A group of two (2) important anti-slavery pamphlets. Works include: 

1. Charles Sumner. The Crime Against Kansas. The Apologies for the Crime. The True Remedy. Speech of Hon. Charles Sumner. Boston: John P. Jewett & Co.; Cleveland, Ohio: Jewett, Proctor & Worthington; and New York: Sheldon, Blakeman & Co., 1856.

8vo, 95 pages. Original blue wrappers. First Boston edition. Dumond p. 107;LCP, Afro-Americana 9996; Sabin 93647.

Provenance: New England Historic Genealogical Society, Boston, MA (withdrawn stamp to front wrapper). 

An early printing of Sumner's consequential diatribe against pro-slavery forces in Kansas. One of the most severe and acidic anti-slavery discourses of the period, he compared slavery expansion into the new States as “the rape of a virgin territory” and as a transparent attempt at building the pro-slavery voting bloc in Congress. The speech so incensed southerners that South Carolina Congressman Preston Smith Brooks attacked Sumner to the point of unconsciousness on the floor of the Senate two days later. The incident highlighted increasing irreconcilability between the North and South over the issue of slavery and is considered a catalytic event leading to the outbreak of the Civil War.

Sabin notes the Washington issue published by Buell & Blanchard as the first issue, but this Boston edition was likely printed nearly simultaneously. An important addition to any abolition collection. 

2. William H. Bissell. The Slave Question. Speech of Mr. William H. Bissell, of Illinois, in the House of Representatives, Thursday, February 21, 1850, in the Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union, on the Resolutions referring the President’s Annual Message to the Appropriate Standing Committees. Washington D.C.: Buell & Blanchard, [1850]. 8vo, 8 pages. Caption title. FIRST EDITION. Dumond p. 28; LCP, Afro-Americana, 1228; Sabin 5637. 

A blistering anti-slavery address in the House of Representatives by one of Congress’s most ardent abolitionists. Bissell was hailed as a hero for resisting Southern attempts to sway Illinois and for his opposition to secession. Such was his influence that there was at one point serious talk of solving “The Slave Question” by way of a duel between himself and Jefferson Davis. 

Uncommon. Only two copies have sold at auction. 

[African Americana, African American History, Black History, Slavery, Enslavement, Abolition, Emancipation] [Pamphlets, Publications, Ephemera, Books, Rare Books, Tracts]