[Footnote 1:  These organs were The Albany Evening Journal, The New York Free Press, The Genius of Universal Emancipation, and The Boston Liberator.  See The Richmond Enquirer, Oct. 21, 1831.]

Trying to account for this insurrection the Governor of the State lays it to the charge of the Negro preachers who were in position to foment much disorder on account of having acquired “great ascendancy over the minds” of discontented slaves.  He believed that these ministers were in direct contact with the agents of abolition, who were using colored leaders as a means to destroy the institutions of the South.  The Governor was cognizant of the fact that not only was the sentiment of the incendiary pamphlets read but often the words.[1] To prevent the “enemies” in other States from communicating with the slaves of that section he requested that the laws regulating the assembly of Negroes be more rigidly enforced and that colored preachers be silenced.  The General Assembly complied with this request.[2]

[Footnote 1:  The Richmond Enquirer, Oct. 21, 1831.]

[Footnote 2:  The Laws of Virginia, 1831-1832, p. 20.]

The aim of the subsequent reactionary legislation of the South was to complete the work of preventing the dissemination of information among Negroes and their reading of abolition literature.  This they endeavored to do by prohibiting the communication of the slaves with one another, with the better informed free persons of color, and with the liberal white people; and by closing all the schools theretofore opened to Negroes.  The States passed laws providing for a more stringent regulation of passes, defining unlawful assemblies, and fixing penalties for the same.  Other statutes prohibited religious worship, or brought it under direct supervision of the owners of the slaves concerned, and proscribed the private teaching of slaves in any manner whatever.

Mississippi, which already had a law to prevent the mental improvement of the slaves, enacted in 1831 another measure to remove from them the more enlightened members of their race.  All free colored persons were to leave the State in ninety days.  The same law provided, too, that no Negro should preach in that State unless to the slaves of his plantation and with the permission of the owner.[1] Delaware saw fit to take a bold step in this direction.  The act of 1831 provided that no congregation or meeting of free Negroes or mulattoes of more than twelve persons should be held later than twelve o’clock at night, except under the direction of three respectable white persons who were to attend the meeting.  It further provided that no free Negro should attempt to call a meeting for religious worship, to exhort or preach, unless he was authorized to do so by a judge or justice of the peace, upon the recommendation of five “respectable and judicious citizens.” [2] This measure tended only to prevent the dissemination of information among