John Anderson Collins (1810–1879) was an American abolitionist.

Biography

Collins was born in Manchester, Vermont. He attended

Middlebury College Middlebury College is a private liberal arts college in Middlebury, Vermont. Founded in 1800 by Congregationalists, Middlebury was the first operating college or university in Vermont. The college currently enrolls 2,858 undergraduates from all ...

, joined the Andover Theological Seminary, and eventually left both to work in the anti-slavery movement. From 1840–1842, Collins served as the General Agent and Vice President of the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society (MASS, founded 1835), a Boston branch of the

American Anti-Slavery Society The American Anti-Slavery Society (AASS; 1833–1870) was an abolitionist society founded by William Lloyd Garrison and Arthur Tappan. Frederick Douglass, an escaped slave, had become a prominent abolitionist and was a key leader of this society ...

. He helped to mentor

Frederick Douglass Frederick Douglass (born Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey, February 1817 or 1818 – February 20, 1895) was an American social reformer, abolitionist, orator, writer, and statesman. After escaping from slavery in Maryland, he became ...

as Douglass began to become a speaker on the abolitionist circuit. A Congregationalist at first (eventually turning to atheism,) he worked with

Quakers Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belief in each human's abil ...

and

Garrisonian William Lloyd Garrison (December , 1805 – May 24, 1879) was a prominent American Christian, abolitionist, journalist, suffragist, and social reformer. He is best known for his widely read antislavery newspaper '' The Liberator'', which he foun ...

abolitionists in the Society for Universal Inquiry and Reform, which hoped to reorganize society along Christian

non-resistance Nonresistance (or non-resistance) is "the practice or principle of not resisting authority, even when it is unjustly exercised". At its core is discouragement of, even opposition to, physical resistance to an enemy. It is considered as a form of pri ...

lines. Collins was the editor of the abolitionist periodicals '' The Monthly Offering'' and ''Monthly Garland''. He combined

abolitionism Abolitionism, or the abolitionist movement, is the movement to end slavery. In Western Europe and the Americas, abolitionism was a historic movement that sought to end the Atlantic slave trade and liberate the enslaved people. The Britis ...

with

communitarianism Communitarianism is a philosophy that emphasizes the connection between the individual and the community. Its overriding philosophy is based upon the belief that a person's social identity and personality are largely molded by community relati ...

. He became a leader in the

Skaneateles Community Skaneateles Community was a utopian social experiment established in 1843 by the Society for Universal Inquiry and Reform in a farm near Mottville, in Skaneateles in Upstate New York based on Fourierist principles. It was one of several communiti ...

, an 1841–1846

Fourierist Fourierism () is the systematic set of economic, political, and social beliefs first espoused by French intellectual Charles Fourier (1772–1837). Based upon a belief in the inevitability of communal associations of people who worked and lived to ...

socialist experimental community, and edited ''The Communitist''. In his later years, he left abolitionism and communal utopianism behind, going to California to follow the gold rush and becoming a Whig candidate for the state legislature.

Bibliography

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Collins, John A. 1810 births 1879 deaths People from Manchester, Vermont American abolitionists