Noble Reformer
MILLER, JOHN R.
Noble Reformer Lessons for today from yesterday’s crusader. BY JOHN R. MILLER At a moment when a supposedly conservative Department of Justice is trying to weaken modern...
...But he would be mystifi ed by the lobbying efforts of Bush’s own Justice Department to stop tougher federal prosecution of pimps and sex slave “masters...
...He would be pleased about the advocacy for abolition by Southern Baptists and such organizations as Concerned Women for America, and he would certainly appreciate the help slavery survivors enjoy today from evangelical groups such as the International Justice Mission, World Vision, and the Salvation Army, and Roman Catholic and Jewish organizations such as Caritas and Project Kesher...
...In absolute numbers there may be as many slaves now as there were in Wilberforce’s day...
...Yet Hague’s painstaking work shows us that, while Wilberforce did take these stands, he was a leader in many reform causes...
...How, then, might Wilberforce and Pitt look at today’s fi ght against slavery— and the role of conservatives and faith-based groups...
...And Hague shows how much there is to admire about Wilberforce: the way he avoided entanglement with sweeping, violent movements to remake society and, along with the Quakers and their leaders, pioneered the use of peaceful means of petition and persuasion to further the abolitionist cause...
...Slavery may be illegal, but it extends into every country in the world, including our own...
...But of his conservative and religious inclinations, his colleagues had no doubt...
...but closer observation reveals him to be what some would disparage as a “values” politician, seeking within a conservative framework to reform society...
...I suspect that Wilberforce would be dismayed to see that many faith-based groups are not broadening their agendas to embrace the slavery issue...
...Pitt added that if, after recognizing the evil of slavery, Britain did nothing, other nations would conclude that Britain found nothing wrong with slavery, and would similarly fail to act...
...He helped create the fi rst Society for the Prevention of Cruelty of Animals and strove to limit wasteful spending by a monarch he supported...
...William Hague has done a genuine service by illuminating, through the life of William Wilberforce, the spiritual dimensions of conservatism, and by showing that conservatism, faith, and reform are not mutually exclusive...
...At the urging of his friend (and later prime minister) William Pitt—the subject of an earlier Hague biography—he fomented an abolitionist movement, led efforts to reform prisons and limit capital punishment to serious crimes, and fought for laws to help the indigent and improve working conditions...
...While Hague addresses such questions only tangentially, good historical biographies—and this is a good one— often give clues in judging how their subjects might have regarded present events, and the actions of contemporary groups and leaders...
...John R. Miller served as ambassador-at-large on modern slavery during the Bush administration...
...Wilberforce certainly understood that prostitution could and did lead to sex slavery...
...To some conservatives in his day, Wilberforce was what we would now call a maverick...
...Equally mystifying would be the arguments of some conservative politicians that federalist doctrine prevents tougher federal prosecution efforts against slave masters...
...But I suspect that both Wilberforce and Pitt would be puzzled by the endless international conferences and multilateral resolutions that substitute for aggressive law enforcement against slavery...
...Equally admirable is the way Wilberforce, after Pitt’s death and Wilberforce’s own parliamentary victory over the slave trade, persuaded the British government to use the Royal Navy to enforce the law...
...During times of peace and turmoil, Wilberforce never wavered in his devotion to abolition...
...BY JOHN R. MILLER At a moment when a supposedly conservative Department of Justice is trying to weaken modern antislavery legislation, William Hague, former leader of Britain’s conservative party, has published a biography of William Wilberforce (1759-1833), the conservative philanthropist who led the struggle 200 years ago to abolish the slave trade in the British Empire...
...For inspiration, look no further than the way Wilberforce handled the argument that abolishing the slave trade was an imposition of British “values” on the world...
...He favored tough antisedition laws when he believed England was threatened by the French Revolution, and later by Napoleon...
...How was [the slave trade] ever to be eradicated if every nation was thus prudentially to wait until the concurrence of all the world should be obtained...
...The author of A Practical View of Christianity, he worked to open India to Christian missionaries and urged stricter public morals...
...And how could they...
...Today, of course, we know that legal abolition by Parliament in Britain and, later, a civil war in the United States did not end slavery...
...Race and plantation economics may not be dominant factors today, but millions are enslaved in brothels, homes, factories, and on farms...
...Echoing arguments we would recognize and appreciate today, Wilberforce and Pitt dismissed the efforts of opponents to delay abolition by invoking multilateralism: “This miserable argument, if persevered in, would be an eternal bar to the annihilation of evil,” Pitt declared in one of the landmark parliamentary debates on the slave trade...
...Pitt’s government, at Wilberforce’s urging, tried to form a multilateral coalition against slavery, but because of French opposition, Britain had to go it alone...
...Wilberforce even took positions that many conservatives would look askance at today: opposing the drilling of troops and publishing of newspapers on Sunday, supporting the closing of theaters because of their association with vice, opposing the creation of labor unions...
...That Hague’s portrait is especially judicious and nuanced, compared with some recent studies of Wilberforce, makes him all the more impressive...
...Hague’s detailed and well-written account gives us the chance to assess slavery, then and now, while also examining the role of conservatives, then and now, in addressing the most serious deprivation of liberty short of murder...
...He and his allies invoked the message of Genesis—that all humans are made in God’s image—as well as the doctrine of Christian love and, for good measure, Adam Smith’s economic theories about the value of free labor...
...More than 600 British sailors lost their lives in the freeing of several hundred thousand men, women, and children from slave ships fl ying fl ags of many nations...
...Wilberforce would undoubtedly be gratifi ed by George W. Bush’s leadership in fi ghting slavery and mustering bipartisan support in Congress for abolitionist efforts...
...Na?ve to some, impractical and apolitical to many, he led one of the most successful struggles for liberty in human history...
...In an age of blurred political parties and blurrier party discipline, Wilberforce prided himself on belonging to no formal group...
Vol. 14 • December 2008 • No. 14
