Oldal 146 [146]
CANADIAN LANDSCAPES/ PAYSAGES CANADIENS
The Colored American also supported unequivocally the British military
response to the uprisings. It urged Black Canadians to support the Crown. Its
contributors also expressed definitively the stakes for Black Americans were
the British to vacate North America. Could they continue embracing the
principles of republicanism as expressed in the Declaration of Independence
yet deny support for a neighboring population’s efforts to effectuate them? It
seems they could.
The Colored American was predated by The Weekly Advocate, founded in
January 1837. The paper’s name change took effect in March 1837 when Sam¬
uel Cornish succeeded the original founders as editor. His aim for his acqui¬
sition was to make it a forum for Black issues, stressing the necessity for inde¬
pendent Black voices in a Black press.
Because our afflicted population in the free states are scattered in handfuls over
nearly 5000 towns and can only be reached by the press—a public journal must
therefore be sent down, at least weekly to rouse them up. To call all their energies
into action—and where they have been down trodden, paralyzed and worn out, to
create new energies for them [...] because without such an organ we can never en¬
list the sympathy of the nation in our behalf [...] it is ours to will and do... (Ripley
216-217).
The newspaper challenged Garrison’s authority on antislavery and often tack¬
led subjects deemed too inflammatory for reform-minded whites. Initially the
paper succeeded. In one year, its editions, usually 4-6 pages, amassed over
1800 subscribers. It even attracted white abolitionist financial support and
circulated across many states, across the Atlantic to Britain, and south to
Jamaica and Haiti.
Yet, the newspaper did not attract as many Black subscribers as its editors
thought fitting. In 1838, the paper reported that, although it was selling more
than 2000 copies a week, if our people be taken as a body, and their patriotism
judged by their support of the ONLY PAPER conducted by themselves, and
consecrated to their interests, every intelligent mind would say they mostly
deserve to be slaves” (“Our Noble Committee”). With this guilt-inducing
broadside the paper’s leaders hoped to stimulate Black readership.
The next years proved chaotic. Changes in ownership, editorial disputes and
financial problems abounded. In 1838, proprietorship passed to a 28-member
Committee of Publication, chaired by Thomas L. Jinnings, a well-known Black
activist in New York City. Attempts to publish a Philadelphia edition failed. A
libel suit weakened the paper, too. By March 1840 Charles B. Ray, a minister
and former sales agent, was publishing the newspaper solo from his office.
During its short life, the paper was combative, attacking Garrisonians for
rejecting political action against slavery. It lambasted the American Moral
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