Oppressors of Their Species Perceive That Their Craft Is in Danger: Advocating Liberty in the Old Northwest

The western abolitionists’ argument for inclusive citizenship was a revolutionary ideal writ large in the Old Northwest. In studying editor Zebina Eastman’s 1842 prospectus for his Chicago-based Liberty Party paper, Western Citizen, against the backdrop of the American antislavery movement, we can see the heart and structure of antislavery politics nearly twenty years before the Civil War. In fact, when Lincoln began his presidency, Eastman sent him a copy of the prospectus, observing that its “declaration of principles” articulated the “fundamental principles of the republican party.” Lincoln asked Eastman for a special interview with regard to them. While we do not know the particulars of that discussion, we know that Eastman emerged as consul to Bristol, England with a mission to strengthen support for the Union by promoting solidarity over the abolition of slavery. Lincoln declared Eastman to be “more than a common man in his sphere” in a letter to Seward for the appointment.

The Western Liberty Party moderates, both Black and white, worked out a constitutional theory that modulated their more radical stances in order to recruit antislavery voters. By restoring the principles of the Declaration—an appeal to natural law and natural rights—abolitionists advocated for a return to revolutionary principles grounded in morality and allegiance to God. This approach helped form a broad political coalition of northerners who shared similar views of the Constitution. Most westerners despised judgmental, pious, divisive abolitionists who seemed to propagate civil disorder. However, the revolutionary language that “all men are created equal” became the touchstone of agreement that abolishing slavery rather than abolishing the Union, Constitution, or churches was the remedy for a sick nation. Northwestern abolitionists supported Lincoln by using revolutionary ideals strategically to enlarge freedom and democracy.