The Intersectional Relationship Between Cassius M. Clay and the Garrisonian Abolitionists

The Intersectional Relationship BETWEEN CaSSIUS M. CLAY AND THE GaRRISONIAN ABOLITIONISTS Stanley Harrold Late in his life Cassius M. Clay recalled his introduction to William Lloyd Garrison in 1 844. Clay remembered that during a visit to Boston he had joked with the abolitionist leader and that Garrison had responded in kind. "I said to him," Clay wrote, "Why Garrison, I had expected to see a long-faced ascetic; but I see you patriots are jolly, sleek fellows—not at all debarred of the good things of life." According to Clay, Garrison replied. "And therein, Clay, you are wrong, and somewhat confound things. The ascetics are the wrongdoers! Who should be happy, if not those who are always right."1 More important than this rare recollection of Garrison's spontaneous wit is the juxtaposition of these two quite different leaders in the movement to abolish black slavery in the United States. Garrison was a New England moralist and pacifist; Clay a Kentucky politician and brawler. Garrison was the chiefadvocate ofimmediate, unconditional abolition ; Clay a leading proponent of gradual, compensated emancipation. What was the relationship between Clay and Garrison, and between Clay and the otherabolitionists who called themselves Garrisonians? What does their relationship indicate about the antislavery movment? Lawrence J. Friedman has revealed the intimate relationships ofNorthern abolitionists within their regional clusters. Others have analyzed the differences and I presented a shorterversion ofthis article at the 1988 Duquesne History Forum. I want to thank Hugh Davis ofSouthern Connecticut State University and Vernon L. Volpe of Kearney State College for their comments. 1 Cassius M. Clay, The Life of Cassius Marcellus Clay (1886; reprint, New York: Negro Universities Press, 1969), 99. See also John L. Thomas, The Liberator: William Lloyd Garrison (Boston: Little, Brown and Co., 1963). Civil War History, Vol. XXXV, No. 2, *> 1989 by the Kent Sute University Press 102CIVIL WAR HISTORY similarities among the various factions of Northern abolitionists.2 But far less is known concerning the relationship of Northern abolitionists to their border slave state stepbrothers who, like Cassius M. Clay, fought against slavery amid the most difficult circumstances. In retrospect border slave state abolitionists appear to have been conservative , profoundly racist, ill-advised, and ultimately insignificant failures. Their Northern counterparts have been seen conversely as radical, racially enlightened, and significant, if not free from racism or successful in achieving their goals. The border slave state abolitionists in general and Clay in particular have been portrayed as isolated and culturally alienated from their Northern counterparts.3 Yet they did not appear to be intrinsically conservative, racist, or insignificant to their Northern Garrisonian contemporaries . There were certainly cultural differences. But Clay was hardly alienated from the Northern antislavery movement. Exploring the relationship between Clay and the Garrisonians helps reveal how the most radical ofthe Northern abolitionists perceived their cause and its progress, how they perceived the role of Southern emancipationists, how they influenced the career of the most famous and notorious of these emancipationists , and how he perceived and influenced them. Cassius M. Clay was born near Lexington, Kentucky in 1810to a prominent slaveholding family. His father decided to name Cassius and his brother Brutus after the aristocratic defenders ofthe Roman Republic, and Cassius grew up strongly committed to the republican values ofpatriotism, individual liberty, and an honest government of law. As a member of the blue grass aristocracy, Clay also developed a strong Southern sense ofpersonal honor and a violent commitment to its defense. Such a background might have led him to become a staunch defender of the right of southern whites to hold blacks in slavery.4 But by 1830 Clay had also been exposed to 2 Friedman, Gregarious Saints: Selfand Community in American Abolitionism ¡830-1870 (New York: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1982); AileenS. Kraditor, Means andEnds in American Abolitionism: Garrison and His Critics on Strategyand Tactics, 1834-1850 (New York: Pantheon , 1967); Ronald G. Walters, The AntislaveryAppeal:American Abolitionism after 1830 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 1976). This study owes a debt in particular to the insights of Freidman and Walters. 3 Gordon E. Finnie, "The Antislavery Movement in the Upper South Before 1840,"Journal of Southern History 35 (Aug. 1969): 319-42; Carl N. Degler...