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William Lloyd Garrison by Archibald H. Grimke

A >> Archibald H. Grimke >> William Lloyd Garrison




"She was the masterpiece of womankind--
In shape and height majestically fine;
Her cheeks the lily and the rose combined;
Her lips--more opulently red than wine;
Her raven locks hung tastefully entwined;
Her aspect fair as Nature could design;
And then her eyes! so eloquently bright!
An eagle would recoil before her light."


The influence of this superb woman was a lasting power for truth and
righteousness in the son's stormy life. For a whole year after her
death, the grief of the printer's lad over his loss, seemed to have
checked the activity of his pen. For during that period nothing of his
appeared in the _Herald_. But after the sharp edge of his sorrow had
worn off, his pen became active again in the discussion of public men
and public questions. It was a period of bitter personal and political
feuds and animosities. The ancient Federal party was _in articulo
mortis_. The death-bed of a great political organization proves
oftentimes the graveyard of lifelong friendships. For it is a scene of
crimination and recrimination. And so it happened that the partisans of
John Adams, and the partisans of John Adams's old Secretary of State,
Timothy Pickering, were in 1824 doing a thriving business in this
particular line. Into this funereal performance our printer's apprentice
entered with pick and spade. He had thus early a _penchant_ for
controversy, a soldier's scent for battle. If there was any fighting
going on he proceeded directly to have a hand in it. And it cannot be
denied that that hand was beginning to deal some manly and sturdy blows,
whose resound was heard quite distinctly beyond the limits of his
birthplace. His communications appeared now, not only in the _Herald_,
but in the Salem _Gazette_ as well. Now it was the Adams-Pickering
controversy, now the discussion of General Jackson as a presidential
candidate, now the state of the country in respect of parties, now the
merits of "American Writers," which afforded his 'prentice hand the
requisite practice in the use of the pen. He had already acquired a
perfect knowledge of typesetting and the mechanical makeup of a
newspaper. During his apprenticeship he took his first lesson in the art
of thinking on his feet in the presence of an audience. The audience to
be sure were the members of a debating club, which he had organized. He
was very ambitious and was doubtless looking forward to a political
career. He saw the value of extempore speech to the man with a future,
and he wisely determined to possess himself of its advantage. He little
dreamt, however, to what great use he was to devote it in later years.
There were other points worth noting at this time, and which seemed to
prophecy for him a future of distinction. He possessed a most attractive
personality. His energy and geniality, his keen sense of humor, his
social and bouyant disposition, even his positive and opinionated
temper, were sources of popular strength to him. People were strongly
drawn to him. His friends were devoted to him. He had that quality,
which we vaguely term magnetic, the quality of attaching others to us,
and maintaining over them the ascendency of our character and ideas.

