club was formed at Danville, then, as now, a cultured community. This club numbered twenty-nine of the most prominent men of that day in the district. The club debated all the important questions then before the country. At a meeting held prior to the adoption by the states of the constitution of the United States, which was then before them for ratification or rejection, the club resolved that the clause of the proposed constitution which provided that congress should pass no act prohibiting the importation of slaves prior to 1808, should be expunged. The club was agreed that congress should deal with the odious business at any time and as soon as it saw fit to do so.

The first constitution of the state distinctly showed a prejudice against the commerce in slaves. It ordained that they should not be brought into the state as merchandise and none were to be brought in that were imported into America subsequent to 1789. It was also recommended that the legislature should enact laws (which it did) permitting the emancipation of slaves under the limitation that they should not become a charge upon the county in which they lived. Thus at the very beginning of the state the difficulties of the slavery problem were already vexing the minds of Kentuckians, busy as they were with their immediate and pressing needs. Rev. Daniel Rice, an eminent Presbyterian minister, was a member of this constitutional convention and advocated a resolution for the gradual extinction of slavery. This resolution was not adopted but it had warm sympathy and support.

In 1798, the general assembly passed an act in which good treatment was enjoined upon the master, and all contracts between master and slave were positively forbidden. The execution of this law was within the jurisdiction of the county courts which were directed to admonish the master for any ill-treatment of his slave. If persisted in, the court had

the option and the power to declare free the abused slave. Moderate chastisement, as in the punishment of children, was not considered ill-treatment. Under this same law white men could be sold into temporary slavery for vagrancy, or for being without visible. means of support and making no effort to better their condition. The whites thus sold were placed upon the same footing as the colored slave, but the purchase of a white vagrant by a colored person or an Indian was expressly forbidden.

As early as 1799, Henry Clay was an avowed advocate of the emancipation of slaves and the abolishment of the institution of slavery. There were many people then in the state who were averse to slavery from scruples of conscience, and from the conviction that it would prove a great social and political evil to the country.

men.

In 1804, a formidable movement against slavery was begun under the leadership of six prominent Baptist ministers: David Barrow, Carter Tarrent, John Sutton, Donald Holmes, Jacob Gregg and George Smith, together with several other ministers of less importance and a considerable number of Baptist laymen, the Baptist church at that time being the most influential church organization in the state. There was no mistaking the purpose of these None of the Abolitionists of later days were more outspoken or stronger of speech. They openly declared for the abolition of slavery, alleging that no church fellowship should be had with slave-holders, as in principle and practice slavery was a sinful and abominable system fraught with peculiar evils and miseries which every good man should condemn. These earnest men are known in the records of that time as "Emancipators" but they called themselves "Friends of Humanity." The Baptist Associations of the state adopted resolutions declaring it improper for ministers, churches or religious associations to meddle with the question of the emancipation of

slaves or with any other political questions. The "Emancipators" thereupon withdrew from the General Baptist Union, and in 1807 formed an association of their own called "The Baptist Licking-Locust Association of the Friends of Humanity" but despite this formidable title and the objects of their association, they accomplished nothing and soon ceased to be heard of. But they had marked the beginning of the outspoken opposition to slavery which had a slow but sure growth in the following years. At this time, slavery

had become an interest and a sentiment in Kentucky too deep-rooted and entwined in every branch and fiber of the commonwealth to be dissevered and torn away by any means less than the horrors of the war that was to come to divide and distract Kentucky and send her valiant sons forth to meet each other in deadly strife upon the field of battle.

Agitation of the slavery question was little heard of after the failure of the "Friends of Humanity" to reach any practical results, until 1833, when, on March 23d of that year, the Kentucky Colonization Society sent from Louisville to Liberia, Africa, 102 manumitted. slaves from the counties of Logan, Adair, Bourbon, Fayette, and Mercer, paying $2,300 for their passage in the brig "Ajax" from New Orleans. This same year the general assembly prohibited the importation of slaves into the state, except when brought by bona fide emigrants, or where they were inherited by actual residents of the state.

In 1836, Rev. John C. Young, a distinguished Presbyterian minister, in a pamphlet of sixty-four pages, made a strong argument for gradual emancipation. In this year, also, the Kentucky Annual Conference of the Methodist Episcopal church unanimously resolved against any interference with the subject of emancipation but at the same time, commended the rectitude, policy and operations of the American Colonization Society.

