140 How the US Became an Antislavery Nation

In The Past Lane - The Podcast About History and Why It Matters

This week at In The Past Lane, the American History podcast, we learn about the long political struggle before the Civil War to rid the US of slavery. I speak with historian Graham Peck, author of Making an Antislavery Nation: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Battle over Freedom. It’s a fascinating conversation about how during the 70 years between the ratification of the Constitution and the Civil War, opponents of slavery gradually pushed the US to become an antislavery nation. But as Peck makes clear, this was no easy task, as proponents of slavery demanded its protection and pushed for its expansion.

In the course of our discussion, Graham Peck discusses:

How political struggles between antislavery and proslavery settlers in Illinois in the 1820s presaged the national debates over slavery in the 1840s and 1850s.

How and why antislavery leaders were content to leave slavery alone where it existed, but were adamantly opposed to allowing its extension into the American west.

Why the controversy generated by the Kansas-Nebraska Act proved to be a key tipping point in the mobilization and unification of political antislavery into what became the Republican Party.

How Abraham Lincoln emerged at this time as a leading advocate of what Peck calls an “antislavery nationalism” that argued that the US had been founded upon the principles of universal freedom with an eye toward to eventual eradication of slavery.

And that this position was actually conservative, and that it was proslavery activists who wanted to expand slavery who were the radicals who threatened the nation’s wellbeing.

Recommended reading:

Graham Peck, Making an Antislavery Nation: Lincoln, Douglas, and the Battle over Freedom (Univ. Illinois Press, 2017)

Anna-Lisa Cox, The Bone and Sinew of the Land: America's Forgotten Black Pioneers and the Struggle for Equality

Andrew Delbanco, The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul from the Revolution to the Civil War Eric Foner, Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men: The Ideology of the Republican Party before the Civil War

Manisha Sinha, The Slave's Cause: A History of Abolition

More info about Graham Peck - website

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Music for This Episode

Jay Graham, ITPL Intro (JayGMusic.com)

Kevin McCleod, “Impact Moderato” (Free Music Archive)

Andy Cohen, “Trophy Endorphins” (Free Music Archive) Borrtex, Perceptions

Jon Luc Hefferman, “Winter Trek” (Free Music Archive)

The Bell, “I Am History” (Free Music Archive)

Production Credits

Executive Producer: Lulu Spencer

Technical Advisors: Holly Hunt and Jesse Anderson

Podcasting Consultant: Dave Jackson of the School of Podcasting

Podcast Editing: Wildstyle Media

Photographer: John Buckingham

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