In the midst of all this progress along so many lines, the days of his
apprenticeship in the _Herald_ office came to an end. He was just
twenty. With true Yankee enterprise and pluck, he proceeded to do for
himself what for seven years he had helped to do for another--publish a
newspaper. And with a brave heart the boy makes his launch on the
uncertain sea of local journalism and becomes editor and publisher of a
real, wide-awake sheet, which he calls the _Free Press._ The paper was
independent in politics and proved worthy of its name during the six
months that Garrison sat in the managerial chair. Here is the tone which
the initial number of the paper holds to the public: "As to the
political course of the _Free Press_, it shall be, in the widest sense
of the term, _independent_. The publisher does not mean by this, to rank
amongst those who are of everybody's and of nobody's opinion; ... nor
one of whom the old French proverb says: _Il ne soit sur quel pied
danser_. [He knows not on which leg to dance.] Its principles shall be
open, magnanimous and free. It shall be subservient to no party or body
of men; and neither the craven fear of loss, nor the threats of the
disappointed, nor the influence of power, shall ever awe one single
opinion into silence. Honest and fair discussion it will court; and its
columns will be open to all temperate and intelligent communications
emanating from whatever political source. In fine we will say with
Cicero: 'Reason shall prevail with him more than popular opinion.' They
who like this avowal may extend their encouragement; and if any feel
dissatisfied with it, they must act accordingly. The publisher cannot
condescend to solicit their support." This was admirable enough in its
way, but it was poor journalism some will say. And without doubt when
judged by the common commercial standard it _was_ poor journalism. In
this view it is a remarkable production, but in another aspect it is
still more remarkable in that it took with absolute accuracy the measure
of the man. As a mental likeness it is simply perfect. At no time during
his later life did the picture cease to be an exact moral representation
of his character. It seems quite unnecessary, therefore, to record that
he proceeded immediately to demonstrate that it was no high sounding and
insincere declaration. For in the second number, he mentions with that
singular serenity, which ever distinguished him on such occasions, the
discontinuance of the paper on account of matter contained in the first
issue, by ten indignant subscribers. "Nevertheless," he adds, "our
happiness at the loss of such subscribers is not a whit abated. We _beg_
no man's patronage, and shall ever erase with the same cheerfulness that
we insert the name of any individual.... Personal or political offence
we shall studiously avoid--truth _never_." Here was plainly a wholly new
species of the _genus homo_ in the editorial seat. What, expect to make
a newspaper pay and not beg for patronage? Why the very idea was enough
to make newspaperdom go to pieces with laughter. Begging for patronage,
howling for subscribers, cringing, crawling, changing color like the
chameleon, howling for Barabbas or bellowing against Jesus, all these
things must your newspaper do to prosper. On them verily hang the whole
law and all the profits of modern journalism. This is what the devil of
competition was doing in that world when William Lloyd Garrison entered
it. It took him up into an exceedingly high mountain, we may be certain,
and offered him wealth, position, and power, if he would do what all
others were doing. And he would not. He went on editing and publishing
his paper for six months regardful only of what his reason
approved--regardless always of the disapproval of others. Not once did
he palter with his convictions or juggle with his self-respect for the
sake of pelf or applause. His human horizon was contracted, to be sure.
It could hardly be otherwise in one so young. His world was his country,
and patriotism imposed limits upon his affections. "Our country, our
whole country, and nothing but our country," was the ardent motto of the
_Free Press_. The love of family comes, in the order of growth, before
the love of country; and the love of country precedes the love of all
mankind. "First the blade, then the ear, then the full corn in the ear,"
is the great law of love in the soul as of corn in the soil. Besides
this contraction of the affections, there was also manifest in his first
journalistic venture a deficiency in the organ of vision, a failure to
see into things and their relations. What he saw he reported faithfully,
suppressing nothing, adding nothing. But the objects which passed across
the disk of his editoral intelligence were confined almost entirely to
the surface of things, to the superficies of national life. He had not
the ken at twenty to penetrate beneath the happenings of current
politics. Of the existence of slavery as a supreme reality, we do not
think that he then had the faintest suspicion. No shadow of its
tremendous influence as a political power seemed to have arrested for a
brief instant his attention. He could copy into his paper this atrocious
sentiment which Edward Everett delivered in Congress, without the
slightest comment or allusion. "Sir, I am no soldier. My habits and
education are very unmilitary, but there is no cause in which I would
sooner buckle a knapsack on my back, and put a musket on my shoulder
than that of putting down a servile insurrection at the South." The
reason is plain enough. Slavery was a _terra incognito_ to him then, a
book of which he had not learned the ABC. Mr. Everett's language made no
impression on him, because he had not the key to interpret its
significance. What he saw, that he set down for his readers, without
fear or favor. He had not seen slavery, knew nothing of the evil.
Acquaintance with the deeper things of life, individual or national,
comes only with increasing years, they are hardly for him who has not
yet reached his majority. Slavery was the very deepest thing in the life
of the nation sixty-four years ago. And if Garrison did not then so
understand it, neither did his contemporaries, the wisest and greatest
of them so understand it. The subject of all others which attracted his
attention, and kept his editorial pen busy, was the claim of
Massachusetts for indemnity from the general government, for certain
disbursements made by her for the defence of her sea-coast during the
war of 1812. This matter, which forms but a mere dust point in the
perspective of history, his ardent young mind mistook for a principal
object, erected into a permanent question in the politics of the times.
But the expenditure of enormous energies upon things of secondary and of
even tertiary importance, to the neglect of others of prime and lasting
interest, is supremely human. He was errant where all men go astray. But
the schoolmaster of the nation was abroad, and was training this young
man for the work he was born to do. These six months were, therefore,
not wasted, for in the university of experience he did ever prove
himself an apt scholar. One lesson he had learned, which he never needed
to relearn. Just what that lesson was, he tells in his valedictory to
the subscribers of the _Free Press_, as follows: "This is a time-serving
age; and he who attempts to walk uprightly or speak honestly, cannot
rationally calculate upon speedy wealth or preferment." A sad lesson, to
be sure, for one so young to learn so thoroughly. Perhaps some reader
will say that this was cynical, the result of disappointment. But it was
not cynical, neither was it the result of disappointment. It was
unvarnished truth, and more's the pity, but truth it was none the less.
It was one of those hard facts, which he of all men, needed to know at
the threshold of his experience with the world. Such a revelation proves
disastrous to the many who go down to do business in that world.
Ordinary and weak and neutral moral constitutions are wrecked on this
reef set in the human sea. Like a true mariner he had written it boldly
on his chart. There at such and such a point in the voyage for the
golden fleece, were the rocks and the soul-devouring dragons of the way.
Therefore, oh! my soul, beware. What, indeed, would this argonaut of the
press take in exchange for his soul? Certainly not speedy wealth nor
preferment. Ah! he could not praise where he ought to reprobate; could
not reprobate where praise should be the meed. He had no money and
little learning, but he had a conscience and he knew that he must be
true to that conscience, come to him either weal or woe. Want renders
most men vulnerable, but to it, he appeared, at this early age,
absolutely invulnerable. Should he and that almost omnipotent
inquisitor, public opinion, ever in the future come into collision upon
any principle of action, a keen student of human nature might forsee
that the young recusant could never be starved into silence or
conformity to popular standards. And with this stern, sad lesson
treasured up in his heart, Garrison graduated from another room in the
school-house of experience. All the discoveries of the young journalist
were not of this grim character. He made another discovery altogether
different, a real gem of its kind. The drag-net of a newspaper catches
all sorts of poets and poetry, good, bad, and indifferent--oftener the
bad and indifferent, rarely the good. The drag-net of the _Free Press_
was no exception to this rule; but, one day, it fetched up from the
depths of the hard commonplaces of our New England town life a genuine
pearl. We will let Mr. Garrison tell the story in his own way:


