As cotton became more and more important to the Southern economy, slavery was growing as well. With this growth, came a growth in opposition as well. One of the first solutions to slavery that was put forth was the idea of colonization. This was the idea to move the slave population back to Africa. With this sentiment, funds were raised to send the free African Americans back across the Atlantic. The nation of Liberia was created as a designated land for former American slaves. Most African Americans were against moving back to a country they had never been to. Many believed, and rightly so, they helped build the nation and the economy and had a right to live in the country in which they were born.

Abolitionists were people who wanted to end the practice of slavery. This movement had many followers. The early abolitionists had been around since the 1700s and called for a gradual end to slavery. They raised money to purchase slaves to be freed. The new abolitionists thought that slavery needed to be ended immediately. They sent out petitions to Congress, campaigned for office, and tried to persuade the South with literature. This kind of campaigning backfired. With the Southern economy unwilling to end this practice, the post office was banned from delivering any abolitionists literature. The House of Representatives could not bring forth bills restricting slavery, and the abolitionists were even attacked in some areas.

The voice and leader of abolitionism throughout the middle 1800s was a man by the name William Lloyd Garrison. He was head of the publication The Liberator, which was read by thousands worldwide. Garrison also founded the New England Antislavery Society. Garrison traveled the world rallying support for the cause. He was very successful, mostly in part to his freed African Americans who made up about 75% of his readers. Garrison’s main tactic was to show the immorality of slavery. Fortunately, William Lloyd Garrison made it to see slavery destroyed in the Union. He was even alive to see Abraham Lincoln sign the Emancipation Proclamation. He was even around to see the 13th Amendment to the Constitution be placed into effect, which banned slavery forever.

One of the largest groups of abolitionists were the free African Americans. This group of men and women worked with white abolitionists, such as William Lloyd Garrison and Wendell Phillips, to actively fight slavery. They sent out pamphlets and publications and even contributed money. The main fighters were David Walker, Frederick Douglass, and Sojourner Truth. David Walker had his own publication call "Appeal." He called for the immediate termination of slavery. His radical texts brought on a reward for his capture in the South, and he died mysteriously nine month after publishing the "Appeal."

Frederick Douglass was probably the best known African American abolitionist. He escaped slavery at age 21 and moved North to Massachusetts. Douglass had learned to read and write because he had been a domestic servant. In 1841, he spoke to crowds about his life as an enslaved person. Douglass was gaining a lot of attention. He became fearful his master would find him and return him to slavery. Because of this fear, he went to England and continued the abolitionists movement. Eventually a group of abolitionists bought his freedom, and he returned to the U.S.

Another famous free slave turned abolitionists was a woman Sojourner Truth. She was a slave in New York and freed when slavery was outlawed in the state in 1827. She believed she was destined to travel the country and inform people on the evils of slavery. Also because she was a woman, she fought for women’s rights and suffrage.