The New England Impasse

Abstract

By the mid-1850s, black activists had achieved a striking level of political power in New England. In Massachusetts, led by leaders like the lawyer Robert Morris and the physician John S. Rock, they supported the firmly anti-slavery American Party (or Know-Nothings), which sent the radical Henry Wilson to the U.S. Senate. The militant fugitive Lewis Hayden became famous for his defiance of slave-catchers, and was appointed to a State House position by Governor John Andrew. The Dred Scott v. Sandford decision led to the convening of a Massachusetts state convention and then a regional meeting to consider how to pressure Republicans.