"Going up-stairs to my office, one day, I observed a letter
lying near the door, to my address; which, on opening, I found
to contain an original piece of poetry for my paper, the _Free
Press_. The ink was very pale, the handwriting very small; and,
having at that time a horror of newspaper original poetry--which
has rather increased than diminished with the lapse of time--my
first impulse was to tear it in pieces, without reading it; the
chances of rejection, after its perusal, being as ninety-nine to
one; ... but summoning resolution to read it, I was equally
surprised and gratified to find it above mediocrity, and so gave
it a place in my journal.... As I was anxious to find out the
writer, my post-rider, one day, divulged the secret, stating
that he had dropped the letter in the manner described, and that
it was written by a Quaker lad, named Whittier, who was daily at
work on the shoemaker's bench, with hammer and lapstone, at East
Haverhill. Jumping into a vehicle, I lost no time in driving to
see the youthful rustic bard, who came into the room with
shrinking diffidence, almost unable to speak, and blushing like
a maiden. Giving him some words of encouragement, I addressed
myself more particularly to his parents, and urged them with
great earnestness to grant him every possible facility for the
development of his remarkable genius."


Garrison had not only found a true poet, but a true friend as well, in
the Quaker lad, John Greenleaf Whittier. The friendship which sprang up
between the two was to last during the lifetime of the former. Neither
of them in those days of small things could have possibly by any flight
of the imagination foreseen how their two lives, moving in parallel
lines, would run deep their shining furrows through one of the greatest
chapters of human history. But I am anticipating, and that is a vice of
which no good storyteller ought to be guilty. So, then, let me
incontinently return from this excursion and pursue the even tenor of my
tale.

