Bailey

Gamaliel Bailey (1807-1859) played a dominant role in shaping the direction of the country's abolitionist movement, particularly its influence and visibility within the national political arena. He accomplished this largely through his role as editor of prominent abolitionist newspapers, such as the Cincinnati-based Philanthropist and the National Era. As a political organizer, strategist, and lobbyist, Bailey helped found the Republican Party, and worked to make the slavery issue a central feature of the Party's platform.

Bailey was born in Mount Holly, New Jersey, the son of Gamaliel Bailey, Sr., a silversmith and Methodist minister, and Sarah Page. The family moved to Philadelphia in 1816, and Bailey graduated from Jefferson Medical College in 1827. While practicing medicine, Bailey also began to pursue his interest in journalism by assisting with and editing several small religious and medical periodicals, such as the Baltimore-based monthly Methodist Protestant.

Around 1832, Bailey moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, and in 1833 married Margaret Lucy Shands with whom he had twelve children, six of whom survived infancy. There, Bailey set up a medical practice and became a lecturer on physiology at the Lane Theological Seminary.

It was in Cincinnati that Bailey became increasingly interested in the antislavery movement. He became an operator of the Underground Railroad, and served as corresponding secretary of the Ohio State Anti-Slavery Society. In 1836, Bailey became associate editor of James G. Birney's Philanthropist before becoming its editor the following year. In 1843, Bailey also started the daily newspaper, Cincinnati Morning Herald, which he ran for three years. As editor of Philanthropist, Bailey emerged as one of the country's dominant figures within the abolitionist movement and used the paper to promote his philosophy of using politics as a way to end slavery in the United States.

Bailey's efforts continued when he was selected by the nation's leading abolitionists to edit National Era, an antislavery newspaper based in Washington, D.C. Editing the paper from 1847 until his death, Bailey combined antislavery articles with popular literature, and made the Era one of the most important weeklies in the country. Notably, he published Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin in serial form in 1851-1852.

One of the founders of the Liberty Party, Bailey and his associate Salmon P. Chase later led the majority of Liberty Party voters into the Free Soil Coalition in 1848. Several years later in 1854, Bailey helped convince anti-Nebraska Whigs and Democrats to meet in common caucus during the struggle over the Kansas-Nebraska Bill, an event that contributed to the founding of the Republican Party.

By the late 1850s, Bailey was in poor health. He died on June 5, 1859, while on a voyage to Europe that had been meant to help with his recovery.