“Slavery is an evil of Colossal Magnitude.”

— John Adams

Letter http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/99-02-02-7261 to William Tudor, Jr., 20 November 1819. Partially quoted in Founding Brothers : The Revolutionary Generation (2000) by Joseph J. Ellis, p. 240 <br class="br">1810s <br class="br">Context: I Shall not pause to consider whether my Opinion will be popular or unpopular with the Slave Holders, or Slave Traders, in the Northern the Middle, the Southern, or the Western, States—I respect all those who are necessarily subjected to this Evil.—But Negro Slavery is an evil of Colossal Magnitude. … I am therefore utterly averse to the admission of Slavery into the Missouri Territory, and heartily wish that every Constitutional measure may be adopted for the preservation of it.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Slavery is an evil of Colossal Magnitude." by John Adams?

John Adams202

2nd President of the United States 1735–1826

Related quotes

“Slavery is an evil of the first magnitude, ... and contrary to all the genuine principles of Christianity, and yet carried on by men denominated thereby.”

Ottobah Cugoano (1757–1791) African abolitionist in England

Source: Thoughts and Sentiments on the Evil of Slavery (1787), p. 24

“The great national and political revolution of '76 set the seal to the liberties of North America. And but for one evil, and that of immense magnitude, which the constitutional provision we have been considering does not fairly reach — I allude to negro slavery and the degradation of our coloured citizens — we could foresee for the whole of this magnificent country a certain future of uniform and peaceful improvement.”

Frances Wright (1795–1852) American activist

Independence Day speech (1828)

“Enjoying things which are pleasant; that is not the evil: it is the reducing of our moral self to slavery by them that is.”

Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish philosopher, satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher

1840s, Heroes and Hero-Worship (1840), The Hero as Prophet

“Ignorance is the parent of bigotry, intolerance, persecution and slavery. Inform and instruct mankind; and these evils will be excluded.”

Richard Price (1721–1791) Welsh nonconformist preacher and radical

Source: A Discourse on the Love of Our Country (1789), p. 13

“What was lost sight of was that the evil of the past, whether of slavery or of Jim Crow, was evil not because it was done by whites to blacks, but because it was done by some human beings to other human beings. The purpose of the law was to end evil acts”

Harry V. Jaffa (1918–2015) American historian and collegiate professor

1990s, The Party of Lincoln vs. The Party of Bureaucrats (1996)
Context: Suddenly, however, remedies for something called 'racism' became the order of the day. The word itself, like 'sexism', is of recent coinage and will not be found in any older dictionaries. The civil rights movement, premised upon individual rights, suddenly became the black power movement, premised upon group rights. 'Affirmative action' became a euphemism for the baldest kind of racial discrimination. That whites had long enjoyed preference over blacks was now taken to be a justification for blacks having preference over whites. What was lost sight of was that the evil of the past, whether of slavery or of Jim Crow, was evil not because it was done by whites to blacks, but because it was done by some human beings to other human beings. The purpose of the law was to end evil acts, not continue them in the guise of 'affirmative action'.

“All human life is a struggle against the shackles of evil, against the slavery of sin, in order to regain true freedom.”

Robert Sarah (1945) Roman Catholic bishop

God or Nothing: A Conversation on Faith (2015)

“It was recognized as a necessary evil at the time, and the justification for the ratification of the Constitution with slavery is that any alternative arrangement would have been more favorable to slavery than the Constitution itself. The Constitution created a government strong enough to deal with the question of slavery when it became what it did become in 1860.”

Harry V. Jaffa (1918–2015) American historian and collegiate professor

2000s, The Real Abraham Lincoln: A Debate (2002), Q&A

“We know most of our forefathers, all of our main Founding Fathers, were against slavery, recognized the evils of it.”

Kayleigh McEnany (1988) American political commentator and writer

Quoted by * 2021-07-06
Kayleigh McEnany Falsely Claims All The ‘Main Founding Fathers’ Opposed Slavery
Source: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/kayleigh-mcenany-false-slavery-claim_n_60e4986ae4b06fb1a6f0128d

“Two magnitudes whether commensurable or incommensurable, balance at distances reciprocally proportional to the magnitudes.”

Archimedes book On the Equilibrium of Planes

Book 1, Propositions 6 & 7, The Law of the Lever.
On the Equilibrium of Planes

“If the moral approval of religious people were withdrawn from the system of individualism, it could be quickly transformed. Just as the churches belatedly called slavery a sin, and later religious institutions pronounced war to be the world's colossal sin, religious institutions should now declare that sanctioning and supporting the profit system is sin.”

Kirby Page (1890–1957) American clergyman

Individualism and Socialism (1933)

“Slavery is an evil of Colossal Magnitude.”

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

John Adams202

Related quotes

Related topics