Garrison had stepped down from his elevated position as the publisher
and editor of the _Free Press_. He was without work, and, being
penniless, it behooved him to find some means of support. With the
instinct of the bright New England boy, he determined to seek his
fortunes in Boston. If his honesty and independence put him at a
disadvantage, as publisher and editor, in the struggle for existence, he
had still his trade as a compositor to fall back upon As a journeyman
printer he would earn his bread, and preserve the integrity of an
upright spirit. And so without a murmur, and with cheerfulness and
persistency, he hunted for weeks on the streets of Boston for a chance
to set types. This hunting for a job in a strange city was discouraging
enough. Twice before had he visited the place, which was to be his
future home. Once when on his way to Baltimore to see his mother, and
once afterward when on a sort of pleasure tramp with three companions.
But the slight knowledge which he was able to obtain of the town and its
inhabitants under these circumstances did not now help him, when from
office to office he went in quest of something to do. After many
failures and renewed searchings, he found what he was after, an
opportunity to practice his trade. Business was dull, which kept our
journeyman printer on the wing; first at one and then at another
printing office we find him setting types for a living during the year
1827. The winning of bread was no easy matter; but he was not ashamed to
work, neither was he afraid of hard work. During this year, he found
time to take a hand in a little practical politics. There was in July,
1827, a caucus of the Federal party to nominate a successor to Daniel
Webster in the House of Representatives. Young Garrison attended this
caucus, and made havoc of its cut and dried programme, by moving the
nomination of Harrison Gray Otis, instead of the candidate, a Mr.
Benjamin Gorham, agreed upon by the leaders. Harrison Gray Otis was one
of Garrison's early and particular idols. He was, perhaps, the one
Massachusetts politician whom the young Federalist had placed on a
pedestal. And so on this occasion he went into the caucus with a written
speech in his hat, eulogistic of his favorite. He had meant to have the
speech at his tongue's end, and to get it off as if on the spur of the
moment. But the speech stayed where it was put, in the speaker's hat,
and failed to materialize where and when it was wanted on the speaker's
tongue. As the mountain would not go to Mahomet, Mahomet like a sensible
prophet went to the mountain. Our orator in imitation of this
illustrious example, bowed to the inevitable and went to his mountain.
Pulling his extempore remarks out of his hat, he delivered himself of
them to such effect as to create quite an Otis sentiment in the meeting.
This performance was, of course, a shocking offence in the eyes of
those, whose plans it had disturbed. With one particular old fogy he got
into something of a newspaper controversy in consequence. The
"consummate assurance" of one so young fairly knocked the breath out of
this Mr. Eminent Respectability; it was absolutely revolting to all his
"ideas of propriety, to see a stranger, a man who never paid a tax in
our city, and perhaps no where else, to possess the impudence to take
the lead and nominate a candidate for the electors of Boston!" The
"young gentleman of six months standing," was not a whit abashed or awed
by the commotion which he had produced. That was simply a case of cause
and effect. But he seemed in turn astonished at his opponent's evident
ignorance of William Lloyd Garrison. "It is true," he replied, with the
proud dignity of conscious power, "it is true that my acquaintance in
this city is limited. I have sought none. Let me assure him, however,
that if my life be spared, my name shall one day be known to the
world--at least to such extent that common inquiry shall be unnecessary.
This, I know will be deemed excessive vanity--but time shall prove it
prophetic." To the charge of youth he makes this stinging rejoinder,
which evinces the progress he was making in the tournament of language:
"The little, paltry sneers at my youth by your correspondent have long
since become pointless. It is the privileged abuse of old age--the
hackneyed allegation of a thousand centuries--the damning _crime_ to
which all men have been subjected. I leave it to metaphysicians to
determine the precise moment when wisdom and experience leap into
existence, when, for the first time, the mind distinguishes truth from
error, selfishness from patriotism, and passion from reason. It is
sufficient for me that I am understood." This was Garrison's first
experience with "gentlemen of property and standing" in Boston. It was
not his last, as future chapters will abundantly show.





CHAPTER II.



THE MAN HEARS A VOICE: SAMUEL, SAMUEL!


