Among the remarkable minds which the "Thoughts" disillusioned in respect
of the character and tendency of the Colonization Society were Theodore
D. Weld, Elizur Wright, and Beriah Green, N.P. Rogers, William Goodell,
Joshua Leavitt, Amos A. Phelps, Lewis Tappan, and James Miller McKim.
Garrison's assertion that "the overthrow of the Colonization Society was
the overthrow of slavery itself," was, from the standpoint of a student
of history, an exaggerated one. We know now that the claim was not
founded on fact, that while they did stand together they did not fall
together. But the position was, nevertheless, the strongest possible one
for the anti-slavery movement to occupy at the time. In the disposition
of the pro-slavery forces on the field of the opening conflict in 1832,
the colonization scheme commanded the important approaches to the
citadel of the peculiar institution. It cut off the passes to public
opinion, and to the religious and benevolent influences of the land. To
reach these it was necessary in the first place to dislodge the society
from its coign of vantage, its strategical point in the agitation. And
this is precisely what "The Thoughts on African Colonization" did. It
dislodged the society from its powerful place in the moral sentiment of
the North. The capture of this position was like the capture of a
drawbridge, and the precipitation of the assaulting column directly upon
the walls of a besieged castle.
Pages:
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166