1839 Warsaw Convention

Meeting of the New York State Anti-Slavery Society Warsaw convention United States Warsaw, NY 42 44 24 N 78 07 59 W region:US_type:event title,inline November 13–14, 1839 Presbyterian church Warsaw, New York New York State Anti-Slavery Society 500 James G. Birney nominated for president Francis Julius LeMoyne nominated for vice president thumb|right|200px|Myron Holley, organizer of the Warsaw and Arcade conventions The New York State Anti-Slavery Society held a convention at the Presbyterian church in Warsaw, New York, on November 13 and 14, 1839.Young 1869 162 The more than 500 attendeesSewell 1976 61 included abolitionists from Western New York and neighboring Pennsylvania. Josiah Andrews of Perry, New York, presided over the meeting, while Holley and William L. Chaplin served on the five-member committee on resolutions. Most of the measures reported by the committee passed unanimously, but the third resolution declaring "that the elector who votes for a candidate for the state or national legislature not known to be the decided advocate of impartial freedom [...] is no less criminal than he would be, if in the primary assemblies he should vote directly against freedom, and in favor of oppressive, cruel and chattelizing laws," was adopted in a contested vote, 22 to 12. The sixth resolution endorsing the creation of a new abolitionist party was adopted unanimously. The convention nominated Birney for president and Francis Julius LeMoyne of Pennsylvania for vice president, and appointed Holley, Andrews, and Joshua H. Darling to prepare an address to the electorate.Anti-Slavery Convention https://www.nyshistoricnewspapers.org/?a=d&d=rf18391127-01.1.2 Rochester Freeman November 27, 1839 Both Birney and LeMoyne declined the nomination of the Warsaw convention. LeMoyne felt an independent ticket was untimely and inexpedient, and warned that the action of the convention suggested a worrying lack of confidence in the moral influence of abolitionism.Sewell 1976 62 Birney approved the principle of independent nominations, but felt the Warsaw convention was not an appropriate venue, and that a candidate should be selected by a national gathering of abolitionists.Birney 1890 348 His conditional refusal set in motion the chain of events leading to the 1840 abolitionist presidential nominating convention.Sewell 1976 65–66 References Bibliography Birney William James G. Birney and His Times 1890 D. Appleton and Company New York https://www.google.com/books/edition/James_G_Birney_and_His_Times/l3EoAAAAYAAJ Sewell Richard H. Ballots for Freedom: Antislavery Politics in the United States, 1837–1860 1976 Oxford University Press New York 75-25464 https://archive.org/details/ballotsforfreedo00sewe Young Andrew W. History of the Town of Warsaw, New York, [...] 1869 none Buffalo, NY https://www.google.com/books/edition/History_of_the_town_of_Warsaw_New_York/uVTHDwAAQBAJ Category:1839 conferences Category:1840 United States presidential election Category:1939 in New York (state) Category:United States presidential nominating conventions in New York (state) Category:Abolitionist conventions in the United States Category:November 1939