American Experience; John Brown's Holy War; Interview with historian James Brewer Stewart, 2 of 5

what about it what a biographical you want to try and understand psychologically do want to try put it into cultural contexts around i mean that's a big question that can be approached in a number of different ways when any kind thinking of brown's hatred of slavery is to reject the bottom of them and it seems to me when you hate slavery that liked his liking i would bad idea it's like loading a relationship thats to her it's hard to imagine us only three people being able to do with them as we will it was hard for john brown to imagine that but he did not have a large free of living in our world he had to see it around

he had had black friends would come apart he had to live in a world where the debate over whether it was right or what it was wrong to exploit people on the basis of their skin color that's a debate that comes to the moral center of who you are if you listen to the debate and if you're a person who in your own life takes family deeply deeply seriously sees yourself as someone who struggles his entire life to make family work and in the process of making family work to find the two rows away from it that's always having to go on without that you have to bring home reports the failure that you can't be the center of something good and hall would make a person like that look to the plantation to think of the family black and white to think of the illegitimacy of the relationship

and deeply deeply personal terms john brown didn't quarrel with slavery john brown he did what slavery meant to him as a human being the exploitation of a the insincerity of it in some ways brown had to be an exploitative in insincere man himself in his own business world and many bar for spent a great deal of time explaining what a duplicitous and two faced man he was when he was trying to sell his were cheap seeing those qualities of yourself more in with your own soul about who we are seeing that there is an institution which is so evil which mirrors your own sense of your own failings with a square the inside of your deeper self with the outside world especially he believes so deeply that god has just got angry god has a providential way of entering the world through human activity would be decades slavery in a way that would be very hard for us to understand that very very much in keeping with someone who would finally

be able to read the book of jeremiah read the book of revelation feels somehow that the plan did indeed need to be perfect with blood and he had to do the business changes and the roots to say the reason they have to go back because i'm like ok you want to go yeah ok that's john brown's hated slavery because of the things that he was forced to see inside of himself that he hated as well one doesn't dislike slavery one doesn't modestly object to slavery in the years before the civil war if one takes the idea of slavery deeply seriously deeply personally the personal and the political goal exactly together brown was a man who valued family valued

his role as a father valued his sense of himself as the sun around which the planet's of his family revolved think about how he would view of plantation think about how he would you see a man like jefferson who would not acknowledge his black family but would reproduce it anyway perhaps by force think of how you would feel about the idea of approving people exploiting people who are your blood can putting their names and bills so this is not to say exactly that this is what all slave holders did that this is what john brown could critique to many of them from doing for doing it he would be right the idea somehow that slavery was the mirror of the things in himself that he whispered from himself and that his own weaknesses in his own sense of the force of his character give him a very sharp moral plants sharper than most americans could

ever want dare to look for is i think twice at the basis of john brown's deep deep get rid of slavery yeah i think that more direct like that's not ok i have to keep learning and i'm grateful for your teaching right right right ok mull course i can't take it in the the underground railroad was to get a sense of what some of raul might've been doing how and i don't know if this is we're going to cut or how dangerous wasn't what was the uss of this is the one world in which john doe was getting a real satisfaction who during the years of business deal that he was able to get at least two was some of that in the law the most important thing to

understand about the underground railroad was that black people and african americans are the only people that trusted other african americans with such difficult and dangerous business as bringing people to freedom it was world about which most whites very little most of the time the idea of challenging all of the problems of slavery on a public level by demanding the immediate emancipation of slavery was one thing the idea of actually making people free one by one with something else quite different all the speeches that one abolitionist made and behalf of abolishing slavery before the civil war freed not a single slate the work that african americans did largely by themselves

to free their relatives their friends their neighbors or anonymous strangers week by week or year by year fried actual human beings in that fundamental way the real work of abolition before the civil war was a secret star not a public story and the importance for brown's involvement as a white in this black enterprise so practical for you could name the names of the people that you've assistant transforming them from pieces of property as seen by the hunt for the real human beings that they were and should be acknowledged as big as a kind of abolitionists of a practical kind of abolitionist which is exactly the sort of abolitionists and the man not involved in the movement in public what i can do best it is like his other business it's the idea of moving goods along

