Declaration of the Anti-Slavery Convention

Credit: Library of Congress
Media type: broadside
Museum Number: Portfolio 153, Folder 26
Annotation: Sixty abolitionist leaders from ten states met in Philadelphia in 1833 to create a national organization to bring about the immediate emancipation of all slaves. This organization was named the American Anti-slavery Society, and the participants elected officers and adopted a constitution and declaration. , The declaration was drafted by William Lloyd Garrison, and it pledged its members to work for emancipation through non-violent actions of “moral suasion,” or “the overthrow of prejudice by the power of love.” The society encouraged public lectures, publications, civil disobedience, and the boycott of cotton and other slave-manufactured products.
Year: 1833