Anti-Slavery Opinions before the Year 1800 / Read before the Cincinnati Literary Club, November 16, 1872

The author surveys anti-slavery opinion in America before 1800 by examining rare pamphlets, speeches, and society records that articulated moral and political critiques of bondage. He opens with a close description of a notable early American library collection and the character of its volumes, then turns to radical tracts preserved there. A facsimile reprint of a 1791 Baltimore oration against slavery anchors the selection, and excerpts illustrate the rhetoric and reasoning used by early opponents of the institution. The work combines bibliographic description, reproduced texts, and interpretive commentary to map the intellectual currents that informed early abolitionist argumentation.