THERE IS DEATH IN THE POT - The University of Texas at Arlington

statements against slavery, but cautioned members against getting caught up in the
excitement of the radical abolitionist movement. 36 Statements as well as petitions and
abstention from slave-labor products urged Friends to high levels of personal morality
and responsibility rather than active involvement in non-Quaker reform societies.
Abstention might succeed in rendering slavery uneconomical, ultimately leading to its
abolition. And if free produce did not succeed in abolishing slavery, Friends had at least
purified themselves and their community from the taint of slavery. 37 As long as free
produce remained an individual, moderate anti-slavery statement, it was unobtrusive
enough for most Quakers to adopt the practice. When Quakers began to organize with
non-Quakers in free-produce associations, however, abstention increasingly took on the
radical tone of Garrisonian abolitionism.
“Sister Societies”
In the months leading up to the Quaker schism of 1827, the women of Green
Street Monthly Meeting arrayed on either side of the split. In 1826, Ann Scattergood and
Mary Taylor were removed as elders of the women’s meeting for their anti-Hicksite
sympathies. 38 Philadelphia Quarterly Meeting — dominated by Orthodox members —
91-93.
36 As quoted in Densmore, “The Dilemma of Quaker Anti-Slavery,” 82.
37 Densmore, “The Dilemma of Quaker Anti-Slavery,” 83; Frost, “Years of Crisis and Separation,”
38 Foster, An Authentic Report of the Testimony in a Cause at Issue in the Court of Chancery of the
State of New Jersey, I: 447; A Full Report of the Case of Stacy Decow, and Joseph Hendrickson, vs.
Thomas Shotwell. Decided at a Special Term of the New Jersey Court of Appeals, Held at Trenton, in July
and August, Eighteen Hundred and Thirty-Three. Embracing the Decision of the Court of Chancery, from
which the Appeal was Made; The Arguments of the Counsel on Each Side, and the Final Decision of the
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