There is a moment in the life of every serious soul, when things, which
were before unseen and unheard in the world around him become visible
and audible. This startling moment comes to some sooner, to others
later, but to all, who are not totally given up to the service of self,
at sometime surely. From that moment a change passes over such an one,
for more and more he hears mysterious voices, and clearer and more clear
he sees apparitional forms floating up from the depths above which he
kneels. Whence come they, what mean they? He leans over the abyss, and
lo! the sounds to which he hearkens are the voices of human weeping and
the forms at which he gazes are the apparitions of human woe; they
beckon to him, and the voices beseech him in multitudinous accent and
heart-break: "Come over, come down, oh! friend and brother, and help
us." Then he straightway puts away the things and the thoughts of the
past and girding himself with the things, and the thoughts of the divine
OUGHT and the almighty MUST, he goes over and down to the rescue.

Such an epochal first moment came to William Lloyd Garrison in the
streets of Boston. Amid the hard struggle for bread he heard the abysmal
voices, saw the gaunt forms of misery. He was a constant witness of the
ravages of the demon of drink--saw how strong men succumbed, and weak
ones turned to brutes in its clutch. And were they not his brothers, the
strong men and the weak ones alike? And how could he, their keeper, see
them desperately beset and not fly to their help? Ah! he could not and
did not walk by on the other side, but, stripling though he was, rushed
to do battle with the giant vice, which was slaying the souls and the
bodies of his fellow citizens. Rum during the three first decades of the
present century was, like death, no respecter of persons, entering with
equal freedom the homes of the rich, and the hovels of the poor. It was
in universal demand by all classes and conditions of men. No occasion
was esteemed too sacred for its presence and use. It was an honored
guest at a wedding, a christening, or a funeral. The minister whose
hands were laid in baptismal blessing on babes, or raised in the holy
sacrament of love over brides, lifted also the glass; and the selfsame
lips which had spoken the last words over the dead, drank and made merry
presently afterward among the decanters on the side-board. It mattered
not for what the building was intended--whether for church, school, or
parsonage, rum was the grand master of ceremonies, the indispensable
celebrant at the various stages of its completion. The party who dug the
parson out after a snow-storm, verily got their reward, a sort of
prelibation of the visionary sweets of that land, flowing not, according
to the Jewish notion, with milk and _honey_, but according to the
revised version of Yankeedom, with milk and _rum_. Rum was, forsooth, a
very decent devil, if judged by the exalted character of the company it
kept. It stood high on the rungs of the social ladder and pulled and
pushed men from it by thousands to wretchedness and ruin. So flagrant
and universal was the drinking customs of Boston then that dealers
offered on the commons during holidays, without let or hindrance, the
drunkard's glass to the crowds thronging by extemporized booths and
bars. Shocking as was the excesses of this period "nothing comparatively
was heard on the subject of intemperance--it was seldom a theme for the
essayist--the newspapers scarcely acknowledged its existence, excepting
occasionally in connection with some catastrophes or crimes--the
Christian and patriot, while they perceived its ravages, formed no plans
for its overthrow--and it did not occur to any that a paper devoted
mainly to its suppression, might be made a direct and successful engine
in the great work of reform. Private expostulations and individual
confessions were indeed sometimes made; but no systematic efforts were
adopted to give precision to the views or a bias to the sentiments of
the people." Such was the state of public morals and the state of public
sentiment up to the year 1826, when there occurred a change. This change
was brought about chiefly through the instrumentality of a Baptist city
missionary, the Rev. William Collier. His labors among the poor of
Boston had doubtless revealed to him the bestial character of
intemperance, and the necessity of doing something to check and put an
end to the havoc it was working. With this design he established the
_National Philanthropist_ in Boston, March 4, 1826. The editor was one
of Garrison's earliest acquaintances in the city. Garrison went after
awhile to board with him, and still later entered the office of the
_Philanthropist_ as a type-setter. The printer of the paper, Nathaniel
H. White and young Garrison, occupied the same room at Mr. Collier's.
And so almost before our hero was aware, he had launched his bark upon
the sea of the temperance reform. Presently, when the founder of the
paper retired, it seemed the most natural thing in the world, that the
young journeyman printer, with his editorial experience and ability,
should succeed him as editor. His room-mate, White, bought the
_Philanthropist_, and in April 1828, formally installed Garrison into
its editorship. Into this new work he carried all his moral earnestness
