Henry Laurens and His Antislavery Thought in Revolutionary America

Henry Laurens and His Antislavery Thought in Revolutionary America


Laurens’s view on slavery is also worth historians to explore. Focusing on the correspondence letters between John Laurens and his father Henry Laurens, Gregory D. Massey examines their antislavery thoughts and believed that their views on slavery were limited in the revolutionary Lower South. According to him, John Laurens “stood alone both in his willingness to attack slavery directly and in his belief that blacks shared a similar nature with whites.” Although Henry Laurens noticed the evils of the slavery institution in South Carolina, he “doubted that blacks could aspire to equality in a republican society, which included the imperative to bear arms in its defense” and “preferred an indirect approach and change ‘by gradual Steps,’ which eventually produced no change at all.

Finally, he chose to retreat into the role of patriarchal master rather than to act in a way that would produce reform. Though Lauren disliked slavery in southern colonies, he could not summon up his courage to abolish it. After all, he was a planter who owned various plantations, which relied on slave labors.

Although these historians have greatly helped us to understand Lauren’s world, the history of South Carolina, as well as American revolutionary history in the 18th century, rarely have they explore his Enlightenment thinking. In my proposal, focusing on Henry Laurens, I would like to explore the characteristics of the American Enlightenment in South Carolina.