with the idea of being personally connected to other people or you gain that person's trust those are brown strikes brown strives to his charisma his sense that he gives to african americans or for your work in the theater stanza that it can be trusted that he's as good as his word and white world many people see him as not being as good as world as his word when it comes to his business dealings in the world of the underground railroad john brown was able to do real abolitionist business and it can be a great great deal to him beautiful way to the idea of what is essentially moving on to freedom the words were doing but maybe you and do it from the point of view of brown and pop radio having to be trusted in the world where white house i can do you know

the single most important thing to remember about the underground railroad is that it was run almost exclusively by african american people naturally african american people illegally according to american while stealing property from the south made them actually suspicious of outside help from well meaning whites were on it seems was able time again to bridge these barriers distrust of defensiveness of secret yes that the african american community would naturally throw up around their own attempts to turn people from being properly into being human beings they were the practical abolitionists people to make all the speeches they wanted about the injustice of slavery and never freed slave they knew with their own ways of doing things that real

individuals could have their lives transformed to freedom under those conditions to all while white collaboration in the secret business a fugitive slave the liberation square and that brown was able to elicit that trust was able to make others who were naturally suspicious of white feel that he was as good as his word feel that he could understand their situation what world it up with brown in a world of blackness where it seems to me he began to learn the kinds of lessons about slavery that would lead him to kansas that would lead into her creature to get their own song it's by the political leadership one of the difficulties about the connection and how this will ultimately

leave you know this experience when reagan came to where he's going to go because it's the relationship quizzes lars wagner says he's learning as a yes mr golden well that misses that that that he's the reporter and one possible white men working with black people working with black people are often desperate working with what people who have to distrust of white world listening to what african americans would say to each other about their own feelings not about slavery isn't abstract sin but instead about the pain of separation the elation of reuniting the struggle with fear a white world that will incarcerate chief which do because record cause you to be rented a criminal for struggling for her own

and for other people's liberation those are conversations that prompted here those are conversations the ground must have taken and in such a way as to really didn't understand in ways that others could not the textures of african american experience on a partial and one computer screen those kind so experiences are ones deeper soul say well that's the external world that's too bad or one can listen and take those things in and i believe that were grounded that was one understands the crystal horror of slavery from the point of view of those who have to grapple with that constantly daily one can then begin to understand why brown would be subprime to the idea of doing something important doing something dramatic do something big the anti slavery movement had gone on for nearly twenty five thirty years without liberating is like what black people have liberated slaves so going to kansas living in

north pole but getting to know why people very very vividly in that setting more and before conceiving of the idea of harpers ferry off its to my mind with these experiences of working in private with african american people as they engineer their own liberation and gave john brown some idea of what that felt like it must have also given the sense that americans were capable of gasoline so that will do that later on that they might come to me in particular i think that one of the most important lessons of so many abolitionists given to them by their african american associates was their skill the resourcefulness their daring their willingness to take risks the capacity to do things that were unimaginable in the name of freedom in that

sense the lessons that john brown learned in the african american underground railroad where the lessons that on different levels many many people from african americans and the abolitionist movement to travel with frederick douglass for several months as we were terrorists get through ohio where incidentally the nectar is under different levels some of the same kind of work i think one of the great stories that lies in all of this is what white people learned from african american people about life's possibilities the possibilities for courage and for change that always has the romantic side to it that you expect too much you begin to generalize about all people and that's almost a flaw that song was the risk that the window into the african american world struggle with something that african american people were able to convey to whites and many many levels

so brown and the sets had special knowledge but it was not special knowledge that made him unique but part rather of re abolitionist movement that was always going to school the pittsburgh the system can be overwhelming what is it if i were living in new york city or boston and eighteen fifty and if i were an african american i would find myself in a world of crude mantis threats to mcchrystal security my safety might be after eighteen

