The Liberator Files

December 22, 1865

Here is an article, by Senator Charles Sumner, which is a call for a monument to be made in memory of Col. Shaw.

December 22, 1865

Here is the Official Proclamation, from Sec. of State William H.  Seward. Declaring that the Amendment has been appropriately ratified and “has become valid, to all intents and purpose, as part of the Constitution of the United States.

The editor comments on the ratification:  “With our own hands we have put in type this unspeakably cheering and important official announcement that, at last, the old ‘covenant with death’ is annulled, and the ‘agreement with hell’ no longer stands.  Not a slave is left to clank his fetters, of the millions that were lately held in seemingly hopeless bondage.  Not a slaveholder may dare to present his claim of property in man, or assume the prerogative of trafficking in human flesh and blood.  Henceforth, personal freedom is secured for all who dwell on the American soil, irrespective of complexion or race.  It is not merely the abolition of slavery , with the old recognized right of each State to establish he system ad libitum; but it is the prohibition, by ‘the supreme law of the land’, duly ratified, to enslave a human being in any part of our national domains, or to restore what has been overthrown.  It is, consequently, the complete triumph as well as utter termination of the Anti-Slavery struggle, as such….”

December 8, 1865

A New England convention of colored people gathered at the Twelfth Baptist Church, Southac Church. Several resolutions are passed, in substance, urging the right to vote for colored citizens.

December 8, 1865

In the Refuge of Oppression column comes an article from Richmond, Virginia, signed “Hanover”.   Also in the column is “The Freedmen”, from the Richmond Whig. The articles degrades blacks, and have warnings for the “white breeders of mischief”, responsible in part for Emancipation.

December 1, 1865

The edition, in the last week of the year, brings an article by Edmund Quincy, written in tribute to Garrison.  “We apprehend that there I no living public man for whom there is felt so sincere and so general a respect.  This is largely and justly owing to his sagacious and statesmanlike conduct during the last five years.  He saw the end from the beginning with a clearness of vision vouchsafed to few of us. He was considerate of difficulties and patient of mistakes, through his discerning of spirits, in circumstances which made many of us almost despair….the name of Garrison can never be separated from that which has struck the chains of slavery from the whites as well as the blacks of America….”

November 10, 1865

R. P. Randolph, writes to Garrison, from New Orleans, and tells of eight large schools just established, of which he is Principal, named for Garrison.

October 20, 1865

Here is a series of letters purported to illustrate that Garrison has expressed “satisfaction” with the Mississippi Constitution.  The editor comments:  ” the readers of the Liberator will require no assurance from us that the above-recorded correspondence is a bold and an audacious forgery; but, inasmuch as it is getting extensive publication in the newspapers, without note or comment, as though it were authentic, and therefore multitudes of thoughtless people may regard it as genuine, we are obliged to brand it as fictitious, utterly ridiculous as the whole affair is.”

October 13, 1865

From the African Repository, is a brief article by Dr. Livingston, the American explorer.  He responds to a question he is often asked: “What sort of people are those you wander amongst?”  Here are some excerpts from his response:  “they are very far from being savages… quite mild and hospitable … it is the duty of each man in the village to give every stranger his supper…they are involved cultivating the soil…they manufacture  excellent iron and copper …they do not understand where all the black people that are carried away go to.. thousand are taken away annually, and you cannot go anywhere without meeting with slave parties…they imagine that the white people eat them.  They look upon us as cannibals, and we look upon them as savages.  If we take an impartial view both, we shall find that they are better than each imagine one another to be.”

October 13, 1865

Colored men in Baltimore have purchased a building, and organized The Douglass Institute, the purpose of which is “the intellectual advancement of the colored portion of the community.”   At the official opening of the building, Douglass’ speech is published here.