Page:Journal of Negro History, vol. 7.djvu/423

 instrumental in securing the famous Somerset decision that, as soon as any slave set foot on British soil he became free. In 1783 the Society of Friends submitted to Parliament the first petition for the abolition of the slave trade. In that same year Thomas Clarkson won the prize in a competition in Latin composition at Cambridge upon the assigned subject, "Whether it is right to enslave others against their will." His essay immediately became a standard authority among opponents of the trade and the institution. A greater consequence was that Clarkson himself was so inspired he devoted his life to the cause of the blacks. In 1787 a "Committee for Effecting the Abolition of the Slave Trade" was organized. It was composed chiefly of Quakers, having Granville Sharp as President and Thomas Clarkson as its most prominent member. Their work was organized to embrace appeals to the public and petitions to the government. Wilberforce, a member of Parliament and an intimate friend of Pitt, was to head the campaign in Parliament, while the Committee was to solicit funds, collect information and arouse public sentiment. This campaign lasted until the abolition of British slave trade in 1806.

This work in behalf of freedom soon extended to France. A little over three months after the London Committee was formed it received a letter from Jean Pierre Brissot, requesting that he and Etienne Clavière migiht become associates of the committee for the purpose of publishing French translations of its literature and collecting subscriptions to be remitted to London for the good of the common cause. The committee declined the offer of financial aid but elected Brissot an honorary member and recommended that a society be formed in France. Now both Brissot and Clavière were active figures in the Revolution. Clavière was at one time minister of finances and Brissot, most ardent of revolutionists, was a Parish Deputy during the Reign of Terror, and a leader of the Girondins from 1789 to 1792. Accordingly, a society was formed in Paris in February, 1788, under the name of the Society of