the slaves were found, had to take up this proble like an atteroes cae Whitefield,[1] who, strange to say, was regarded by the Negro race as its ene favored the introduction of slavery He was primarily interested in the conversion of the colored people Without denying that ”liberty is sweet to those who are born free,” he advocated the i therace which would make them partake of a liberty far more precious than the freedom of body”[2] While on a visit to this country in 1740 he purchased a large tract of land at Nazareth, Pennsylvania, for the purpose of founding a school for the education of Negroes[3] Deciding later to go south, he sold the site to the Moravian brethren who had undertaken to establish a roes at Bethlehem in 1738[4] Some writers have accepted the statement that Whitefield commenced the erection of a schoolhouse at Nazareth; others [5] Be that as it may, accessible facts are sufficient to show that, unwise as was his policy of i slaves, his intention was to improve their condition It was because of this sentiia in 1747, when slavery was finally introduced there, that the people through their representatives in convention reco slaves, and do whatever they could to ed This favorable attitude of early Methodists toward Negroes caused them to consider the new churchmen their friends and made it easy for this sect to proselyte the race

[Footnote 1: _Special Report of the US Com of Ed_, 1871, p 374]

[Footnote 2: _Ibid_, p 374]

[Footnote 3: Turner, _The Negro in Pennsylvania_, p 128]

[Footnote 4: Equally interested in the Negroes were the Moravians who settled in the uplands of Pennsylvania and roaion as far south as Carolina A painting of a group of their converts prior to 1747 shows aroes, Johannes of South Carolina and Jupiter of New York See Hamilton, _History of the Church known as the Moravian_, p 80; Pluroes_, p 3; Reichel, _The Moravians in North Carolina_, p 139]

[Footnote 5: _Special Report of the US Com of Ed_, 1869, p 374]

CHAPTER III

EDUCATION AS A RIGHT OF MAN

In addition to the ion there was a need of another factor to h This required force was supplied by the response of the colonists to the nascent social doctrine of the eighteenth century During the French and Indian War there were set to work certain forces which hastened the social and political upheaval called the Ahly favored sects condescended to grant the rising denominations toleration, the aristocratic elened to look e nuro should be educated and freed To acquaint themselves with the claims of the underman Americans thereafter prosecuted more seriously the study of coke, Milton, Locke, and Blackstone The last of these was then read more extensively in the colonies than in Great Britain Getting froe ideas of individual liberty and the social coovernoverned, the colonists contended ious freedom, industrial liberty, and political equality

Given impetus by the diffusion of these ideas, the revolutionary movement became productive of the spirit of universal benevolence

Hearing the contention for natural and inalienable rights, Nathaniel Appleton[1] and John Woolical conclusion They attacked not only the oppressors of the colonists but censured also those who denied the Negro race freedom of body and freedouainst the writs of assistance on the British constitution ”founded in the laws of nature,” he ”shuddered at the doctrine taught and the consequences that ht be derived from such premises”[3]

[Footnote 1: Locke, _Anti-slavery_, etc, p 19, 20, 23]

[Footnote 2: _Works of John Woolman_ in two parts, pp 58 and 73; Moore, _Notes on Slavery in Mass_, p 71]

[Footnote 3: Adams, _Works of John Adams_, vol x, p 315; Moore, _Notes on Slavery in Mass_, p 71]

So effective was the attack on the institution of slavery and its attendant evils that interest in the question leaped the boundaries of religious organizations and becahout the country Not only did Northern men of the type of John Adams and James Otis express their opposition to this tyranny of men's bodies and ton pointed out the injustice of such a policy Accordingly we find arrayed against the aristocratic masters almost all the leaders of the American Revolution[1] They favored the policy, first, of suppressing the slave trade, next of ee, and finally of educating theovern a people contending for political liberty, and men like Samuel Webster, James Swan, and Sarounds;[3] Jonathan Boucher,[4] Dr Rush,[5] and Benja plans to educate slaves for freedom; and Isaac Tatem[7]

and Anthony Benezet[8] were actually in the schoolroohten their black brethren

[Footnote 1: Cobb, _Slavery_, etc, p 82]

[Footnote 2: Madison, _Works of_, vol iii, p 496; Ston, _Works of Jefferson_, vol

ix, p 163; Brissot de Warville, _New Travels_, vol i, p 227; Proceedings of the American Convention of Abolition Societies, 1794, 1795, 1797]

[Footnote 3: Webster, _A Sermon Preached before the Honorable Council_, etc; Webster, _Earnest Address to My Country on Slavery_; Swan, _A Dissuasion to Great Britain and the Colonies_; Hopkins, _Dialogue Concerning Slavery_]

[Footnote 4: Boucher, _A View of the Causes and Consequences of the American Revolution_, p 39]