"THE LEADING CONSTITUTIONAL SCHOLAR FOR GARRISON AND THE RADICAL ABOLITIONISTS"
BOWDITCH, William I. Slavery and the Constitution. Boston, 1849.
First edition of abolitionist attorney Bowditch's incendiary 1849 work declaring the Constitution a proslavery document, defiantly announcing—"we are a nation of slaveholders"—a crucial work in the highly public dispute that split apart Frederick Douglass and William Lloyd Garrison. $2100.
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"THE PREMIERE ARCHITECT OF THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT IN THE U.S."
DU BOIS, W. E. Burghardt and DILL, Augustus Granville, eds. Negro American Artisan. Atlanta, 1912 (i.e. 1913).
First edition of a defining work in the influential series of conferences and publications directed by Du Bois, who created, at Atlanta University, the "first American school of sociology," this key work particularly asserting "Du Bois' theory of the talented tenth," developed in his 1903 essay that helped forge the Harlem Renaissance by arguing for Black education that encouraged "intelligence, broad sympathy, knowledge of the world that was and is," very scarce in original wrappers. $1800.
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"AN EPOCH IN THE HISTORY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE"
PERCY, Thomas. Reliques of Ancient English Poetry. London, 1812. Three volumes.
Revised fifth edition of Percy’s Reliques, in handsome straight-grain morocco-gilt bindings. $900.
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