Ahead of Her Time: Abby Kelley and the Politics of Antislavery (review)

Book Reviews Edited by Thomas D. Hamm Ahead of Her Time: Abby Kelley and the Politics ofAntislavery. By Dorothy Sterling. New York: Norton, 1 991 . 436 pp. Illustrations, notes, selected bibliography , and index. $22.95. In assessing the impact ofthe Religious Society ofFriends on American culture, one cannot leave out the contributions of certain men and women who were nurtured by the Society butultimately left itbecause they became impatientwith the slowness ofchange. This was particularly true of those who became caught up in the antislavery movement outside the walls of the meeting house. Perhaps the mostcolorful andinfluential ofthese was Abby Kelley (1811-1887), of Worcester, Massachusetts, a school teacher turned anti-slavery lecturer, a Garrisonian who played a role in the schism ofthe American Anti-Slavery Society over the question ofwomen's right to serve on committees. Abby Kelley's courage in facing hostile crowds, where she was sometimes called "Jezebel," and her heroic travel in the service ofthe antislavery cause made her a role model for such younger women as Lucy Stone and Susan B. Anthony. Her partnership marriage to Stephen S. Foster, also an abolitionist lecturer, was remarkable for her day, the two taking turns, one at home doing child care and farming, while the other traveled in the antislavery cause. And though she resigned from the Uxbridge Meeting in 1841, she remained a Friend in speech, dress, and attitudes all her life. Abby Kelley's devotion to and practice of the principles of nonresistance (nonviolence) were noteworthy. She was among a handful of antislavery activists who continued to believe that slavery could be abolished by moral weapons alone, and who refused to support the Civil War. Later, she and Stephen again practiced nonresistance in refusing to pay taxes on their farm, claiming "no taxation without representation," because Abby was not allowed to vote. Dorothy Sterling, who has written extensively on the abolition of slavery and on the black experience, has given us the first full and scholarly biography of this remarkable woman, setting her in the context of her times and the antislavery movementtowhich she was devoted. A Quakerreader mightwish thatshehadbeen more interested in, and sympathetic with, the complex ramifications ofthe struggle within the Society of Friends over the slavery issue, which led to Abby Kelley's resignation, and to the disownment of Isaac Hopper, William Bassett, and others. In the same vein, further exploration of Abby Kelley's devotion to nonresistant action would be interesting to Friends today, a we struggle to understand the meaning of nonviolent struggles for justice. One cannot ask everything of a single author, however, and we cannot be other than grateful for a book so gracefully written, so readable, so well documented that we come away with a well rounded picture of a fascinating woman and her times. PhiladelphiaMargaret Hope Bacon ...