Slavery on Trial: Law, Abolitionism, and Print CultureAmerica's legal consciousness was high during the era that saw the imprisonment of abolitionist editor William Lloyd Garrison, the execution of slave revolutionary Nat Turner, and the hangings of John Brown and his Harpers Ferry co-conspirators. Jeannine Marie DeLombard examines how debates over slavery in the three decades before the Civil War employed legal language to "try" the case for slavery in the court of public opinion via popular print media. Discussing autobiographies by Frederick Douglass, a scandal narrative about Sojourner Truth, an abolitionist speech by Henry David Thoreau, sentimental fiction by Harriet Beecher Stowe, and a proslavery novel by William MacCreary Burwell, DeLombard argues that American literature of the era cannot be fully understood without an appreciation for the slavery debate in the courts and in print. Combining legal, literary, and book history approaches, Slavery on Trial provides a refreshing alternative to the official perspectives offered by the nation's founding documents, legal treatises, statutes, and judicial decisions. DeLombard invites us to view the intersection of slavery and law as so many antebellum Americans did--through the lens of popular print culture. |
Contents
| 1 | |
Banditti and Desperadoes Incendiaries and Traitors | 33 |
At the Bar of Public Opinion | 99 |
All Done Brown at Last Illustrating Harpers Ferry | 199 |
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Slavery on Trial: Law, Abolitionism, and Print Culture Jeannine Marie DeLombard Limited preview - 2007 |
Common terms and phrases
abolition abolitionism abolitionist Acre’s African American antebellum antislavery movement appeared authority Black Acre black advocacy black speech black testimony Bondage Boston Burwell Burwell’s civic civil court of public courthouse courtroom crime criminal trial depicting discursive Dred Dred’s enslaved era’s extralegal Finkelman Folger former slave Frank Leslie’s Frederick Douglass freedom Fugitive Slave Garrison Harpers Ferry Harriet Beecher Stowe Ibid Isabella John Brown Judge juridical jury justice lawyer legal spectatorship Lewis Tappan libel liberties literary literature Marcus Wood Martin Delany Matthias murder Nat Turner newspaper nineteenth-century Northern novel pamphlet political popular legal consciousness print culture print debate proslavery public opinion published racial readers reading reform rhetorical role scene sentimental Slave Law slave narrative slaveholding slavery debate Sojourner Truth South Southern story Stowe Stowe’s Thoreau tion tribunal Uncle Tom’s Cabin Vale violence Virginia Wagenen white abolitionists White Acre white advocacy white advocates William William Lloyd Garrison York