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The Abolitionist Legacy

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This is the second volume of a pair of books devoted to a systematic narrative and analysis of the abolitionist movement. McPherson's focus is the white abolitionists though there is some information about black abolitionists. This book traces the experience of the abolitionists during Reconstruction, its destruction in the late 1870s, and events leading up to the founding of the NAACP. McPherson provides both narrative and an effort at quantification by measuring attitudes to a variety of issues in a group of militant pre-war abolitionists and their descendents.

McPherson is particularly concerned with rebutting the idea that abolitionists lost interest in black rights after the Civil War. Not surprisingly, this is a complex story. Indeed, some abolitionist figures did fall away. The experience of Reconstruction, which like much of Gilded Age America, was characterized by quite a bit of political corruption in Southern states, alienated some former abolitionists. Others became more committed to genteel political reform (mugwumpism), which others were attracted by the idea of pursuing alliances with "moderate" paternalistic southern whites. MacPherson shows, however, that a core majority of pre-war abolitionists remained committed strongly to ideals of black political and social equality, providing considerable support for Reconstruction policies. As they were before the Civil War, this core remained an important and militant fringe movement in American life.

After the withdrawal of Federal troops from the South, many of these individuals remained outspoken advocates for black rights. The end of Federal intervention in the South, however, caused a number to focus on gradualist, meliorist strategies, pursuit of alliances with relatively liberal Southern whites, and strong emphasis on education for blacks. Quite a bit of this book is devoted to educational efforts in the South, describing the very impressive efforts of white abolitionists to support black colleges and educational institutions, some initially integrated. These efforts were often complicated by Southern white resistance and violence, and as time went on, by black efforts to escape what was partially a paternalistic system.

The 1890s saw the extinction of hopes of progress through alliance with Southern "moderates" and gradualism. The wholesale disenfranchisement of black voters, imposition of Jim Crow laws, and frequent lynchings eventually led to a new relative militancy, neo-abolitionism, led in several cases by descendents of pre-Civil War activists. Oswald Garrison Villard, a principal founder of the NAACP, was the grandson of the great William Lloyd Garrison. McPherson has interesting chapters on Booker T. Washington, the relationship between abolitionism and women's rights, and the interesting role of opposition to American imperialism as a factor in the re-emergence of neo-abolitionism.

Despite the wavering of some members of the movement, the paternalism of many, and their sometimes sanctimonious and rigid piety, these individuals, particularly those associated with Garrison and his family, were the only consistent white supporters of equality of African-Americans across many decades.