fifty ad singing to african americans and to many many whites especially to someone like john brown as if the interests of slavery truly kid rule the nation if i were a black man walking down the street in your city i would wonder whether the white coming the other direction that i didn't know would recapture me send it to the sheriff put me a mock trial and then send the south to be insulated as a fugitive if i were john brown i would wonder knowing about my own experiences in the underground railroad prior to that time what that would feel like i would ask a deeper question why was it possible for this labor system has extraordinary economic combine cotton rice called back to so dominate the american economy to be so much the economic base of

american industrialization to reach its tentacles into the economy even want to provide the raw material for the factories of new england to provide the impetus for westward expansion in the south two seem to be moving in tandem with the expansion of the nation itself across the great plains into the southwest into texas i guess myself the question why was it that practically every politician making fifteen seemed to favor slavery seemed to be willing in all cases whatsoever to legislate in favor of flavors interests to be willing to do the bidding of the south and the selection of presidential candidates the creation of supreme court appointments the development of economic policies the shaping of diplomacy it has the united states looked out towards the caribbean and central and latin america the idea that somehow there was a terrible expanding

conspiring and evil slave power and politics seems to me to be the most important feeling and well documented few months the people that the united states was literally becoming a slave republic where the interests of the master class the planters a very small number of white southerners were very privileged and owen great amounts of land great amounts of wealth great numbers of people dictated the destination freedom of everyone and ultimately to move a little further in the eighteen fifties could say as judge tanya did in the supreme court decision of the dred scott case that slavery had a right to expand anywhere and the republicans wanted to go and the black man had no rights that white men are bound to respect it we are

doing and why the quest to appease that overwhelming sense that when we were creating one might look like it was going to turn to when a slave an immensely proud of them ok to use or toward the us to say ok i got it the news right i got ok i'll do with bristol or nets are not much more compact who was it but it's really good with well the frozen teaching said that the subprime mess although i understand i like to

write i understand that you go to court decision at fifty four i know i know i do things which would object if i were black man at fifty thinking about america thinking about the united states i would feel deeply threatened deeply depressed if i were fifty years old during the time that i've been why i would've seen let's start from all ok sure if i were john brown looking at america teaching fifty i would feel angry and i would feel deeply deeply disturbed and distressed during my lifetime i would have seen the size of slaveholding america double double again i would've seen the population of those enslaved rise from one point seven five million to nearly three million i would've seen westward expansion dictated

by southern interests i would've seen american politics dominated by slave owners presidential candidate supreme court appointments legislation i would've been deeply disturbed by the new fugitive slave act which basically turned three african american people into targets of opportunity for slave catchers reading the no rights of any kind to speak to defend their own freedom against kidnapping and being sent south i would ask myself what has twenty five years or twenty years of abolitionist education and the answer that i would've given his that has accomplished very very little and that the slave power as john brown would call it rules american politics and that the united states itself is now a large he would use this term over and over to a slave auction it's b

right so the three or four times you use your ears there was i would talk a job they are able to use them see that that this is so this is the song contra do with historians working for me do that i'm coaching if i got a job and i don't get it and when miami a fugitive slave this is its ancestors layla ok with not just for an update in nineteen fifties john brown would look at the united states and john brown with an anchor john brown was angry eighteen fifty for very very good reasons for his product during his lifetime the anti slavery movement had not liberated a

single slave with all the speeches and all of its education instead the size of the republic occupied by slave plantations and slave mastered masters had doubled and doubled again the slave population of the south had grown from about a million to close to two and a half million the power of slave reason interests in politics seemed over and over again to dictate who would be president of the united states who would be nominated to the supreme court how legislative decisions would be rendered how politics would be done in eighteen fifty many people besides brown but certainly brown himself as he said over and over again it feared and believe deeply that the united states was not be coming but indeed had become a slave aaker says not a democracy not a place where the popular will of the majority of its citizens determined the destiny of the nation

but were rather a small clique of depraved and highly organized planters man of great wealth great power great moral bankruptcy time to the united states from its democratic heritage to something evil aristocratic corrupt polluted air and despicable that would be john brown's view of america but then i didn't know they look at this as young alleges that the ability to be in yellow face the fifties and some level is a period when people started to become ready to that fight for their beliefs and

eighty the aristocratic common thing about the arab world actually closer to just one we're trying to cope with ok i'm sorry