In my earlier blog about the movement away from the authoritarianism of the antebellum south, there were many heroes. Prominent figures, well known in our history… journalists like Horace Greely and ultimately Abraham Lincoln… championed the antislavery and anti-authoritarian causes in the years before and during the Civil War.
In the narrative that I cited from Heather Cox Richardson, though, the movement congealed as ordinary Americans gathered in towns and villages across the country and came to a growing consensus about justice for enslaved people.
A sentinel event, according to Professor Richardson, was a meeting of thirty congressmen in Washington to develop a response to the impending Kansas Nebraska Act. The meeting, drawing together representatives from across the political spectrum, was convened by Israel Washburn, a congressman from Orono, Maine. Growing out of this meeting, the congressmen went to their home districts and communities and talked with people about the peril of extending slavery with the Kansas Nebraska Act and how the country might chart a different direction.
Washburn’s role with the Kansas Nebraska Act was a notable part of a long career of public service. He represented the Bangor area in Congress, served as Governor of Maine, and was active in recruiting troops during the Civil War. He was one of the founders, with Abraham Lincoln, of the Republican party, which 160 years ago stood for civil rights and later was a moving force in the cause of Reconstruction.
As I think about “dissidents and heroes” in this story, though, I want to back up a generation. Mainer that I am, I have been familiar for many years with the Washburn family and their homestead, which remains a thriving living history site, in Livermore, Maine. Israel was one of eleven siblings, ten of whom survived to adulthood, who were children of Israel Sr. and Martha Benjamin Washburn.
Israel Sr. was born in Massachusetts in 1784 and moved to Maine in 1806. Three years later, he bought the homestead from Cyrus Hamlin, the father of Lincoln’s first vice president, Hannibal Hamlin. (I have often wondered how the post-Civil War era would have been different if the progressive Hamlin had not been replaced in the 1864 election by the racist Andrew Johnson.)
Israel Sr. was a teacher, storekeeper, and farmer whose businesses were often financially challenged. He had a brief political career of his own, serving as a state representative in what was then Massachusetts, prior to Maine statehood in 1820. Martha is described by the Washburn-Norlands Living History Center as “a devoted wife and loving mother who instilled ambition in her children.”
The Washburn children were indeed ambitious.
Israel Jr., you know.
Algernon was a merchant and banker in central Maine who was prosperous and generous enough to support his younger siblings.
Elihu left home in a time of financial hardship and moved to Galena, Illinois. He became an attorney and served in the US House of Representative for seventeen years. In Galena, he struck up a friendship with a West Point graduate and dry goods merchant, Ulysses Grant. As a congressman, Elihu advocated for Grant’s military promotions.
Elihu was also an early supporter and personal friend of Abraham Lincoln. Along with William Seward, it was Elihu who met Lincoln at Washington’s Baltimore and Ohio station in February, 1861, after a long, arduous and secretive train journey from Springfield. After the war, Elihu opposed the Johnson retrenchment in civil rights and served as Secretary of State and minister to France in the Grant administration.
Cadwallader relocated to Wisconsin. He served in congress, was a major general in the Civil War, was elected governor of Wisconsin, and founded the company that became Gold Medal Flour.
Charles took part in the California Gold Rush of 1849 and later worked as an editor/writer and diplomat.
Samuel was a naval officer in the Civil War and returned to Livermore to care for Israel Sr. and then to raise his family.
William was a businessman, congressman, and senator in Minnesota.
In an era with limited vocational opportunities for women, the three Washburn daughters, Martha, Mary, and Caroline, were all educated and actively engaged in teaching and family life.
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Sometimes opposition and heroism in response to authoritarianism come in specific events, such as Israel Washburn Jr.’s convening fellow congressmen to begin a national conversation about the Kansas Nebraska act.
Sometimes opposition and heroism run deeper.
Israel Sr. and Martha Washburn never came to particular notoriety outside of their community. But they raised children who valued education, justice, and civil rights, and who embodied these values in their public and private lives throughout the mid-to-late 19th century.
You may not be in a position to change the course of history by convening 30 friends, but you can follow in the footsteps of Israel, Martha, and innumerable other people in simply living your life in a way that brings goodness into the world. Being a parent who instills “ambition.” Being a sibling, a colleague, a neighbor, a friend, who models qualities of respect, forbearance, and kindness. Being a person who speaks the truth, in public and in private.
Neither Israel nor Martha lived to see the full expression of these values in their children (Martha died in 1861 and Israel, in 1876), and so it may be with any of us. But that’s what it means to live in hope, or live in faith, right?