July 31, 1837, "the Abolition press" of

In

James G. Birney, was "carefully destroyed" as the chronicles of that period stated, at New Richmond, Ohio, on the north side of the Ohio river be it noted. James G. Birney was a native of Kentucky, who was born at Danville in 1792, and who had the distinction of being the first candidate for the presidency of the United States on an anti-slavery ticket. 1833, he aided in the formation of the American Colonization Society, of which he was chosen president, he being at the same time a professor in the faculty of Center College at Danville, Ky. Birney's views were at first conservative, then progressive, and rapidly changed to anti-slavery of the most demonstrative kind. In 1834, in a letter addressed to the public, he advocated immediate emancipation, at the same time illustrating his consistency by setting free his own slaves. He then removed to Cincinnati where he established The Philanthropist, a paper of a type which prudence prohibited him from publishing in Kentucky. So far in advance of the thought of the day, even in the free state of Ohio, was the Philanthropist, that, as has been stated, Birney's press was thrown into the river, but nothing daunted, with the courage of his convictions, he revived the publication of his paper in connection with a Dr. Bailey who shared his views on the slavery question. Birney was first nominated for the presidency in 1840 by the Liberty, or Abolition, party, and a second time in 1844 by the same party. It is claimed by students of political history that at the election he drew from the Whig party enough votes to lose the state of New York to Mr. Clay, thereby causing the election. of Mr. Polk to the presidency. Birney was "the voice of one crying in the wilderness," preaching a doctrine destined to lead to a dreadful war and to the signing, years afterwards, by another Kentuckian, of a proclamation of emancipation. tion of emancipation. Did he dream, as he saw his press and type sink beneath the waves of the Ohio in 1837 and the hopes of Mr. Clay

for the presidency vanish into thin air in 1844, that in a few short years, though he would have passed to his fathers, the aim of his life would have been accomplished and freedom proclaimed for all men? How little men know in the midst of their struggles for a principle, how wide-spread the effect of their efforts may become.

In October, 1839, Rev. John B. Mahan, a citizen of Ohio, was indicted in Mason county, Kentucky, for kidnapping slaves. Governor Vance of Ohio delivered him to the Kentucky authorities, on the requisition of Governor Clark, for trial in this state. At his trial, it was proven that fifteen slaves had passed through his hands, by what was known in those days as the "underground railway," but he was acquitted on the ground that the alleged offense was committed in Ohio, and that the courts of Kentucky had no jurisdiction of offenses committed in other states.

In the same year, the legislature exempted from taxation for public schools the property of free negroes, and adopted resolutions complimentary to the state of Illinois for the adoption by the legislature of that state of resolutions "condemning interference in the domestic institutions of the slave-holding states, either by congress or the state legislatures, as contrary to the compact by which those states became members of the Union, highly reprehensible, unpatriotic and injurious to the peace and stability of the Union." In this same year the Ohio legislature passed an act, by a vote of twenty-three to eleven in the senate and fifty-three to fifteen in the house, providing punishment for the abduction or aiding in the abduction or escape of slaves by a fine not exceeding $500, or imprisonment not exceeding sixty days, the culprit to be also liable to the aggrieved person for all damages, and a court of that state enforced this law in 1839 by convicting and punishing Rev. John B. Mahan, the same man who had escaped conviction in a

Kentucky court for a like offense for lack of jurisdiction.

In 1843, Wharton Jones, of Kentucky, obtained a judgement before Judge McLean and a jury in the United States circuit court at Cincinnati, against John Van Zant of Warren county, Ohio, for $1,200 damages for having abducted his slaves. Another and like action, tried a few days later under the same penal statute, resulted in a fine of $500 being assessed against Van Zant who was defended in each of these cases by Salmon P. Chase, then a young lawyer, but who was destined to play a great part in the future history of the country, finally dying as chief justice of the supreme court of the United States with unsatisfied ambition as his heart was set on the presidency as had been that of Clay, Webster, Calhoun, Blaine and other prominent men, who were destined never to reach that exalted position.

One of Kentucky's sons who was to play a leading part in the agitation attendant upon the slavery question was Cassius M. Clay of Bourbon, a distant relative of Henry Clay. He was a fearless man, inperious, determined and able. In after years, he was known as "The Old Lion of Whitehall" the name of his estate. August 1, 1843, while making an abolition speech at Russell's Cave in Fayette county, Mr. Clay was attacked by a man named Samuel M. Brown, who fired a pistol at him, the bullet striking him just beneath the fifth rib, where it was deflected by contact with a bowie-knife worn by the speaker whose life was thus saved. Mr. Clay returned Brown's attack, cutting him severely with his bowie-knife inflicting injuries from which it was thought he would die, but he finally recovered.

June 4, 1845, Cassius M. Clay began at Lexington the publication of the True American, a newspaper in which he ably advocated the abolition of slavery. On August 14th of that

year, at a meeting of citizens held at the court house in Lexington, Benjamin W. Dudley, Thomas H. Waters and John W. Hunt, were appointed as a committee "to wait upon Cassius M. Clay, editor of the True American, and to request him to discontinue its publication, as its further continuance, in our judgement, is dangerous to the peace of our community and to the safety of our homes and families." The meeting then adjourned to meet again on the following day and receive the report of its committee.

To the committee's note, informing him of the action of the meeting, Mr. Clay, from a bed of sickness of more than a month's standing, wrote a defiant and characteristic reply. No man ever drove Cassius M. Clay to do that which he did not wish to do. At the adjourned meeting this reply was read, whereupon a call was issued "for a general meeting of the people of the city and county to be held on Monday, August 18th, at the court house, to take into consideration the most effectual steps to secure their interests from the efforts of abolition fanatics and incendiaries." At this, which was presided over by Waller M. Bullock, with Benjamin Gratz as secretary, and attended by a large concourse of people from Fayette and the adjoining counties, another communication was received from Mr. Clay and read to those assembled. Thomas F. Marshall, one of Kentucky's great orators, delivered an address setting forth the incendiary character of Mr. Clay's paper, at the conclusion of which he submitted six resolutions which were adopted. It was the sixth of these resolutions which was the important one, since it proposed and produced results. Under its provisions a committee of sixty prominent citizens was appointed and authorized to proceed to the office of the True American, take possession of the press and printing material, pack up the same, place it at the railroad office for transportation to Cincinnati and report forthwith to the meeting."

