Vesey should be lauded for his heroism. He was willing to risk his life for the freedom of his fellow men. You can’t get much more noble than that. Like Patrick Henry, like George Washington, et. al. Give me liberty or give me death, and all that good stuff.
The same goes for John Brown. The actions of both Vesey and Brown were a continuation of the American Revolution. That both men have been vilified and labeled as lunatics is just evidence of the moral blindness that has afflicted American society for so long.
I don’t think anyone considers Vesey a lunatic. Brown has that reputation, although <b>tomndebb</b> disagrees and with some basis for that also.
The complaints against Vesey in this debate was that he shouldn’t be honored for wanting to foment a revolt that might have resulted in the deaths of thousands of people.
As it was practiced at the time, slavery involved the perpetration of the crimes of assault, robbery, kidnapping, torture, and rape, against its victims. Victims of these crimes, as well as any interested bystanders, had a moral right to use any means neccessary to stop these crimes. That some of the criminals and some of the people who stood to profit from these crimes might have died is not particularly significant. Thousands of people died in the process of restisting the slave trade. It’s absurd to for anyone living in a society based on the widespread perpetration of capital crimes to have any reasonable expectation of safety.
All I can say is that anybody who doesn’t think Brown was a lunatic needs to read more about Brown. I think the Manson analog holds. Study the massacres at Potawatamie Creek, where his victims were hacked to death in the middle of the night. The man was a loony, who seized monomaniacally upon the abolitionist cause as an outlet for his lunacy. His choice of an admirable cause through which to express his insanity makes him no less insane.
Manson could be quite convicing, just like Brown. Remember, Manson befriended Dennis Wilson (of the Beach Boys) and several record producers before his “family” went on its rampage. He was a hair’s breadth away from becoming an eccentric rock star instead of a notorious killer. If Brown had lived in another time, I think he would have wound up shooting up the crowd at a Burger King, or going on some similar rampage.
BorisB, your point is well taken about the pikes. On the other hand, the outcome at Harper’s Ferry shows just how logical Brown’s plan really was.
I recommend Oates’s biography to y’all. He presents an unbiased view of the man, but I think the facts to be gleaned from that account will convince you that the guy was mentally unstable. From that book, you will also learn how the propaganda machine of the abolitionist movement promoted a (false) saintly image of the man. That image colored many later biographies, which failed to view the historical record with a more dispassionate eye (as Oates does).
Oates, by the way, is a highly respected historian. You may remember him as one of the “talking heads” in the Ken Burns Civil War documentary.
As far as the OP goes, I understand the sentiment behind seeking a memorial for Vesey. The Patrick Henry analogy is a pretty good one. He was just a man prepared to do whatever was necessary to free his people. Desperate times call for desperate measures, and all that.