Harriet Beecher Stowe and Social Reform in England

Celts, Catholics & Copperheads: Ireland Views the American Civil War

“…41 Similar views came from John Mitchel in Richmond: As for the [pro-J Northern Irish, who seem to have got themselves persuaded that the enfranchisement of Ireland is somehow to result from the subjugation of the South, and that repeal of one union in Europe depends on the enforcement of another union in America, our friends here do not well understand the process of reasoning which leads to that conclusion, nor do I. 42 In September, 1863, he wrote that the Confederates had "universally repudiated Anglo-Saxonism" and that the Confederate press persistently impressed upon its readers that separation from the Yankees was neces sary "by reason of the difference of race. We consider ourselves here rather to belong to the 'Latin races' and claim kindred with the Celts."…”

“…." 42 The other incident that made most of the Irish public irrevocably opposed to the war policy of the North and to the forcible restoration of the Union was the New York draft riots in July, 1863. The anti-Negro, anti-draft sentiment of the Irish Americans had been building up to a fever pitch for some time.…”

“…41 John Mitchel was convinced that England hoped to profit from the war and really cared for neither section, but he realistically acknowledged that the South was ready to use English friendship to gain independ ence, although the Confederacy "in her inmost soul" despised Eng land. 42 In 1866 the Irish-American claimed that fear of the Fenians had prevented Great Britain from intervening in the Civil War. 43…”

“…The Radicals, also, received little encouragement from an organ of the American abolitionists, the Boston Liberator, which on March 1, 1861, advocated letting the South go in peace "as a good riddance." 42 But it did not take the Radicals long to conclude that the real issue in the war was the abolition of slavery, which was an implicit aim of the North. As John Bright began his great antislavery campaign in the interest of democracy and reform in the United Kingdom, the Northern Whig supported him and continued to do so throughout the war: "We believe that Mr.…”

The problem of understanding modern humanitarianism and its sociological value

“…Similarly, Frank Klingberg notes that while touring Britain promoting the cause of American antislavery, Harriet Beecher Stowe provoked a storm of protest from those campaigning to improve the conditions of the white working classes when she refused to recognise the plight of white adult “wage slaves” as a worthy humanitarian cause. Stowe held that industrial capitalists and landlords should not be blamed for workers’ poverty but rather that this should be attributed to the “traffic in intoxicating drinks” and the sin of intemperance (Klingberg , p.551). In this instance the moral judgements that Beecher Stowe cast on the white working poor operated so as to make her see them as not worthy of humanitarian concern.…”