Reaching the door of the office of the offending newspaper, the key to the door was given by the city marshal to the chairman of the citizens' committee. the citizens' committee. The mayor of the city was also present and gave notice to the members of the committee that they "were acting in opposition to law, but that the city authorities could offer no forcible resistance to them." The names of the committeemen were called and each of them was admitted to the office. "On motion of Major William McKee, it was resolved that the committee held itself responsible for anything which might be lost or destroyed whilst they were performing the duty assigned to them." Printers were appointed to take down the press and put up the type, the secretary making an inventory of the property as it was packed up. The desk containing Mr. Clay's private papers was, by unanimous resolution, sent to his home, and he was notified by letter, that the press, type and other paraphernalia of the True American had been carefully put up and shipped by railroad and river steamer to Cincinnati, to the care of Messrs. January & Taylor, and that all charges and expenses had been paid. It will be observed that Mr. Clay received notice of the departure of his property, "by letter." That was the safest method of conveying information to Mr. Clay when his feelings were ruffled. The committee of sixty was on September 18th following, arraigned before Judge Trotter of the Lexington city court, on a riot charge, the jury promptly returning a verdict of "not guilty."

Among the sixty prominent men serving on this committee was George W. Johnson, of Scott county, who was to become the provisional governor of Kentucky under the Confederate regime, twenty years later, and to fall on Shiloh's desperate field fighting bravely by the side of his Kentucky comrades. James B. Clay was another member of the committee. He was the son of Henry Clay, the real "Great Commoner," and afterwards a Democratic

member of congress from the historic Ashland district. Another was William R. McKee, who, a few years later, was to fall at the head of the regiment of Kentuckians whom he commanded at the battle of Buena Vista, during the War with Mexico.

In 1845, Miss Delia A. Webster of Vermont was arrested and confined in the jail at Lexington charged with abducting slaves and aiding in their escape across the Ohio river. The proof against her was absolute, and her conviction and sentence to the penitentiary for a term of two years followed. But she was a woman and the jury, with characteristic Kentucky recognition of the sex, unanimously signed a petition addressed to Governer Owsley praying that he pardon her. After she had spent a short time in quiet meditation in the prison, a pardon was granted, and Miss Webster returned to her home, doubtless impressed with the danger attendant upon interference with the affairs of other people. Her companion and accomplice, Rev. Calvin Fairbanks, was less fortunate, and received a sentence of fifteen years in the penitentiary. These people were doubtless very honest, good people, who thought they were rendering service to God and humanity. As a matter of fact, they were merely fanatics and were really injuring rather than aiding, the cause in which they had enlisted.

In October, 1845, Rev. Alexander M. Cowan, agent of the Kentucky Colonization Society, collected $5,000 with which to aid in purchasing a district forty miles square in Africa, to be called "Kentucky in Liberia," as a home for colored colonists from Kentucky. The first freed slaves for the proposed colony left Louisville January 7, 1846. This Liberian experiment has not proven a success, nor yet wholly a failure. At a comparatively recent date the government of the United States was listening to appeals for assistance from residents and officials of the Negro Republic. The negro supplies a problem wherever he

may be, and the wisest statesmanship has not yet answered the question of what shall be done with him. In the absence of a final solution, the experiment of letting him alone is suggested to the selfish politicians who have exploited him for their own ends.

On the night of August 5, 1848, thirteen slaves escaped in a body from Mason county, crossing the river into Ohio. At about the same time forty-two slaves from Fayette and Bourbon counties attempted to escape. In an effort to capture them, which was made in Bracken county, resistance was shown and one of them shot and dangerously wounded one of the white pursuers named Charles H. Fowler. The negroes scattered, but all were finally captured. It is interesting to note that one of these negroes was the slave of Cassius M. Clay, who failed to practice what he preached in his newspaper. The leader of this party was a white man named Patrick Doyle, who had bargained to take each of them to a place of safety for $10 each. He was arrested, taken to Lexington, tried and sentenced to twenty years imprisonment for enticing away slaves.

On February 3, 1849, the Kentucky house of representatives, by a unanimous vote, adopted a resolution declaring "that we, the representatives of the people of Kentucky, are opposed to the abolition of slavery in any form or shape whatever, except as now provided for in the constitution and laws of the State." This resolution, however, was not adopted by the senate.

On February 12, 1849, an enthusiastic emancipation meeting was held in Maysville and on the following day, a similar meeting was held in Louisville. These meetings were the beginning of an earnest and exciting contest for the election of delegates to a convention to revise the constitution of the state and the gradual emancipation of the slaves formed. for months the leading topic of public, private and newspaper discussion. On February 23,