Charles Sumner, White Slavery in the Barbary States 1848 1st ed Abolitionist

Description: White Slavery in the Barbary States. A Lecture before the Boston Mercantile Library Association, Feb. 17, 1847, by Charles Sumner. Published by William D. Ticknor and Company, Boston, in 1847. Softcover, 60 pages. Missing the back cover; text is complete. This is the first edition of Sumner's abolitionist work, issued as a pamphlet in 1847 soon after the lecture was given. In the lecture, Sumner recounted the international success in combating the slave trade practiced in Algiers and Tunis. Ever-present in the background of the lecture was slavery in the United States, where the tensions that ultimately led to the Civil War were already mounting. Condition: There are no bookplates, ink names, pen/pencil notations, library markings, or similar flaws. The interior pages are clean and bright. Purchasers should be aware that the back cover of this pamphlet is missing. The text of the 60-page pamphlet is complete, however, and it is suitable for conservation and rebinding. Charles Sumner (1811 – 1874) was an American lawyer, politician, and statesman who represented Massachusetts in the United States Senate from 1851 until his death in 1874. Before and during the American Civil War, he was a leading American advocate for racial equality and the abolition of slavery. Sumner began his political activism as a member of various anti-slavery groups, leading to his election to the U.S. Senate in 1851 as a member of the Free Soil Party. He soon became a founding member of the Republican Party. In the Senate, he devoted his efforts to opposing the "Slave Power," which culminated in a vicious beating by Representative Preston Brooks on the Senate floor in 1856; Sumner's severe injuries and extended absence from the Senate made him a symbol of the anti-slavery cause. Though he did not return to the Senate until 1859, Massachusetts reelected him in 1857, leaving his empty desk as a reminder of the incident, which polarized the nation as the Civil War approached. During the Civil War, Sumner led the Radical Republican faction critical of President Abraham Lincoln for being too moderate toward the South. As chair of the Foreign Relations committee, Sumner worked to ensure that the United Kingdom and France did not intervene on behalf of the Confederate States. After the Union won the war and Lincoln was assassinated, Sumner and Thaddeus Stevens led congressional efforts to grant equal civil and voting rights to freedmen and to block ex-Confederates from power so they would not reverse the gains derived from the Union's victory in the war.

Price: 120 USD

Location: Slingerlands, New York

End Time: 2024-02-02T18:09:09.000Z

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