William Lloyd Garrison Character Analysis in Stamped from the Beginning

Another of the five figures featured in the book, Garrison was a white anti-slavery activist and editor of the influential abolitionist paper The Liberator. Born in 1805, Garrison worked for a newspaper editor as an indentured servant during his teenage years. His interest in the temperance movement soon developed into a passion for abolition. He initially supported the gradual abolition of slavery (as was common at the time) but soon after revised his position and fought for immediate and full abolition. Garrison dedicated his entire life to the anti-slavery project but still harbored racist ideas. After meeting Frederick Douglass at an abolitionist meeting on Nantucket Island, Garrison worked alongside Douglass and wrote the preface to Douglass’s Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. Kendi explains that this preface is overflowing with racist ideas, namely revolving around the notion that slavery had severely ruined and corrupted Black people. During the Civil War era, Garrison was skeptical of Abraham Lincoln, whom he perceived as being insufficiently committed to the abolitionist cause. However, Garrison later became more impressed with Lincoln’s actions surrounding the end of slavery. Garrison continued to harbor naïve hopes of racial progress even as it became clear that the Reconstruction era was being replaced by brutal retaliation and the institution of segregation. He died in 1879.

William Lloyd Garrison Quotes in Stamped from the Beginning

The Stamped from the Beginning quotes below are all either spoken by William Lloyd Garrison or refer to William Lloyd Garrison. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:

Discrimination, Racist Ideas, and Ignorance Theme Icon

If Blacks did not violently resist, then they were cast as naturally servile. And yet, whenever they did fight, reactionary commentators, in both North and South, classified them as barbaric animals who needed to be caged in slavery. Those enslavers who sought comfort in myths of natural Black docility hunted for those whom they considered the real agitators: abolitionists like Garrison. Georgia went as far as offering a reward of $5,000 (roughly $109,000 today) for anyone who brought Garrison to the state for trial.

Related Characters: Ibram X. Kendi (speaker), William Lloyd Garrison

Page Number and Citation: 173

Explanation and Analysis:

William Lloyd Garrison Character Timeline in Stamped from the Beginning

The timeline below shows where the character William Lloyd Garrison appears in Stamped from the Beginning. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.

...(1743-1826), a slaveholder who managed to be both “antislavery” and “anti-abolitionist.” Third is William Lloyd Garrison (1805-1879), who spread assimilationist ideas about Black inferiority via his work as an abolitionist. Garrison... (full context)

...lost its power. Three years after the death of the two presidents, 23-year-old William Lloyd Garrison gives the address at the American Colonization Society’s Independence Day celebration. Garrison was raised by... (full context)

In 1828, Garrison meets Benjamin Lundy, the editor of the Genius of Universal Emancipation. Garrison is deeply affected... (full context)

The following year, Garrison publishes an article calling for immediate abolition. In November, a “disciple” of Denmark Vesey named... (full context)

As a believer in nonviolence, Garrison is wary of Walker’s Appeal, although he admits it contains some important “truths.” In the... (full context)

From this point forward, Garrison commits to fighting for immediate emancipation, a cause he will support for the rest of... (full context)

...the will of God. When asked if he repents, he replies, “Was not Christ crucified?” Garrison is disapproving of Turner’s rebellion’s violent method and concerned that it would dissuade people from... (full context)

...Yet enslavers continue to develop racist ideas because they want to justify slavery—a process that Garrison does not grasp. In 1832, he publishes a critique of the ACS entitled Thoughts on... (full context)

...the American Anti-Slavery Society, gaining the support of a number of wealthy and powerful individuals. Garrison is given a “minor” role in the organization. While the AASS proclaims to advocate for... (full context)

...is a “necessary evil,” instead firmly claiming that it is “a good—a positive good.” Like Garrison, Calhoun is considered an extremist; both men perceive the other as a potential destroyer of... (full context)

In 1841, Garrison spends three days at a gathering of abolitionists on Nantucket Island, during which he meets... (full context)

...and leads the way for many more slave narratives to be published in the future. Garrison writes the preface but—despite speaking from a staunchly abolitionist perspective—he ends up emphasizing Black inferiority... (full context)

...during the war, but President James K. Polk rejects this proposition as “foolish.” In 1847, Garrison writes that proslavery sentiment and racial prejudice is on the decline, though he emphasizes that... (full context)

...describing Black people’s “childlike simplicity of affection, and facility of forgiveness.” Essentially, this is what Garrison has been attempting to do throughout his career: not dissuade people from holding racist ideas,... (full context)

Garrison praises Uncle Tom’s Cabin, although he is troubled by its emphasis on submissiveness. Douglass offers... (full context)

...is a good thing). Despite their mutual opposition to slavery, polygenesis, and segregation, Douglass and Garrison’s friendship dissolves. Douglass dislikes the patronizing “paternalism” of the white abolitionist movement, whereas Garrison suggests... (full context)

...proved himself an advocate of Black people’s rights while serving as a congressman for Illinois. Garrison, meanwhile, is scornful of the idea that Lincoln actually poses any threat to slavery. Meanwhile,... (full context)

...Proclamation seriously. Lincoln remains in favor of colonization, which earns him the scorn of both Garrison and Douglass. In 1862, Lincoln writes an article in the National Intelligencer clarifying that his... (full context)

...Many Black Christians as well as the New England elite nonetheless shower Lincoln with praise. Garrison welcomes the Emancipation Proclamation, expresses admiration of Lincoln, and becomes a “tenacious Unionist.” Still, the... (full context)

In 1863, Garrison’s son Willie brings home a friend, the German-American journalist Henry Villard, who tells Garrison about... (full context)

Yet Garrison, who has made a career out of urgency, insists that his fellow abolitionists be patient... (full context)

...recommendation of rights stops far short of treating Black and white people as truly equal. Garrison, meanwhile, continues to comment on the “brutishness” of the formerly enslaved and advocates for Lincoln’s... (full context)

...Yet against the odds, Lincoln is reelected. The formerly enslaved editor of the The Liberator, Garrison Frazier, insists that Black people cannot be truly free without owning land of their own.... (full context)

...Thirteenth Amendment, which abolishes slavery. This is a welcomed development amidst fierce infighting among abolitionists. Garrison remains stubbornly opposed to the prospect of granting voting rights to the formerly enslaved. In... (full context)

...that giving Black people land will have a corrupting effect—they need to work for it. Garrison, meanwhile, focuses on the importance of assimilation for Black people in the North. Once the... (full context)

William Lloyd Garrison is delighted by the Fifteenth Amendment, which he considers a “miracle.” Some celebrate the amendment... (full context)

...sharecropping, which allows them to be exploited by landowners. Witnessing this erosion of civil rights, Garrison writes a series of articles denouncing the “abandonment” of Reconstruction. Yet many other commentators, even... (full context)

...continue living among their former enslavers and sought freedom in the North. In April 1879, Garrison cancels what would have been his final speech due to illness, speaking via a proxy... (full context)

Du Bois, meanwhile, has become embroiled in a debate with William Lloyd Garrison’s grandson, Oswald Garrison Villard, the “darling of White liberal America.” At this point, Du Bois... (full context)

William Lloyd Garrison Character Analysis

William Lloyd Garrison Quotes in Stamped from the Beginning

Chapter 13: Gradual Equality Quotes

William Lloyd Garrison Character Timeline in Stamped from the Beginning