ABOLITION OF SLAVERY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 191, 15 August 1933, Page 6

ABOLITION OF SLAVERY.

My attention has been drawn to statements made by the Rev. Lawson Marsh at the Town Ball on a recent Sunday, and again repeated at the Lyceum Club last Thursday when referring to the recent centenary of the Rev. William Wilberforce, that the Church, through the action of Wilberforce, took the first to abolish the African slave trade. The fact is it was left for Thomas Paine to sound the first clear and effective note on the subject. His article on "Justice and Humanity" demanding emancipation was published in March, 1775, and republished in (Tommy's edition of his works (Vol. I.)- Mr. Con way also asserts that Paine drafted the Pennsylvania Act of 17S0, abolishing negro slavery. This was the first Act of its kind in Christendom. The article attracted considerable attention, and thirtyfive days later led to the establishment of. an American anti-slavery society. It is onlv fitting that the campaign against slavery thus inaugurated should have been triumphantly closed bv Abraham Lincoln. HONOUR TO WHOM HONOUR IS DUE.