and enthusiasm of purpose. The paper grew under his hand in size,
typographical appearance, and in editorial force and capacity. It was a
wide-awake sentinel on the wall of society; and week after week its
columns bristled and flashed with apposite facts, telling arguments,
shrewd suggestions, cogent appeals to the community to destroy the
accursed thing. No better education could he have had as the preparation
for his life work. He began to understand then the strength of
deep-seated public evils, to acquaint himself with the methods and
instruments with which to attack them. The _Philanthropist_ was a sort
of forerunner, so far as the training in intelligent and effective
agitation was concerned, of the _Genius of Universal Emancipation_ and
of the _Liberator_. One cannot read his sketch of the progress made by
the temperance reform, from which I have already quoted, and published
by him in the _Philanthropist_ in April, 1828, without being struck by
the strong similitude of the temperance to the anti-slavery movement in
their beginnings. "When this paper was first proposed," the young
temperance editor records, "it met with a repulsion which would have
utterly discouraged a less zealous and persevering man than our
predecessor. The moralist looked on doubtfully--the whole community
esteemed the enterprise desperate. Mountains of prejudice, overtopping
the Alps, were to be beaten down to a level--strong interest, connected
by a thousand links, severed--new habits formed; Every house, and almost
every individual, in a greater or less degree, reclaimed. Derision and
contumely were busy in crushing this sublime project in its
birth--coldness and apathy encompassed it on every side--but our
predecessor, nevertheless, went boldly forward with a giant's strength
and more than a giant's heart--conscious of difficulties and perils,
though not disheartened, armed with the weapons of truth--full of
meekness, yet certain of a splendid victory--and relying on the promises
of God for the issue." What an inestimable object-lesson to Garrison was
the example of this good man going forth singlehanded to do battle with
one of the greatest evils of the age! It was not numerical strength, but
the faith of one earnest soul that is able in the world of ideas and
human passions to remove mountains out of the way of the onward march of
mankind. This truth, we may be sure, sunk many fathoms deep into the
mind of the young moralist. And no wonder. For the results of two years
agitation and seed sowing were of the most astonishing character. "The
change which has taken place in public sentiment," he continues, "is
indeed remarkable ... incorporated as intemperance _was_, and still
_is_, into our very existence as a people.... A regenerating spirit is
everywhere seen; a strong impulse to action has been given, which,
beginning in the breasts of a few individuals, and then affecting
villages, and cities, and finally whole States, has rolled onward
triumphantly through the remotest sections of the republic. As union and
example are the levers adopted to remove this gigantic vice, temperance
societies have been rapidly multiplied, many on the principle of entire
abstinence, and others making it a duty to abstain from encouraging the
distillation and consumption of spirituous liquors. Expressions of the
deep abhorrence and sympathy which are felt in regard to the awful
prevalence of drunkenness are constantly emanating from legislative
bodies down to various religious conventions, medical associations,
grand juries, etc., etc. But nothing has more clearly evinced the
strength of this excitement than the general interest taken in this
subject by the conductors of the press. From Maine to the Mississippi,
and as far as printing has penetrated--even among the Cherokee
Indians--but one sentiment seems to pervade the public papers, viz., the
necessity of strenuous exertion for the suppression of intemperance."
Such a demonstration of the tremendous power of a single righteous soul
for good, we may be sure, exerted upon Garrison lasting influences. What
a revelation it was also of the transcendent part which the press was
capable of playing in the revolution of popular sentiment upon moral
questions; and of the supreme service of organization as a factor in
reformatory movements. The seeds sowed were faith in the convictions of
one man against the opinions, the prejudices, and the practices of the
multitude; and knowledge of and skill in the use of the instruments by
which the individual conscience may be made to correct and renovate the
moral sense of a nation. But there was another seed corn dropped at this
time in his mind, and that is the immense utility of woman in the work
of regenerating society. She it is who feels even more than man the
effects of social vices and sins, and to her the moral reformer should
strenuously appeal for aid. And this, with the instinct of genius,
Garrison did in the temperance reform, nearly seventy years ago. His
editorials in the _Philanthropist_ in the year 1828 on "Female
Influence" may be said to be the _courier avant_ of the Woman's
Christian Temperance Union of to-day, as they were certainly the
precursors of the female anti-slavery societies of a few years later.

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