316 Political Activity and Resistance to Oppression: From the American Revolution to the Civil War
Adjaye, Joseph. “Amistad and the Lessons of History.” Journal of
Black Studies 29, no. 3 (January 1999):455–59.
Cable, Mary. Black Odyssey: Th e Case of the Slave Ship Amistad.
New York: Viking Press, 1971.
Jones, Howard. Mutiny on the Amistad: Th e Saga of a Slave Revolt
and Its Impact on American Abolition, Law, and Diplomacy.
New York: Oxford University Press, 1987.
Martin, B. Edmon. All We Want Is Make Us Free: La Amistad and
the Reform Abolitionists. Lanham, MD: University Press of
America, 1986.
Meyers, Water Dean. Amistad: A Long Road to Freedom. New
York: Penguin, 1988.
Osagie, Iyunolu Folayan. Th e Amistad Revolt: Memory, Slavery,
and the Politics of Identity in the United States and Sierra
Leone. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2000.
Zeinert, Karen. Th e Amistad Slave Revolt and American Abolition.
North Haven, CT: Linnet Books, 1997.Anglo-African Magazine
Published in New York City between 1859 and 1865, the
Anglo-African Magazine was a monthly magazine devoted
to publishing African American political and intellectual
thought. Among the half-dozen other periodicals launched
by blacks in the pre–Civil War era, the Anglo-African sur-
vives as the most comprehensive and sophisticated. In-
cluding editorials, satire, poetry, sociological reports, and
new fi ction, the magazine provided a portrait of black in-
tellectual diversity and depth. Whereas some periodicals
devoted themselves exclusively to fi ction or politics, the
Anglo-African assembled literature, science, politics, and
demography to create a multifaceted journal. While it op-
erated, it was known as “the black man’s Atlantic Monthly.”
From the inaugural issue, publisher Th omas Hamilton
promised an objective review of black America. Because the
majority of blacks received their information from white
media, Hamilton balanced this with an exhaustive parade
of black writers and reporters, including Martin Shed Cary,
Martin R. Delany, Frederick Douglass, Frances Ellen Wat-
kins Harper, John Mercer Langston, William Cooper Nell,
Daniel Payne, J. W. C. Pennington, and James Th eodore
Holly. Th ese authors contributed not only to a report on
contemporary black life, but also to the uplift of the race
itself. Although questing to provide an impartial survey of
African American experience, Hamilton explicitly encour-
aged articles that would reaffi rm race pride, such as biog-
raphies of black heroes and reviews of African history. In
editorials, Hamilton repeatedly defamed the widespreadTucker, came to the United States in the 1860s and helped to
found several of North America’s fi rst black colleges. Th ese
missionary schools also produced several graduates who
became important nationalists and leaders in Sierra Leone.
Spain continued to press the United States for com-
pensation for the Amistad, and controversy surrounding
the issue persisted for years in Congress and diplomatic
circles. Subsequent American presidents continued to sup-
port Spain’s claim. However, the House of Representatives,
led by John Quincy Adams until his death in 1847, repeat-
edly denied compensation to Spain. With the election of
President Abraham Lincoln in 1860 and the defeat of slave-
holding interests on the U.S. political stage, eff orts to com-
pensate Spain ended.
Th e actions of the Africans on the Amistad and the
legal battles they inspired dealt a crucial ideological blow
to slavery in the United States. Th e issues surrounding the
case and the agency and assertions of the Amistad Africans
forced participants and observers to grapple with the ethi-
cal, legal, and political dimensions of 19th-century slavery.
Th e Amistad trials helped to solidify and advance a fl edgling
antislavery movement in the American North and placed
the confl ict between property rights and human rights on
an international stage. Th e case ultimately spawned the
American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society and inaugu-
rated a reformist abolitionist movement that attempted to
alter national policy. Th ese eff orts, directly traceable to the
uprising on the Amistad, intensifi ed debates over slavery
and thus presaged the tensions that ignited the American
Civil War and the end of American slavery.
See also: Abolition, Slave Trade; Adams, John Quincy;
Cinque, Joseph; Tappan, Lewis
Christina Proenza-ColesBibliography
Abraham, Arthur. “Th e Amistad Revolt: An Historical Legacy of
Sierra Leone and the United States.” Washington, D.C.: U.S.
Department of State, Bureau of Information, 1987.
Abraham, Arthur. “Sengbe Pieh.” Dictionary of African Biography,
Vol. 2. Algonac, MI: Reference Publications, 1979. 141–44.
Abraham, Arthur. Sengbe Pieh: A Neglected Hero?” Journal of the
Historical Society of Sierra Leone 2, no. 2 (1978):22–30.
Adams, John Quincy. Argument of John Quincy Adams before the
Supreme Court of the United States in the Case of the United
States, Appellants, vs. Cinque, and Others, Africans, Captured
in the Schooner Amistad, by Lieut. Gedney, Delivered on the
24th of February and 1st of March 1841. Whitefi sh, MT: Kes-
singer Publishing, 2004.