1850

 

As the debate over slavery grows heated, Van Loon boils it down to this: “Both sides pleaded and argued and made a great showing of unselfish patriotism. But both sides knew that there was only one issue, that it was moral rather than economic and that the name thereof was slavery [emphasis added]. (124-361)

 

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“‘All now is uproar,’ wrote [Henry] Clay, ‘confusion, and menace to the existence of the Union and to the happiness and safety of the people.’” Clay was a slave owner, “but he had no great love for slavery.”

 

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September 18: The Fugitive Slave Act is passed. McMaster explains its impact: 

The fugitive slave law gave great offense to the North. It provided that a runaway slave might be seized wherever found, and brought before a United States judge or commissioner. The negro could not give testimony to prove he was not a fugitive but had been kidnapped, if such were the case. All citizens were “commanded,” when summoned, to aid in the capture of a fugitive, and, if necessary, in his delivery to his owner. Fine and imprisonment were provided for anyone who harbored a fugitive or aided in his escape. The law was put in execution at once, and “slave catchers,” “man-hunters,” as they were called, invaded the North. This so excited the people that many slaves when the seized were rescued. Such rescues occurred [the next year] at New York, Boston, Syracuse, and at Ottawa in Illinois.

 

NOTE TO TEACHERS: I had good success asking students to explain the difference, if any, between “law” and “justice.”

 

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“By the Light of My Own Effigies.” 

“[Stephen] Douglas [who had helped work out an agreement for passage of the act] was for the time being bitterly denounced. ‘I could then travel,’ he said at a later day, ‘from Boston to Chicago by the light of my own effigies.’” The Whig Party: “It was said to have ‘died of an attempt to swallow the fugitive slave law.’” (56-378, 391, loose pieces)

 

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“Dripping Fast Away.”

 

In an era long before air conditioning was invented, George P. Morris pens a poem, “New York in the Dog Days,” which appears in Godey’s Lady’s Book.

 

These lines amuse me:

 

Oh, this confounded weather!

    (As someone sung or said),

My pen, though but a feather,

    Is heavier than lead;

At every pore I’m oozing –

    My plumptitude I’m losing,

And dripping fast away. (254)

 

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That same year, Jenny Lind came to America and performed a series of 93 concerts. As Finley writes,

 

Jenny Lind was the first great singer brought here at the height of her fame. And the country went Jenny Lind mad. Glass factories perpetuated the diva’s image in Jenny Lind bottles; a new type of chaise was named in her honor; cabinet-makers designed the Jenny Lind bed; while milliners, modistes, tobacconists and cooks all concocted something new or different and called it Jenny Lind.

 

Not all the music in Godey’s, Finley notes, was to be sung, “some of it was directed at the toes.” Hale “advocated dancing in an era when many people, in fact by far the majority outside of large centers, looked upon it as a sinful pastime invented by the devil.” Hale considered dancing “a healthful exercise conducive to bodily grace.” (255-256)

 

Horace Greeley contributed fiction, Irving, Longfellow, Emerson, Bryant and many more contributed to Godey’s. William Gilmore Simms’s Katherine Walton was serialized in the magazine – and later praised by Professor Vernon Louis Parrington. He particularly liked the character of Lieutenant Porgy, who, says Finley, “took to throwing pots of hot hominy into the faces of persons who displeased him.” Parrington also liked Simms’ inclusion of “a goodly company of blackguards that are an asset to American literature.” Charlotte Cushman’s Extracts from My Journal, Finley also commends. (257)

 

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Charles Coffin writes of this era, that in New England, dancing was still thought of by some as “an invention of the devil. When oyster-suppers came into fashion the old folks opposed them. One woman said oysters would lead to dancing.”  (72/84) 

Fall was a time for gathering apples, making cider, harvesting corn, and for the young to gather for husking parties… “the finding of a red ear entitled the finder the privilege of kissing the prettiest girl in the company.” (72/86)