[African-Americana] Wright, Elizur, Jr. Autograph Letter, signed on an Anti-American Colonization Society Broadside "The Shields of American Slavery..."

New York: American Anti-Slavery Society, February 24, 1834. Lengthy two-page autograph letter, signed by American abolitionist and mathematician Elizur Wright, Jr. to reformer and abolitionist Rev. Samuel J. May, written on the integral leaf of an anti-American Colonization Society engraved broadside titled "The Shields of American Slavery. Broad enough to hide the wrongs of Two Millions of Stolen Men" (London: Daggett & Ely, ca. 1833-34). Addressed on verso of integral leaf by Wright, with post-script by him. Docketing on verso; remnants of original wax seal at same, with loss from when opened. Library Company, Afro-Americana 11; OCLC 64749937

American abolitionist Elizur Wright (1804-85) writes to fellow abolitionist, reformer, and founder of the American Anti-Slavery Society (AASS), Rev. Samuel J. May. Wide-ranging in content, Wright communicates the sending of a parcel of anti-slavery pamphlets to May for his distribution; mention of Wright's correspondence with an acquaintance newly recruited to the abolitionist cause; reference to Prudence Crandall's Canterbury School for Black girls; the exchange of abolitionist literature, including Elizabeth Heyrick's 1824 Immediate, Not Gradual Emancipation... and William Wilberforce's 1823 An Appeal to the Religion, Justice, and Humanity of the Inhabitants of the British Empire, in Behalf of the Negro Slaves in the West Indies; the current state of the Anti-Slavery Society; and the distribution and price of various abolitionist pamphlets. Wright also discusses the engraved broadside on the first leaf published by the AASS to criticize the American Colonization Society and their plan of Black resettlement in Africa, writing, "The design on the first leaf is intended to represent the doctrines & tendencies of the Colonization Society. Its doctrines are contradictory as represented by the large Shields & its tendency is as represented by the __ matter, first to hide the atrocities of the System--the whip, & hammer, & chain & enormities of the trade, & second, the principles of justice, and contained in ____ self-evident ____".

Formed in Philadelphia in 1833 by 60 prominent abolitionists, including William Lloyd Garrison, the AASS was a nationwide organization committed to the immediate emancipation of all enslaved people. The group employed a wide range of tactics, including the publication of pamphlets, broadsides, and circulars, sponsoring lectures, encouraging acts of civil disobedience, and boycotting goods produced by enslaved labor, to compel a national moral reckoning with slavery. Among the Society's founding figures was the Rev. Samuel J. May (1797–1871). Though initially drawn to colonization as a young man, May underwent a shift in conviction around 1830 when William Lloyd Garrison persuaded him to embrace immediate abolitionism. From that point forward, May dedicated himself to the cause, even in the face of violence. Together with Garrison, he helped establish both the New England Anti-Slavery Society (NEASS) and the AASS itself, where he sat on the executive committee alongside Lewis Tappan and worked as a paid agent.

May's activism extended beyond the organization's leadership. He publicly supported Prudence Crandall's effort to operate a school for Black girls in Canterbury, Connecticut, and he published The Unionist, an abolitionist newspaper, beginning in 1833. He also lent his assistance to the formation of the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society in 1834. Deeply committed to racial equality, May consistently advocated for racial and gender-integrated abolition at a time when many reformers favored segregated groups and refused membership based on sex and color. He actively aided people escaping from bondage and was an acquaintance with Sojourner Truth, Harriet Tubman, and Frederick Douglass, and he served as president of the Syracuse Fugitive Aid Society. On behalf of the AASS, May traveled to Canada to visit communities of formerly enslaved people who had settled there, and with the outbreak of the Civil War, he founded one of the earliest Freedmen's Relief Associations, in 1862. During the postwar period he became a vocal proponent of Radical Reconstruction, and championed voting rights, education, and land redistribution for the newly freed population. Alongside this, he was a vocal feminist, pacifist, and education and labor reformer.

Elizur Wright was born in Connecticut, raised in Ohio, educated at Yale, and taught at Western Reserve College, in Ohio. Influenced by William Lloyd Garrison, Wright joined the New York Anti-Slavery Society, and helped form the American Anti-Slavery Society where he served as its corresponding secretary. In this role, he edited the Anti-Slavery Record and the Quarterly Anti-Slavery Magazine while performing administrative duties in the organization. In the 1840s, while living in Boston, he split with the Garrisonians, and worked for rival papers of Garrison's The Liberator. As a member of the Boston Vigilance Committee, Wright assisted in the rescue of freedom seeker Shadrach Minkins in 1851, and was subsequently arrested but not convicted. Up until his death, he continued to support abolitionism and other causes, including insurance reform.

The present broadside attacks the American Colonization Society (ACS) by depicting the four "shields" protecting slavery (the north, south, east, and west) and placing side by side conflicting quotes from members of the ACS and their views regarding slavery, emancipation, resettlement, and missionary work. Formed in 1816, the ACS sought the resettlement of free and emancipated Blacks outside of the United States, typically to Africa. It was heavily criticized by the African American community, AASS founder William Lloyd Garrison, and other immediate abolitionists who saw its designs as driven by racial prejudice and its solution as not a reckoning with the question of slavery but as a means of ultimately preserving it. Garrison published in 1832 his Thoughts on African Colonization, that discredited the ACS, and where he derided it as "inadequate in its design, injurious in its operation, and contrary to sound principle." Rare, we can locate only one other copy of this broadside at auction, and only three other copies in institutional collections: The Library Company of Philadelphia, Cornell University, and Florida Atlantic University.

From the personal papers of American minister and abolitionist, Rev. Samuel J. May (1797-1871), thence by descent in the family

[African-Americana] Wright, Elizur, Jr. Autograph Letter, signed on an Anti-American Colonization Society Broadside "The Shields of American Slavery..."