You chase away the darkness by being a beacon of light.
In the narrative that I cited from Heather Cox Richardson, though, the movement congealed as ordinary Americans gathered in towns and villages across the country and came to a growing consensus about justice for enslaved people.
A sentinel event, according to Professor Richardson, was a meeting of thirty congressmen in Washington to develop a response to the impending Kansas Nebraska Act. The meeting, drawing together representatives from across the political spectrum, was convened by Israel Washburn, a congressman from Orono, Maine. Growing out of this meeting, the congressmen went to their home districts and communities and talked with people about the peril of extending slavery with the Kansas Nebraska Act and how the country might chart a different direction.
Washburn’s role with the Kansas Nebraska Act was a notable part of a long career of public service. He represented the Bangor area in Congress, served as Governor of Maine, and was active in recruiting troops during the Civil War. He was one of the founders, with Abraham Lincoln, of the Republican party, which 160 years ago stood for civil rights and later was a moving force in the cause of Reconstruction.
As I think about “dissidents and heroes” in this story, though, I want to back up a generation. Mainer that I am, I have been familiar for many years with the Washburn family and their homestead, which remains a thriving living history site, in Livermore, Maine. Israel was one of eleven siblings, ten of whom survived to adulthood, who were children of Israel Sr. and Martha Benjamin Washburn.
Israel Sr. was born in Massachusetts in 1784 and moved to Maine in 1806. Three years later, he bought the homestead from Cyrus Hamlin, the father of Lincoln’s first vice president, Hannibal Hamlin. (I have often wondered how the post-Civil War era would have been different if the progressive Hamlin had not been replaced in the 1864 election by the racist Andrew Johnson.)
Israel Sr. was a teacher, storekeeper, and farmer whose businesses were often financially challenged. He had a brief political career of his own, serving as a state representative in what was then Massachusetts, prior to Maine statehood in 1820. Martha is described by the Washburn-Norlands Living History Center as “a devoted wife and loving mother who instilled ambition in her children.”
The Washburn children were indeed ambitious.
Israel Jr., you know.
Algernon was a merchant and banker in central Maine who was prosperous and generous enough to support his younger siblings.
Elihu left home in a time of financial hardship and moved to Galena, Illinois. He became an attorney and served in the US House of Representative for seventeen years. In Galena, he struck up a friendship with a West Point graduate and dry goods merchant, Ulysses Grant. As a congressman, Elihu advocated for Grant’s military promotions.
Elihu was also an early supporter and personal friend of Abraham Lincoln. Along with William Seward, it was Elihu who met Lincoln at Washington’s Baltimore and Ohio station in February, 1861, after a long, arduous and secretive train journey from Springfield. After the war, Elihu opposed the Johnson retrenchment in civil rights and served as Secretary of State and minister to France in the Grant administration.
Cadwallader relocated to Wisconsin. He served in congress, was a major general in the Civil War, was elected governor of Wisconsin, and founded the company that became Gold Medal Flour.
Charles took part in the California Gold Rush of 1849 and later worked as an editor/writer and diplomat.
Samuel was a naval officer in the Civil War and returned to Livermore to care for Israel Sr. and then to raise his family.
William was a businessman, congressman, and senator in Minnesota.
In an era with limited vocational opportunities for women, the three Washburn daughters, Martha, Mary, and Caroline, were all educated and actively engaged in teaching and family life.
------
Sometimes opposition and heroism in response to authoritarianism come in specific events, such as Israel Washburn Jr.’s convening fellow congressmen to begin a national conversation about the Kansas Nebraska act.
Sometimes opposition and heroism run deeper.
Israel Sr. and Martha Washburn never came to particular notoriety outside of their community. But they raised children who valued education, justice, and civil rights, and who embodied these values in their public and private lives throughout the mid-to-late 19th century.
You may not be in a position to change the course of history by convening 30 friends, but you can follow in the footsteps of Israel, Martha, and innumerable other people in simply living your life in a way that brings goodness into the world. Being a parent who instills “ambition.” Being a sibling, a colleague, a neighbor, a friend, who models qualities of respect, forbearance, and kindness. Being a person who speaks the truth, in public and in private.
Neither Israel nor Martha lived to see the full expression of these values in their children (Martha died in 1861 and Israel, in 1876), and so it may be with any of us. But that’s what it means to live in hope, or live in faith, right?
You chase away the darkness by being a beacon of light.