Liberty Is the Object of All Men

ONE OF THE MOST INTERESTING DOCUMENTS at the Illinois State Archives is an 1822 petition sent by free African Americans to the Illinois General Assembly.1 The signers of the petition asked for the right to male suffrage and for equal protections under the law. The petition took courage to sign, and it shows that African Americans were not passive bystanders in the fight for civil rights and an end to slavery in the pre–Civil War era.In 1822 Illinois was embroiled in a campaign to make it a slave state. Slavery had existed in Illinois since French settlers arrived in the area in the 1700s, and although Illinois entered the union in 1818 as a nominally free state, the 1820 census showed that it contained at least 660 enslaved people, with that number probably closer to 1,000. It also contained approximately 450 free African Americans in a state with a population of roughly 51,000. Antislavery activists defeated the attempt to formally make Illinois a slave state, but enslaved people would be held in bondage in Illinois until the 1840s.2The petition, whose faded signature page reveals roughly thirty now mostly illegible signatures, called for stronger laws to prevent violence against the free Black community. At the time, free African Americans in Illinois were facing increased abuse and threats to their livelihoods. This included an increase in slave catchers coming into the state to capture them and sell them into bondage out of state. The state's discriminatory 1819 Black laws severely restricted the rights of free African Americans in Illinois, including banning them from testifying against whites in court. The state's constitution banned African Americans from voting and placed other restrictions on them as well.The petitioners’ solution to the problem was to request male suffrage, which they felt would give them protection and redress against the abuses they were facing. The petitioners, however, noted, “We disclaim any pretensions of equality with the whites, but in political justice.” The need to add that they were not requesting social equality reflected the prevailing attitude of the times. Opposition to slavery in Illinois did not translate into support for equal rights for free African Americans.The petition was submitted to state representative George Churchill, an antislavery advocate from Madison County, who introduced it in the house. Later, when he opposed making Illinois a slave state, his opponents would use the petition as evidence that he favored equality among the races, a sin in nineteenth-century Illinois.3 Churchill would deny this charge, stating he introduced the petition in recognition of the right of all citizens to petition their government. In a letter to the Edwardsville Spectator, he wrote that he agreed the laws against kidnapping free African Americans were insufficient but he didn't support the request for suffrage. He wrote “the latter parts of the memorial I considered unreasonable and improper.”4Governor Edward Coles was another antislavery activist. A native of Virginia, he freed his slaves upon his arrival in Illinois and provided them with land and work in Illinois. In his inaugural address to the state legislature in December 1822, he called for the abolition of slavery in Illinois and more effective laws to prevent the kidnappings of African Americans. He also called for revisions to the state's Black laws which he found discriminatory and unfair.However, Coles did not mention the petition or suffrage for free African Americans, even though a copy of the petition first appeared in the Edwardsville Spectator the previous October. And, he went on to state, “I should not be for holding out any particular encouragement for the emigration of free negroes to the State, as they are the kind of population not to be desired.” Coles, who also supported the colonization of free African Americans out of the country, did add “the duty of society, as well as every benevolent feeling, demands of us to protect them as long as they remain among us, especially in the enjoyment of the inestimable right of personal liberty,” which could be interpreted as wanting African Americans out of Illinois but granting them citizen rights such as suffrage while they remained.5In this environment, the petition never stood a chance of being acted upon. It was sent to a select committee in the house, which had been set up to address the governor's proposals as they related to the kidnapping of free African Americans and the abolition of slavery. The majority report of the committee supported abolishing slavery, called the laws punishing the kidnapping of free African Americans insufficient, and called for the revision of the state's discriminatory 1819 Black laws. However, the committee chose not to act on the petition for suffrage, with the majority report calling it a Constitutional question. The majority report added that the general assembly needed to pass laws to “prevent the emigration of coloured persons in this state.”6The life of free African Americans in Illinois would remain precarious throughout the duration of national slavery. While the bid to make Illinois a slave state was voted down in 1824, the state's discriminatory Black laws would become increasingly harsh and would not be repealed until 1865. African American men would not achieve suffrage until 1870.The petition presented by free Black persons in 1822 serves as one of several examples of African Americans protesting inequality in Illinois and the nation prior to the Civil War. The names of the signers of the petition have mostly been lost to history, although efforts are being made to learn more about them. Operating at a time of intense discrimination and bias, they filed a petition with the Illinois General Assembly in the belief that, as stated in the petition, “Liberty is the object of all men.”