The Antislavery Constituency in Jacksonian New York City

THE ANTISLAVERY CONSTITUENCY IN JACKSONIAN NEW YORK CITY John B. Jentz Historians have not adequately analyzed the popular constituency of the abolitionist movement, the sympathetic audience which, while not forming part of the active leadership, did support antislavery activities. Writing in 1967, David Brion Davis said of antebellum reform in general, "Little is known of the rank and file members, to say nothing of the passive supporters, of a single reform movement."' Davis' statement is still accurate, especially for abolition in the 1830s, the formative period when the doctrine of immediatism came to dominate the cause.2 Prior to the formation of antislavery political parties beginning in 1840, the best sources for studying the antislavery constituency are the abolitionist petitions submitted to Congress, a substantial number of which are preserved in the National Archives. This article analyzes such petitions from New York City, a center of national abolitionist activity in the 1830s. Three basic findings result from this analysis: a substantial majority of the male signers were artisans and shopkeepers; the wealth and occupational status of the signers declined considerably over the decade; and a significant number of radicals associated with the city's labor movement signed the petitions. These findings indicate that abolition had a broader , more diverse, and more popular constituency than has commonly been thought and that, when studying abolition's followers, historians should look to other sources in addition to evangelical revivalism and middle-class reform on which so much attention has been focused. This article is an expanded version ofa paper delivered on April 13, 1978, at the convention of the Organization of American Historians in New York City. 1 David Brion Davis, ed., Ante-Bellum Reform (New York, 1967), p. 10. 2 Useful for their insights into the antislavery constituency in the 1830s are Leonard L. Richards, "Gentlemen of Property and Standing": Anti-Abolition Mobs in ¡acksonian America (New York, 1970); Paul E. Johnson, A Shopkeeper's Millennium: Society and Revivah in Rochester, New York 1815-1837 (New York, 1978); Whitney R. Cross, The Burned-overDistrict: The Socialand IntellectualHistory of Enthusiastic Religion in Western New York, 1800-1850 (Ithaca, 1950); James BrewerStewart, Holy Warriors: TheAbolitionists and American Shvery (New York, 1976); Judith M. Wellman, "The Burned-Over District Revisited: Benevolent Reform and Abolitionism in Mexico, Paris, and Ithaca, New York, 1825-1842" (Ph.D. diss., University of Virginia, 1974). Civil War History, Vol. XXVII, No. 2Copyright© 1981 by The Kent State University Press 0009-8078/81/2701-0001 $01.00/0 102CIVIL WAR HISTORY These conclusions are based on research in New York Citydirectories, tax assessment rolls, and other sources in an effort to identify the signers of twelve petitions against slavery in the District ofColumbia submitted to the House of Representatives from New York City between 1829 and 1839.3 These petitions include all the existing antislavery memorials from New York City from 1829 through 1836, when abolition in the District was the sole issue on which such petitions were submitted. Beginning in 1837, a national petition campaign sponsored by the American Anti-Slavery Society produced memorials on many other subjects, including abolition in the territories, ending of the interstate slave trade, elimination of the congressional "gag" rule against considering antislavery petitions, and so on.4 Groups of these memorials on different antislavery subjects were probably circulated together since many of the same people signed several petitions, often in similar order.5 Any petition which included abolition in the District of Columbia among its requests has been analyzed here, but the findings about the petitions against slavery in the District probably apply to the memorials on other antislavery issues as well. Signing an antislavery petition in Jacksonian New York City was itself 3 With over4000 signers, these memorials include all those on the subject in the National Archives from New York City signed by men before 1840, with the exception of a small petition with only 17 signers, most of whom were 21 years old or younger and not in the directories. This was the only petition which included the ages of the signers, probably because of their youth. Its occupational percentages, for example, for the four men over21 who were found in...